Down time

I'm sitting down by the lake. It's 8.30pm and the sun is just setting. It's a full camp activity tonight. The whole camp is playing counsellor hide and seek. Basically, all the counsellors hide throughout the camp property with little chips that have our camp names written on them. The campers are divided into teams and have to search the camp property to find us counsellors. When they do find us, they get one of our chips. Apparently, the counsellors are all worth different points and at the end they hand in their chips which are tallied up to figure out the winning team.
It's definitely my favorite camp activity as it's pretty much the only time that I get to be by myself (besides sleeping) and just chill out and listen to music (thank god for the ipod). I picked the perfect hiding spot, right on the edge of the lakeside bank under a wee bush. Got some good snaps of the sun setting and had some time to get in a cheeky blog post.

Batter up

Last week we had the most retarded (no offense to them) kids here for camp. They were little devil children and by the end of the week all the counsellors were ready to slap them (they have definitely made me not want children for a very long time). But Friday afternoon finally came and there parents arrived to take them far far away from us and hopefully, they will never return. Then we jumped in the camp people mover and rode straight to Dallas, with a quick stop at Walmart to purchase a well needed bottle of vino each...And boy was it satisfying.

I stayed with a few other international counsellors at one of the American counsellors grandparents ranch. It was super cute and very very Texas. We headed straight for the hot tub when we arrived with vino bottles in hand.

On saturday afternoon we went to the Texas rangers baseball game. It was so ridiculously hot. I was literally sticking to my seat it was that bad.

First, we went to the most amazing mexican restaurant for lunch. We ordered Margarita's and they were potent as but delicious. Then I had the best quesadilla available to man kind!

The baseball was so much fun. We didn't have the best seats but we were all together in a big group with our camp staff and our sister horse camp's staff who we did staff training with. The stadium was giant and we ended up just walking around for a wee while and also sat in an Irish bar for a bit (it had air-conditioning and vodka...) and of course we watched the game too. After the game we went back to the ranch and got a grand tour of the property on the back of the pickup with the dog Libby. It was such a beautiful night and a good way to end a fun day out.

Tomorrow we have horses coming out to our camp for the day. I haven't rode a horse since intermediate school so this could be an interesting experience. I'm sure the kids will be able to teach me some skills this time around.

This week has been the hottest week yet with temperatures over 40degrees every day. Its great for tanning but not so good for sweating/personal hygiene haha.

And the most exciting news I have yet.... I'm going to see Celine Dion live in Vegas! Bought my ticket last night so am still super excited. I'm going with a friend from camp and a few of her friends from home. We are staying at the MGM grand hotel for 4 nights, which surprisingly works out pretty cheap for such luxury :D

Roller-coasters, reptiles and little rascals

Our week long camp training finally came to an end and before we knew it, our first group of little darlings had arrived. I guess all the laxing in the sun, eating cinnabuns (amazing) and listening/not really listening to our camp director and admin staff talk about what to expect when the kids arrive, had to come to an end at some point. But before the real work begun, we were sent off to Six Flags Over Texas theme park for a day of riding Roller-coasters, sweating profusely and a lot of staff bonding. It was awesome. My favorite ride was the superman. Kinda like the fear fall at rainbows end but way higher/better. We were there from around 10am till 9pm and I think I went on every ride apart from 1 or 2...maybe 3. It was the perfect way to end staff training.

Sunday afternoon was when our first group of kids arrived. They were an awesome group and mostly were well behaved. I'm a unit leader so I'm in charge of a number of cabins and counsellors who all have there own assigned cabins to look after, which makes up 1 unit (my unit is called frog). Basically I'm in charge of making sure our unit and all our scheduled activities runs smoothly and liaising with the admin staff and camp director. And i get my own walkie talkie... O yea haha. But I also get to do all the activities with the kids like kayaking,swimming, archery, tie dye, nature hikes and lots of crafts!

