Guest Blogger Windsor recently shared her take on cabin life at Camp ASCCA. While we are all sad about not being able to be together this summer, we couldn’t miss this opportunity to highlight the cabin experience.
From Whoville to Candyland, cabin life is fun and games.
When you arrive at Camp ASCCA, you are given your assigned cabin by counselors who greet you in the parking lot with a lanyard to wear that has your name and the names of your counselor and cabin on it. After signing in, you meet your counselor, who takes your bags to your cabin and places them under the bed picked out for you. Your counselor will ask which sheets they have that you would like for your bed and then makes your bed for you. The rest of the first day you can acclimate to cabin life and start to get to know your bunkmates.
The boy cabins are along the left side, and the girl cabins are along another path on the right. Each cabin is named for Native Americans in Alabama. For example, you may be assigned to the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Creek or Moundville cabin. The first summer I was assigned to Cherokee, and the second summer I stayed in the Moundville cabin. Each cabin has a special chant, which we sing and shout loud and proud as we leave each morning to start the activities for the day. The chants are always short and catchy, so yours will be easy to memorize.
The cabins are decorated with various themes. The cabin in my first camp had Dr. Seuss phrases and characters all over the place! My nickname then was Beach Bunny because I always dressed in shorts and tank tops as if I were going to the beach. During my second summer camp, the cabin I stayed in had a Candyland theme. It was decorated with colorful candy cutouts and clever candy phrases, and each camper got a candy nickname. Mine was Spearmint. One girl was named Katherine, so her nickname was Kit-Kat. She was so lucky to get that name! That’s one of my favorite candy bars!
Each cabin typically has 10 campers and eight summer staffers made up of counselors and program staff members. The cabin is huge, and the bunks go out from the center like the spokes of a bicycle wheel. You will be assigned a bottom bunk, and your counselor will be nearby in case you need him or her in the night.
Only staff use phones and other electronics, not the campers, but you will have loads of fun and won’t need any electronics. Even on a rainy afternoon, in the cabin you can draw pictures and color in the coloring books. You can listen to music with your bunkmates, too. There are also various card games like “Go Fish” and others. Of course, you can always talk with your bunkmates.
Each camper in your cabin has different abilities. You will have the opportunity to learn new things about everyone in your cabin. Mark Twain said, “There is no such thing as an uninteresting life, such a thing is an impossibility. Beneath the dullest exterior, there is a drama, a comedy, a tragedy.” So do not be shy to ask about someone’s life and be sure to share your own story!
Cabin life at Camp ASCCA offers rest, relaxation and time to get to know a few of your fellow campers a little better.
Located in Alabama on Lake Martin, Camp ASCCA offers campers a wide variety of traditional recreational and educational activities with a unique design for accessibility.
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