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We are excited to announce the itinerary for the 2010 Teen Adventure Trip.  This program is for all of you campers and prospective campers who are too old to come to Birch Hill but still too young to apply to be a counselor (16-17).  We assembled this itinerary through countless days of first-hand research and countless years of New England adventure experience.  Feel free to call, e-mail, or stop by camp to enroll or find out more!

2010 Teen Adventure Program Itinerary

• Day 1 (Sunday) - Participants meet at Camp Birch Hill for an inventory of equipment and a pre-trip meeting.  Once packed up and ready, the group will depart for Acadia National Park (the only National Park in new England) where they will camp out for the night.  That night they will have fun around the campfire and prepare for the first adventure.
• Day 2 (Monday) - The group will leave the campsite bright and early to do a half day of kayaking off the shore of Bar Harbor (http://www.acadiafun.com/).  This trip is led by an experienced guide who takes the group to some fun spots around the coast where participants get to explore some rocky islands, look for seals and other wildlife, and try to avoid tipping over in the kayak.  For a few hours after the trip the group gets to explore Bar Harbor, which is full of cool local stores, ice-cream shops, restaurants, and fun people.  The day is rounded out back at the campsite where we have our first of many leadership exercises.
• Day 3 (Tuesday) - Another early morning as the group heads to my favorite hike/climb in Acadia.  It is called the Beehive and it starts out as a nice, calm, wooded path and finishes with a scramble up rock cliffs with iron hand and foot-holds sunken directly into the stone.  The views from the top are staggering and everyone will certainly feel accomplished after the strenuous climb.  As a reward, the entire group then goes to The Jordan Pond House (http://www.jordanpond.com/) for a luxurious lunch around the stunning pond.  There is an optional two or three mile walk around the pond which everyone usually takes part in where we have seen deer, moose, and other wildlife in the past.  That afternoon we then go over to Echo Lake for some swimming and lounging by the crystal clear water.  Back to the campsite for the evening.
• Day 4 (Wednesday) - Participants get to sleep in a bit and leisurely pack up the campsite.  We load into the van and head to the Penobscot outdoor center in Maine.  That afternoon is spent working on teamwork and leadership as we set up camp once again.
• Day 5 (Thursday) - Rise at the crack of dawn to raft the Penobscot River (http://www.northernoutdoors.com/site/rafting/penobscot_river.html).  This is not the river we take our campers to each session as the minimum age to raft is 15 years old.  The class four and five rapids are challenging and it is not uncommon to see rafts flip or spill their contents into the whitewater.  No worries, though, we use the most respected rafting outfit in Maine for this adventure and they take safety seriously.  In previous runs of the Penobscot we have seen Bald Eagles and moose.  After rafting the group packs up the van and heads back to Camp Birch Hill to spend the night.
• Day 6 (Friday) - Nothing really beats Hampton Beach in the summer; except mixing in some Deep Sea Fishing as well.  The group will head out to Hampton and hop on a fishing charter (http://www.algauron.com/) for a half-day of fighting the mighty bluefish off the coast of NH.  Following the fishing, the group spends the hottest hours of the day taking in rays on the beach and then heads back to camp.  We then take our catch from the day (over 90 pounds last time) and make home-made fish ‘n chips for the group.  That night the participants get to take part in the camp social and spend the night in a cabin.
• Day 7 (Saturday) - The group will spend the entire day out on Merrymeeting Lake waterskiing, wakeboarding, tubing, and having fun.  Our professional wakeboarding instructor will be present to give everyone tips and most definitely put on a show.  Back to camp for the night to prepare for the next departure.
• Day 8 (Sunday) - Participants will enjoy breakfast at camp before heading off to Mt. Washington where we will take the cog railway (http://www.thecog.com/) to the summit.  After an hour or so of taking in the views the group will head back down to North Conway to explore the adventure nerve-center of New Hampshire.  They will camp out at the base of the mountain that night.
• Day 9 (Monday) - It is alpine day for the participants.  They will take a ride down the ridiculously fast alpine slide at Attitash (http://www.attitash.com/alpineslide.html), play alpine disc-golf at Wildcat, and do some downhill mountain biking at the mountains as well.  They will camp out again that night at one of the fun camp grounds in the area.
• Day 10 (Tuesday) - The group will drive over to Newfound Lake to swim in the cleanest body of water in New Hampshire.  During the day they will make a quick trip over to Painted Rocks for some supervised and safe cliff-jumping.  As the sun starts to go down we will take the group to Cardigan Mountain where we will camp for the night.  That night we will ascend half-way up the mountain with only our headlamps for a night sensory walk.  I promise that participants will be talking about this for years to come.
• Day 11 (Wednesday) - The group will summit Cardigan Mountain and descend through the “Cathedral Forest,” which is a very cool trail with some natural water slides and rivers to cross.  After the hike it is back to camp once again!
• Day 12 (Thursday) - For the final day of adventure the group will travel to Nashua, NH for some indoor skydiving (http://www.skyventurenh.com/) followed by more time at the beach to relax and unwind.
• Day 13 (Friday) - While the Birch Hill facilitators assemble a DVD of the two weeks of pictures for each participant, the group will help run camp’s Carnival Day for the campers and get to talk with the counselors about their experiences and advice about being a counselor.
• Day 14 (Saturday) - Everyone departs from Birch Hill to go home and collapse for a few days of recovery.