Camp food is actually amazing as well, which I did not expect at all. We get two different options (both of which are always delicious and the decision is always a hard one) and then there is always the most amazing salad bar, so at least I'm still eating my greens. In the mornings the salad bar is like a fruit bar with lots of melon and other delicious fruits which I always get amongst. It's hell luxury compared to uni hostel food haha. Probably gonna come home a huge fattie though. On Wednesday night we do a cook out with the kids where they cook a 3course meal on a camp fire. Sounds hard but it's actually not too bad. It takes ages though. We have to start around 4 and don't eat till 6.30ish. And then there's s'mores aka the best thing ever created. It's 2 wheat biscuits with toasted marshmallows and Hershey's chocolate mmmmmmm. That's probably enough chat on food for now......

This weeks theme was a lot to do with nature and the environment so we had a nature specialist come in and talk to the kids and she bought some of her pets. And by pets I mean reptiles. The turtle was my fav but there was also a few others including an iguana and a snake ekk. Got up close to them all which was freaky as, especially the snake!

The week is almost over now yay and the kids get picked up tomorrow afternoon. We are going into Dallas for the weekend to stay with host families. I'm am so looking forward to a proper bed and a decent shower (and not getting woken up by kids in the middle of the night). The camp has planned for us to go to an outdoor movie on Friday night and then hitting up a huge mall on Saturday woohoo cannot wait. All us international staff have planned a trip to Austin for the 4th of July holiday which I am so excited about. We got return bus tickets for $2.00 and accommodation at a hotel for $12.00 each a night. America is so cheap and I love it! So we are all counting down the days till we can let loose and party :D

I survived a week in Texas (y'all)

So it's been almost a week since I officially arrived in Texas. It has been a very long and intense week but it has so far been amazing!

I arrived late Saturday afternoon and the outdoor education manager picked me and another girl who arrived from australia up from the airport. We then got taken out for dinner to a place called Applebee's. Well that was an experience in itself. It was your typical american Texas restaurant. I ordered 'chicken fried chicken' and asked for an oj but was told that they only have juice boxes for kids... So instead I got a huge Pepsi. My meal came out and it pretty much could have fed all of brangelina's kids but it was pretty tasty.

For the first few days we stayed at one of the girl scouts camps that was close to the airport as there were people arriving from overseas over 3 days. So we just kinda chilled there and ate a shitload of American packaged food. My first morning there was a scorpion in the hand sink in the bathroom. The bugs are shit but everything else is wicked (some of the food is a bit shit and all the texans keep saying how healthy we are because we actually eat fruit and vegetables)

Then on Monday all the internationals had arrived so we moved to our camp which is like an hour and a half outa Dallas. Pretty much as soon as we got there we had to start lifeguard training which we literally only just finished now (it's 10.30 on Friday evening) so that has consumed our week. We didn't really have much spare time as the days have been so packed with either practical or written training. We did get to go to Walmart twice and we had Wendy's and chick-fil-a for lunch. We spent 2 full days at the local pool learning all the rescue skills, 2 full day in the classroom learning CPR and first aid and all that jazz and then yesterday we spent a day at the lake learning more stuff and practicing with the kayaks and canoes which was super fun. We also had to sit like 5 written tests and 2practical which was a tad scary but I passed all of them yay. So now I'm officially an American lifeguard.

Now we have a week of staff training and then on the 10th we get our first bunch of kids. It feels like I have been here for so much longer than a week it's crazy.

All us lifeguards seem to be getting on really well which is great and today we meet the rest of the counsellors and staff which will be interesting but hopefully good. Next weekend we get to go to 6 flags over Texas which is a theme park so I'm super excited about that.

The weather here is pretty random like we have already had 3 storms with thunder and lightning but it's only been at night. In the day time it's been fricken hot like around 29/30 degrees and it's super humid and will only get hotter. I think I've already started getting a tan so I'm pretty chuffed about that.

Not sure if I'll have wifi this week as we are shifting to our first camp and then come back to the one that I'm at at the mo at the beginning of July. But hopefully I will beable to post something again soon for y'all (hehe)