Photo Credit: Camp Sava
WOW was a wonderful experience, and Bear Camp was a great part of it – tenting, swimming in the river, visiting a school on top of a mountain, Himalayan river walk, s’mores and making natural art. The first day we arrived at Bear Camp we sat down under an open tent, drank some juice and were introduced to Simon and TB,our camp guides.
The activities started the morning we arrived, we walked about a kilometer to a bridge and waited and waited and waited until we had lunch…while waiting for the life jackets. At last the life jackets arrived, where they were dropped from the bridge to the river.
Photo Credit: Camp Sava
Photo Credit: Camp Sava
Photo Credit: Camp Sava
Once we got our hands on them, we couldn’t wait to get into the water. We had fun playing for about 30 minutes until we were told to make natural art, which was actually pretty fun. But then we got to swim again.
Our short walk back was really not eventful. When we arrived at camp we got changed, and then Simon taught us how set up our tents properly. Once the demo was over it was down to the big question: who will be our tent mates?
The teachers unsurprisingly had said that our groups had to meet a set of standards: Each tent must have students from three different countries. Each tent group must have at least two different languages spoken. Tent groups cannot be with anyone from the same room at camp Panther.
After these standards were met we went on setting up our tent. Most of the students had no problem, but our tent wasn’t so easy because our tent was different than the other.
By then it was already tea time. During tea time we could play a bunch of sports or sit under the open tent and read. As tea time finished, we ended daylight by doing yoga on three big carpets. About 15 minutes after we started yoga we ended it. Next straight to the dining tent.
Dinner was pretty good, at the dining tent we met Billy the Cat. A few kids threw sausages at Billy, which he liked, as we slowly finished eating our dinner
It was finally time to head down to the campfire. As we sat around the burning campfire, the daughter of the owner of Snow Leopard adventures came to tell us a really scary story about a couple and a mad man. WOW, that story was scary. The best part about the campfire was the s’mores, mmmmmmm. If you got your marshmallow just right, you really had a nice treat.
Sleeping was not the best. It would have been great if wasn’t so cold. By the way, trying to sneak out was no use, because there was a teacher always keeping watch. In the morning, we woke up to the wonderful breeze and sight of the Rishikesh mountains. There was tea and biscuits in the morning, then a briefing from the teachers followed by getting our bags packed and breakfast. Nothing is better than a hot meal on a cold morning.
When we were all ready, we got started on the hike with our guides. Before we got going, we all went to the bathroom. The bathrooms were not what we are used to in Delhi, they were in a very small tent, with a hole in the ground and a toilet seat. Next to the hole was a bucket of sand. Once we got used to it, it was actually not that bad. On the hike we got to learn the true meaning of dead legs, but it was totally worth the best view and experience of WOW. At the end of the hike was one of the the best things ever, a natural waterfall – cold but amazing.
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