Monthly Archives: August 2012

Activities, Events, Summer Camp

Olympic Excitement Comes To Qwanoes!

Juniors #3 On Now – Then… Youth Camp!

Emily Zurrer holding an autographed Qwanoes "LiftOff" shirt (the theme her last year as a camper).

Today is the last full day of Juniors #3 and what an amazing week it has been! Right from the start we could see that this group of campers was extra-excited about pretty much everything. We are thankful for each and every camper that is here with us! This week has been filled with all the activities, adventure, firesides, surprises, and everything else that make a week at Qwanoes so much fun. And while all the fun is happening, lots of new friendships are being made and everyone is being challenged to live life to the full here, but also in their everyday lives! See photos of the week so far.

Youth Camp 2012 is now just two days away! We have been planning for Youth Camp for months now and can hardly wait to live it up with hundreds of senior high youth next week. It’s hard to see summer coming to an end, but it’s NOT OVER YET and Youth Camp is a pretty incredible “final act” to the summer!

Emily about to speak to campers and staff at the qrok Tower.

You Just Never Know Who’ll Drop In At Tucktime!

Yesterday afternoon, a very special guest visited Qwanoes  – causing a huge amount of excitement! Emily Zurrer, former Qwanoes camper and member of the Canadian women’s soccer team that just won Olympic Bronze, was here during tucktime!

Signing lots of autographs!

Emily was swarmed by campers AND staff  – and took it all in stride. She signed tons of autographs, posed for many pictures, spoke some encouraging words to campers and staff at the qrokTower, passed around her Bronze medal, and even had time for a quick tour around the camp.

She loved seeing some of the new activities and facilities that have been added since she was last at Qwanoes like the SkyScraper and Elevator in the Challenge Course, the concrete Skate Park, the greatly-expanded Aqua-Park and Paddle Surfing at Qwanoes Beach, Shave Ice Palace, the Q-Town Activity Centre, and the Pacific Woods Lodge.

Holding the Bronze medal!

Emily was very kind and gracious to everyone, even when some campers tried to attack her with a water blaster a couple of times during her visit!

Here’s some of what Emily had to say to us at the qrok Tower: “It’s so cool to be back and to see all you guys… I just want to encourage you all to never give up on your dreams no matter what…. Have fun at camp – this is amazing – you guys are so lucky to be here… I wish I could come back as a camper and go on the Blob and do all the fun stuff you guys get to do!”

Emily with staff from when she was a camper!

It was great to have Emily back here for the first time since she was a camper! And many of us here held an Olympic medal for the very first time ever!!

To hear Emily talking to us and to catch a glimpse of all the excitement for yourself, click the play button on the video below – “Emily Zurrer At Qwanoes!”

 

~ Written by Julie Bayley (Qwanoes’ Associate Program Director)

 

 

Activities, Events, Q-Town & Music, Social Media, Summer Camp

Action Here & Far Away

Jr. High #4 Cruising Right Along

We’ve been having a great week here at Qwanoes with Jr. High #4 on right now! Right now, tuck time is beginning and campers and counselors are gathering together on the field. Tunes are blasting from the qrok Tower and it’s time to hang out together on the main field! The weather was perfect this morning for “Wide Eyed & Liquified” – our wettest game of the week – and for going down our giant wet and sudsy water slide “Big Blue.”

Love this perfect summer weather!

More Sunny, Warm Days Ahead

Speaking of weather… the weather forecast at Camp Qwanoes is for just about perfect summer weather for the rest of Jr. High #4, all of Jr. High #5, and even into Juniors #3!

As many of you who live on Vancouver Island and in Greater Vancouver already know, we all experienced a huge electrical storm on Tuesday evening. At one point, part of this storm passed directly over Camp Qwanoes causing quite a bit of excitement. This happened right as the camp was enjoying “It’s Your Turn,” a time when each cabin group gets free time to do something fun together. As the storm got closer, the field was filled with people playing games and having a great time.

Everyone was evacuated safely to the cabins and buildings and no one was hurt. For many of us, the loudest crash of thunder we have ever heard occurred right after a lightning strike very close to the Pacific Woods Lodge!

Even our food services staff are in the spirit of the Olympics... see the message in the jello!

Victory For Canada! 

This morning, many of us were very excited to hear about Canada’s victory over France in the Bronze medal game in women’s soccer at the 2012 Olympics! Former Qwanoes camper Emily Zurrer is on the team and although she has been sidelined with an injury, she has been right there part of all the action.

