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On Wednesday 11th
March 2009, my brother, my mum and I drove our maroon commodore down
to the back gate and got my name marked off.
After a little wait
for everyone to arrive, we were finally allowed to go on the bus.
Once everyone had settled down we left the school to go to Kangaroo
Point. It felt like a minute second and we were already down at the
wharf. Ms Giblin said that we might have been given an extra long
ride around the Hawkesbury River but the ferry came just on schedule
so it was still a 20 minute ride. I was sitting next to Claire, but
neither of us could work out which island was Milson Island until we
actually saw a sign with the name on it.
Once we had arrived
on hard ground, we walked over to the tent for an information talk
about the island. Whilst we were being talked to the tractor took
everyone’s bags up to the assembling area. Whilst we were waiting
for the other school to arrive (St Johns), we went to the free time
area and had a short play. In the free time area I played on the
equipment and watched Emily and Jess .B practise gymnastics. Once St
Johns had arrived at the island every one of us assembled at the
assembly area to find out what cabin we were going to stay in. I was
called out to stay in the units. When everyone in the units came up
to Mrs Zifkin, we walked down to them. I was in unit 2a in the
bunkroom with Fizzy, Bonnie and Jess. It felt like I was in a 5star
resort because we had everything that we could wish for in our unit.
After about an hour
of organising we strolled up to the dining room for our delicious
lunch. For lunch I had wraps with mince, sour cream, and salad.
After having a good feed we got into our groups I was in red group)
and wandered to our afternoon activities. Mick was our instructor
and he was quite funny to. Our activities for the afternoon were
orienteering and archery. First was orienteering and Mick had to get
something for it. While he was out we had to form groups of 6 or 7.
My group was Maya, Jess, Justin, Luke, Dilusha, Dylan and I. With
orienteering we had to collect a map and walk to the places on the
map that had numbers we had to find a letter. When we’d found all of
the letters we had to put them together to make a combination of
words having something to do with the island.
When everyone had
finished searching their maps we ate afternoon tea. After the apples
and oranges we walked down to archery range to do archery. Mick
showed us how to shoot the arrow and told us all the safety about
archery. Now that he had finished talking, he put us into three
different groups. He called out for group one to have a try, then
two, then three that was my group. I got nothing at first but after
a couple of tries I shot the target!
It was time to
finish the archery activity so we walked back up the hill to the
assembly area to get called up for our roast dinner in the dining
hall. For dessert that night we had peaches and ice cream in a
plastic wrapper. After dinner our school went to the huge grass area
to play many really fun games. One of them required us to run with
our hands in the sky above our head and scream. You had to stop
running when either you dropped your hands or stopped screaming to
take another breath. After having a great time a great time playing
the games we all went to the dining hall for supper. Supper was cold
chocolate milk and a biscuit. We wandered back down to our units and
got ready for bed. Once we were snug we talked for a while then fell
asleep.
When we’d all woken
up from our big day before we found Mrs Zifkin outside of our door
telling us to be walking up to the assembly area in ten minutes.
That caused a big hurry up. Once we’d followed our feet up to the
meeting place we sat in a straight line ready to be invited to
breakfast. When everyone was in the hall we ate toast, cereal and
yoghurt for breakfast. After breakfast we started our morning
activity. My group’s activity was abseiling. We found our way down
the long path to the riverside where the abseiling cliff was. I was
the fourth person to go down. It was really scary for me when I
slipped and crashed against the wall. When I got down the cliff
Bonnie and some others helped me to take my harness and helmet off.
Whilst people were climbing down the wall we ate a piece of fruit.
When everyone, even
Mrs Zifken and Mr Hardy had finished climbing down the cliff, we all
walked up to the harness shed and put them away. Time went past so
quickly but it was then time to have lunch. For lunch we had ham and
salad sandwiches.
