In this recap I want to focus on friendships at camp. Seeing new friendships form, grow and continue for years has easily been my favorite part of running Water Monkey. So many of our campers have made friends here at camp and then brought those relationships back home by meeting up during the year (even flying and visiting each other as far as Europe from the U.S.), coordinating vacations together, going to the same college together and keeping in constant contact via social media.
On the first day at camp most of us are strangers. After seven days together on the boats, at meals, playing sports and having fun it can be difficult to say goodbye. I always knew that Water Monkey would be a special place where like-minded campers and staff would meet and get to know each other but I guess the extent to which it has surpassed my expectations is a testament to how unique our camp program is.
Water Monkey Camp as a whole is truly greater than the sum of its parts...you can buy yourself an epic boat and some gear and spend a week out on the lake but you’ll me missing a bit of magic that happens here each summer.
Now some fun 2018 stats!
126 campers over 7 weeks!
Campers stayed an average of 1.21 weeks at camp (longest stay by any camper was 4 weeks by Stan tha man)
Average number of campers per week was 18 (we limited each week this summer to 18 campers and were full every week)
Campers were 68% boys and 32% girls
Average camper age was 13.9
57.9% of campers were returners, 42.1% were first timers
Campers came from 15 states (CO, CT, DC, GA, IL, MA, ME, MT, NH, NJ, NY, PA, RI, VA and VT) as well as Canada, China, France and Italy!
2,055 gourmet meals prepared and served by amazing Chef Rebecca
400 pounds of food scraps and waste diverted from the landfill to local hungry pigs!
10,804 unique visitors to watermonkeycamp.com in the past 12 months
10,363 photos uploaded for parents and campers to enjoy
3 baby loons on the lake
1 Taylor Swift concert at Gillette Stadium
Infinite smiles, laughs and good times
Average water temperature during camp was 78 degrees
Merrymeeting Lake is 1,100 acres and the cleanest lake in New Hampshire
24 hours spent cleaning boat insides during the season and 20 hours spent washing and waxing the outsides
254 hours on the Calypso Green MasterCraft NXT22 and 234 hours on the Jetstream Blue MasterCraft NXT22 for a total of 488 hours of boating this season!
2,800 gallons of gas consumed on the lake producing roughly 25 metric tons of CO2 offsett with contributions to cooleffect.org (specifically the Alto Mayo Conservation Initiative) as well as the Southeast Land Trust of New Hampshire who, along with many Merrymeeting Residents and the US Forest Service, is attempting to raise $1,500,000 preserve 2,000 acres of forest surrounding our perfect lake. Our total contributions will offset about 50 metric tons of CO2 this year with the extra going towards camper travel to/from camp.
