I did it.  I am a survivor.  2 months, 8 weeks, 40 days, 310 hours, 18600 minutes or however many seconds of summer camp counselling and I still stand.  There were definitely some rough patches over the course of the past couple months.  Some challenging characters and situations.  But all in all I’d say it was rather successful. I also firmly believe that I am a better person for surviving it.  I definitely have a higher tolerance for small annoyances and am much more patient in dealing with them – oh! and I’m way better at track stalling on my bike.  Having kids constantly (and unexpectedly) falling off their bikes mid-trail keeps you on your toes, or pedals, if you’re good.

The past few weeks really blew by and the full sensation of being finished hasn’t really set in yet.  This might be because I still go to Hardwood every day for camp, a different kind of camp, a training camp this time.  Nonstop from one camp to another, keeping up the summer-long streak of being at Hardwood.  Yep, that’s right, haven’t missed a day since Canada Day (okay maybe one, but I still went roller skiing right past HW that day).  The camp runs until Wednesday and started yesterday afternoon.  We’ll be hosting a few athletes for the course of the camp: Julian, Avery, Erin and Sarah. They were quite a rowdy bunch after an evening of slack lining, unicycles, frisbees, a viewing of The Hunger Games and then a round or two of darts (lets just say we don’t have any sharp shooters).

Future circus performer

the real training starts here

Before the camp a couple guys, Ben and Jordan, came down early to do some mountain biking.  Despite spending everyday on the bike they still got me out to do some riding with them afterwards.  It was fun to actually ride consistently rather than the stop and go that comes with campers.  One thing I did find was that a summer of slow riding/walking kills your ability to ride with any fluidity.  I just felt super choppy and found riding quickly almost unnatural and foreign.  Riding off a bridge yesterday didn’t feel that natural either.  It was a good thing Ryan and I moved the barbed wire out off that section of trail Friday.  Otherwise I’d be quite a bit more battered than I already am.  Fear not though, I was in good enough shape to try unicycling on the slack line the same evening.

So I’m looking forward to the rest of the training camp. It’s great to have such a big group of people to train with and it’s nice to just see everyone again.  Now that I’ve got more time on my hands I’ll probably throw up an update whenever something entertaining happens.  And lets face it… With the guests I’m hosting and the kids at this camp, something interesting is bound to happen.

Jackson Out.