After lunch we had a
little bit of time to get ready before our afternoon activities. We
talked while walking to our next activity and it was kayaking. Mick
took us just outside of the sheltered area to tell us how the
paddles and lifejackets worked. Once we’d found every bit of
information out we stood in a line from shortest to tallest ready
for Mick to hand us a paddle and a lifejacket. After that we all
followed the road down to near the wharf under a pine tree to listen
to Mick’s instructions for getting the kayaks into the shore.
Everyone worked as a team to get them into the water without being
scratched by the rocks. Every boat was in the water, so we chose a
partner and hopped into a kayak. My partner was Sara and together I
thought we did quite good synchronisation. Once everyone had reach a
beach far away, Sara and I were still stuck in a wall of oysters but
we finally pulled free. When we were all on shore we had afternoon
tea whilst Mick was telling us about the history of the island.
Shortly after that
we hopped back in the kayaks with a new partner. My partner was
Stina. We set off on our way back to the wharf but Stina and I
didn’t work together very well so we kept going in different
directions to the rest of the group. In the end Mick picked us upon
the speed boat to direct us to the others. A special boat came up
just before us to bring the SES’s box up to the island so that held
us up about ten minutes. Once we’d all pulled up on the beach shore,
everyone got muddy shoes because of the 1m thick mud. It only took
us five minutes to put the kayaks back in the shed but we were still
seven minutes late to free time, because of the little hold up.
Signora had swapped over with Mrs Ziftken before kayaking. Signora
helped us clean the paddles and lifejackets and ourselves before we
jumped in the pool at free time.
After that we had
about half an hour to get ready for dinner and the disco. We were in
quite a rush to get to the dining hall because we had to be early
because we were going to be on duty that night. When Mick had
finally come, he chose some people to do serving. I wasn’t chosen
unfortunately. But I still got to washing up and that was fun. For
dinner we had spaghetti bolognaise and for dessert we had jelly and
peaches.
It had already been
a busy day but then it was time to have to disco. For me it was such
a blast. By this time everyone was worn out but we still had our
supper and went straight to bed.
In the morning we
had to wake up fairly early, because we had to pack up the whole
cabin and organise ourselves for the day, before 7:45am. Once we’d
all finished, we took ourselves to the dining room for breakfast
which was cereal, toast and pancakes. After breakfast we all
wandered to our morning activities and my group went to the high
ropes course and the giant swing. I found that the high ropes course
would’ve been much harder so I chose that. I was partners with Laura
and we were the fastest to get organised so she started first. It
was a very high and hard track but everyone except for Luke
finished. It was an activity to remember. When everyone had finished
the course and had taken off their harnesses, we all took them back
to the harness shed to keep to keep safe. Then it was time to walk
back up the hill for lunch. For lunch we had roast chicken and salad
in wraps, but our group arrived a bit late so they’d already run out
so we just had hot dog rolls.
It was nearly the
end of our great camp so all of our guides talked to us as a group
in the assembly area to say goodbye and to say what a great time
they’d had with us. We’d had such a fantastic time on our well
organised camp but it was time to go back down to the wharf to go on
the ferry. We carried any bag onto the ferry and hopped on. I was
one of the first to sit on the ferry, so I sat on the top level. It
was a beautiful drive back to Kangaroo Point but nothing could beat
the fun I’d had at Milson Island.
Finally we were back
at Kangaroo Point to catch the bus to school again. Ms Giblin told
us to take a bag from the boat, up the hill and to the buses.
Unfortunately I had to take a carry bag and it was REALLY heavy. 5G
and 5B girls were on one bus, and 5H and 5B boys went on the other.
It felt like such a long time on the bus, but we did get back on
time. Once I’d jumped off I saw my num and I was so excited to see
her again.
Driving down the
hill to the back gate I had mixed emotions. I felt:
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Excited to be
with my family again.
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Sad to be
leaving my cabin and the beautiful island.
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Special because
we were the first children from our school to go on that camp.
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Important
because everyone was looking at us and looking very happy.
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Tired from the
great activities that I’d experienced.
The best part of the
camp for me was the abseiling, the ropes course, thrill and thought
of doing something I haven’t done before.
By Georgina 5B
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