Dan is having a great time in Colorado. We left on May 11 and arrived in Estes Park on May 12. We spent several days playing in the Rocky Mountains & Estes Park before dropping Dan off at the camp on Tuesday evening, May 16. Russ & Deb then went to South Dakota and played around Custer, Deadwood, Sturgis, Mt. Rushmore and the Bad Lands. The camp Dan is working at this summer is Cheley Colorado Camps & the website is:
http://www.cheley.com. His pre-camp work was finished on Wednesday. Thursday he had off & spent it fishing, hiking & sledding in the Mountains. Yesterday & today he has “Wilderness Training”. He has tomorrow off then his pre-camp training begins. The pre-camp work was only for a few counselors that wanted some extra $$ for coming early to work and the Wilderness Training is only for those who haven’t had it before & want to accompany the campers on over-night hikes. Next week the training is for all counselors so the remainder of the counselors should be arriving this weekend. There are over 200 counselors from all over the country. We met about a half dozen boys Dan’s age when we dropped him off and none of them were from Colorado. Memorial weekend Dan had Sunday & Monday off. Sunday he scheduled a 6 hour fly fishing guide & he caught a lot & learned a lot. After fishing he & 3 other guys attempted to climb Longs Peak – the highest in Colorado at over 14,000 feet. They planned to climb to a certain level, pitch the tents, then climb the rest of the way on Monday. Climbers have to be back below the tree line before 1:30 pm because of lightening strikes. They weren’t able to get as far as they wanted on Sunday to pitch the tents because of a blizzard with over 60 mile per hour winds and temps below 0. Dan did climb about 6.5 miles of the 7.5 mile hike when he & Cecil decided that was as far as they wanted to go. They were the 2 beginner hikers – the other 2 were more experienced. Dan & Cecil played on the snow & ice & waited for the other two to return. Dan said it was “an experience”. The campers arrive on June 14. Dan loves being there – he misses Jackie but he said he is able to talk with her on the phone more than he thought he would since his phone doesn’t work at the camp. Camp is only 4 miles from Estes Park where his phone works great. A few pictures of our trip to Colorado, South Dakota and Dan’s fishing & hiking experience have been added.