Last week during Juniors #2, we showed a video from Emily in Q-Town talking about the buildup to the Olympics and sharing encouragement with all the campers and staff.  Since Canada was playing Great Britain the next day in the quarter-final, we sent Emily a new video of all of us cheering on Canada.

Our tweet to Emily before the game vs. Great Britain

After Canada won the game against Great Britain, Emily sent us a new video to thank us for our support and some of her teammates got in on this too! We showed this video in the first Q-Town at Jr. High #4. In the video Emily said, “We just want to say… a huge thank you for the video. You guys are awesome. It pumped our team up!”

Canadian goalkeeper Karina LeBlanc went on to say, “Hi Camp Qwanoes! We just want to thank you for the amazing video… we love you.” They said they hoped to make us proud and they sure did with their solid performance against the United States in the semi-final – followed by the huge win today against France!

See “‘Go Canada Go’ In Q-Town”:

See last week’s blog post Go Canada Go!  to see the first video we sent Emily.

Back to Jr. High #4… Looking forward to Q-Town and the Surf-O-Rama concert tonight, more activities and competitions like the Skate Comp tomorrow, plus everything else that happens on a Qwanoes day!

~Written by Julie Bayley, Qwanoes’ Associate Program Director

 

 

Activities, Camp Staff, Events, Q-Town & Music, Summer Camp

Go Canada Go!

An Exciting, Action-Packed Week

Today, Juniors #2 is coming to an end and it has been an exciting, action-packed week.

Each day has included things like… daring to go off the Screamer, aiming for the target in archery, racing RC cars at the Qwanoes RC Speedway, playing with new friends in the Aqua-Park, creating something in Artrageous Crafts, trying out fun challenges at the Surf-O-Rama carnival, sliding down our giant wet and slippery slide called “Big Blue,” hanging out with caring counselors and staff, singing with our band Quixotic in Q-Town, listening to the week’s speaker Mark Batten (from Calvary Christian Church in Surrey), and so much more.

See photos of Juniors #2 here.

We look forward to welcoming our Jr. High #4 campers on Sunday, as well as having our CIT #2 (Counselor-In-Training) program begin!

Camp Qwanoes Cheering For Canada

On our camp picture day this week, we decided to send a huge message of support to former Qwanoes camper Emily Zurrer (on the Canadian women’s soccer team) and the entire Canadian Olympic team in London. Hundreds of campers and staff gathered on the grass in front of Club Coco. We got out our giant Canada flag, put on some Canada clothing, and went a bit crazy cheering for Canada. Who knows? Maybe a future Olympian is in this group of 8 to 11 year-old campers!

An International Olympics Celebration At Qwanoes

What do the Olympics and Qwanoes have in common? Both bring people from many different countries together! After cheering for Canada, everyone at Juniors #2 had the chance to watch as staff and campers from different countries got up in front of the group and sent messages of support to their own Olympic teams. It is very exciting to see how Qwanoes staff come from so many different backgrounds and parts of the world and unite together for the purpose of loving kids to life!

Staff from Great Britain

Countries represented on our staff team this summer include New Zealand, Australia, Scotland, England, Northern Ireland, France, Switzerland, Brazil, Colombia, the United States, and of course Canada.

Hear what some of our international staff have to say about being at Qwanoes…

“It doesn’t matter where we are from… we are one big family… it’s good to be here.” – Sabrina from Brazil

“I’m a ‘go big or go home’ kind of guy which is why I have come to Qwanoes for 7 years and I’m not stopping!”– Byron from USA

Staff from Brazil

“There is nothing quite like this in Scotland… It’s so cool to get to know people from all over the world. Canadians are very enthusiastic.” – Fiona from Scotland

“Always wanted to do summer camp! And we don’t have camps like Qwanoes in Australia. We do a lot more here at Qwanoes than camps back home. We make the experience the best ever for kids so that they will never forget! With lots of purpose every week. We put maple syrup on everything! Drive on the wrong side of the road! The Qwanoes yellow buses are amazing. Canadians are super friendly and genuine.” – Steph from Australia

Our Aussie & Kiwi staff having some fun!

“Love the people, they are amazing…”– Miles from New Zealand

“I love the landscape here, the nature, forest, the ocean, people are so friendly…” – Christophe from France

Click the play button below to see and hear international staff and campers cheer for their countries!

~ Written by Julie Bayley (Qwanoes’ Associate Program Director)