Year 9 Summit Camp

By Dakota, Leyah and India.

From Wednesday 4th August until Friday 6th August, students from the Year 9 cohort attended the ‘Summit Camp’ located in Trafalgar East. The activities at The Summit were: giant swing, team bush challenge, the cave, Laser Tag, Highwire, Abseiling and summit window, and the flying fox. Each of the activities was intended to incorporate some form of team building and to test your fears. With the giant swing, the team had to help and hoist their friends up to the top, and similarly the highwire required the team to keep their friends in the air by holding their rope and giving slack and tightening when needed. Other activities incorporated the team by bringing support: the cave, summit window and abseiling. The rest brought about teamwork literally by bringing us together as a team, like in the bush challenge which required us to do various tasks which lead us to a puzzle and laser tag. 

The camp was focused on pushing yourself, overcoming fears and learning how to work as a team. Support played a massive role in the mud run and communication between everyone was essential. On the first night, we all gathered together and did an activity about restricting and empowering thoughts. We then went on to write down an empowering thought on one side of a wooden board and a restricting one on the other. Then we lay it between concrete slabs and broke the boards in half with a sharp blow from our hands. That night was really special as everyone felt vulnerable yet safe because we all knew the people in the room held no judgement. It was really special to see everyone be so vulnerable and to even visually see how the things written on the board had such a tight hold on some people. The night got even more special when you got to see them let go and accept their empowering thought as well as the thought that everyone is there for each other. 

On day two we had the big monster course. This incorporated activities like crawling through mud pits with barbed wire, swimming over a net in the lake, pulling tires onto a sled and much more. Whilst each team completed the monster course, we had to carry three tires between the team and link hands or arms to each activity. You had to learn how to communicate well with your team and leave no one behind. It was a great challenge and tricky for some of us to overcome, but all-round great fun. Each group had to complete the course twice and at the end could go down a slide into the lake to rinse off.

My favourite activity was breaking the wood because it was a time where everyone’s guard went down, and it was a special moment to be able to feel so vulnerable yet safe because you were surrounded by all the people you trusted and by people who were also vulnerable. Everyone came together as a group and supported each other through every fear and physically and emotionally draining task. It was such a good camp and it’s amazing we were lucky enough to squeeze in camp in between lockdowns. I think lockdowns have challenged everyone and camp was a way to somewhat escape and have fun without fear of getting muddy. 

I thank Miss Greer, along with the leaders at Summit, so much for this opportunity. I wouldn’t say I overcame anything but I definitely pushed myself to do something that I didn’t necessarily want to. The cave challenge was really hard for me because I have massive claustrophobia which causes me to have panic attacks even when someone just mentions going to a mine or an underground cave. I pushed myself and went into the cave because I knew if Shay could overcome her fear of heights then I could at least face my claustrophobia.  Though I didn’t necessarily enjoy the experience I am still glad I did it.  I’m honestly grateful for the whole experience at camp. Three of my closest friends were terrified of some of the activities and even had panic attacks, but we all helped encourage and support one another. It was amazing.