Camp Forest Kingdom III

Hiking to the camp

The summer camp in Chiprovtsi--the big project I've been working on with colleagues this summer--was great! 43 children, 5 PCVs, and 10 adults from the local community participated in the camp.

The Day Before…

T. and I went shopping in Sofia for last minute supplies the day before the camp while N. managed the set up of tents and tables at Pilatovets (the name of the camp area). Everything pictured in the garage (2 grills, 39 sleeping bags, sleeping mats, 50 t-shirts, etc.) we managed to fit in a 5 person Skoda…along with three people wearing seatbelts. It was impressive.

Aerial View from Tower

After unloading supplies, I met Neysa, Ben, Amy, and Joe at the bus stop. We made tofu pad thai and salad. It was great to have them here to help with the camp. Though there were lots of local volunteers and colleagues, they helped keep me not crazy. 

At 7 am, we headed to the Municipality to load the laska for its first trip to the camp site. Neysa and Joe stayed up at the top to help unload baggage and assemble the grills. Ben, Amy, and I hiked up with the 43 kids  and two colleagues. The rest of my colleagues and local volunteers were already at the camp. For breaks, we stopped to hang the new signs for the camp.

The kids were divided into 5 teams, each with a leader and assistant leader. Different colored bracelets identified teams. Leaders were chosen from participants in the 3-day leadership camp during the first week of August. In theory, leaders were responsible for keeping track of their teams, especially when it was their turn to serve a meal or gather everyone for a hike.  

After lunch, the teams competed in relay races. We tried to balance traditional relay races with ones geared for teambuilding. Different icebreakers, teambuilding, and relay race activities we used are here.

Narodna Topka, Jump Rope, Tug of war, and Frisbee Drunken Carrot worked best for free time games. So did French braiding, yoga, and variations on Charades. This website as a lot of play-acting games and other group activities for kids in Bulgarian:

Sessions on emergency first aid and camp fire safety were also held on the first day. Here is a link for fire safety in Bulgarian. 

After dinner, we made s’mores, assembly line style with the kids. Yulka, the chef of the camp, taught the kids folk songs and traditional games. At the end of the night, Ben brought out his guitar and sang. It was a very long, but lovely first day.

Hike to Gushovski Monastery. The kids took turns with 3 binoculars and I'd prepared a nature scavenger hunt (the one we used at Matt and Grant's camp in Belasitsa) and mountain herb identification cards. We didn't get to the scavenger hunt, but the herb identification activity worked well. 

The nurse who came on the hike turned out to be something of an expert on the plants and herbs in the Balkan mountains. She helped us find examples of pretty much everything in bloom. I used this website to find some of the common mountain herbs in Bulgaria and information on when they're in bloom, how to find them, and what to use them for. 

Seeing what we found on the herb list. The yellow flowers in the foreground are St. John's Wort. We also gathered Stinging Nettle, Wild Thyme,  Chicory, Coltsfoot, Yarrow, Blackberries, and some I can't translate. 

Other activities: Viktorina: 15 questions about Bulgaria—geography, history, etc.—with small prizes for the first correct answer. Swim in the river. Yoga using sleeping mats as yoga mats. This turned out to be way more popular than I'd expected. 

Treasure Hunt: Ben made 5 maps leading to the treasure. We hid them early in the morning. We had them staggered on opposite ends of the camp so with each map they had to run to the opposite end of the site. It worked okay except that the sheep dogs were out and some of the maps were hidden a little ways from camp. We ran ahead to make sure there weren’t any problems. There weren’t. 

The treasure was hidden at the end of the rock wall on the far end of camp. The rock wall is part of 2nd/3rd century ruins that are around the camp from Roman times. Hence the name: Children’s Forest Kingdom.

Campers with certificates

The mayor of the municipality handed out certificates to the kids and the local press took pictures and video. After lunch we hiked back to Chiprovtsi.

On the community forum, Tsveti posted some great pictures from day 2. I used a few in these posts. Here's the link to the  website.