Era: Prehistoric/Stone Age
Campers and counselors walk the grounds as dinosaurs, cavewomen and, in particular, the Flintstones. In Stone Age fashion, campers made Stepping Stones; they took wet circular slabs of gray, red, or brown concrete and decorated them with stones, small colored pebbles, shiny bottle-caps, seashells, and colored glass. These beautiful, one-of-a-kind pieces of stone-art now decorate the pathway of Erica’s Garden.
In addition, campers are now proud pet owners! Campers transformed small, black stones with metallic marker decorations and created their very own pet rocks.
In Caveman Storytelling, they rolled picture dice and wove together an original story with contributions related to the images. What does a kid playing baseball, a turtle in a fedora, prayer, medicine, Camp Simcha, dancing, and a megaphone have in common? One story went as follows: A man was driving when he ran over a turtle. Devastated, he rushed the turtle to the hospital to receive immediate care, but the terribly unlucky turtle was hit by a baseball. The man prayed intently for the welfare of the turtle. Soon after, the turtle was traveling past a stop-sign when he met his best friend: a caveman in a wheelchair. They went to Camp Simcha together, where they danced and had a huge celebration.
At the Archeological Dig, the campers once again displayed their creative flairs. They were presented with ancient artifacts recovered from an archeological dig right here at Camp Simcha: chess pieces, dinosaurs, pirates, and Silly Bands. From these relics, they pieced together history, and acted it out.
Once upon a time, a very long time ago, Camp Simcha was just a barren wasteland where dinosaurs roamed freely, until a band of pirates arrived and plotted to capture and kill the dinosaurs with their arsenal of Silly Bands. The pirates were wildly successful, and they celebrated their skill until they realized that with no more land to plunder or dinosaurs to trap…they were actually quite bored. So one pirate mastermind invented a new pastime, a game he called chess, which the pirates soon grew quite fond of and played every waking moment. And that is the real history of Camp Simcha. And chess.
-T