There are many pieces of machinery at Camp Birch Hill which make the summer camp possible each year.  Towards the top of the list would be the camp van (brand new one for this summer), the Gator, our new wakeboarding/waterskiing boat, our walk-in fridge and freezer, and the John Deere 4200 tractor.  Superior to all of these, however, is the General, our dump truck.

The General is really an ‘85 Ford F350 dump truck with so many miles that the odometer long ago stopped recording them.  The signals intermittently function, you have to kick the hydraulic lever to get the back to raise, only one windshield wiper works (“works” is a loose term for how it actually performs, the wiper really only does its job if you chant a special windshield wiper song while pushing and pulling on the button), and there is a giant hole in the floorboard which I now affectionately refer to as my air conditioning, as it provides a nice breeze from below whereas previously the truck had no vents.  (Note to parents: campers never get an opportunity to ride in or near the General, only my safety is ever at risk!)

The most obvious and essential task which the General performs is the carting away of all of the trash and recycling generated by our summer population of 225 to 250 campers and staff on any given day.  It is amazing how much refuse can be created each day by our hordes and the variety it comes in is also staggering.  Trash-collecting does happen to be one of my favorite things to do during the summer.  We pump some country beats and drive the General from cabin to cabin, rec hall to cafe, waterfront to Lodge, all before the campers wake up for breakfast.  It does get dirty – I have often thought about submitting my job to Mike Rowe at the Discovery Channel for an episode of Dirty Jobs – but nothing that a good pair of work gloves and some overalls can’t protect you from.

Next to trash removal, the General’s second function is to make yard-work and maintenance much easier.  Every fall and spring we spend months raking our vast property of millions, if not billions, of pine needles, which all get driven to the local transfer station.  Last spring we took three trips per day, four times per week, from late April through early June.  In 2008 when the ice storm took out most of New England we made over 20 trips to the dump with the General full of recently felled tree limbs (picture below).

Rich, Joe, and I putting the finishing touches on a load of pine limbs.

This year, however, the General has had a rough time.  First Rich accidentally took out one of the side walls by reversing into a metal dumpster.  Next, we were moving some large rocks from the counselor parking lot and may have overloaded the General, causing a few joints in the lifting mechanism to break.  At some point, whatever balances out the two sides of the truck broke and the entire bed nearly fell off while we were trying to dump a load of debris.  We decided it was finally time for the General to see the doctor.

Above is a picture of the General in its current state, disassembled in the auto mechanic’s yard.  Bobby, our mechanic, has time and again proven himself in being able to fix whatever we throw at him so I have 100% confidence that the General will be back in time for spring cleanup.

The frame has definitely looked better.

As you can see from the above picture, though, Bobby has his work cut out for him.  I will hopefully have some pictures of the General looking fresh and all fixed up by the end of this month so check back for updates!