Recently our Year 6 group attended their camp at Arthur's Pass. We all had an amazing time, supported by a fabulous group of parents.

Each year, our Year 6 tamariki get the opportunity to experience a two night camp. For the second time, we headed up into the mountains to stay at the Outdoor Education Centre, run by the Kind Foundation, in Arthur's Pass. We packed our gear into cars and were off by 7:30.

Our first stop was at Springfield, where we met up with Ms Christie who was able to join us for the first night. We had planned to stop for lunch at Castle Hill, but abandoned this as the weather wasn't ideal. However, once we arrived in Arthur's Pass, any clouds had well and truly cleared away and did not return the whole time we were there. The weather couldn't have been better.

Mr Campbell had planned for all possible situations and catered for our earlier arrival at camp but setting up activities in the township related to the learning the children had been doping around kea and introduced pests, as well as some fun group challenges. This kept everyone busy until lunchtime.

After lunch, we met our camp instructor - Alex, who led us, along with Mr Campbell, on our first activity rotations - the sensory trail and making shelters. Both activities were lots of fun as well as providing a great opportunity to step up to one of our camp goals - accepting ‘challenge by choice’. During the sensory trail, the children followed a long rope over a bush trail while blindfolded. They needed to navigate up and down hills and over tree roots - all our children rose to this challenge incredibly well.

After breakfast on Thursday groups had two more activity rotations - search and rescue and UHF radios. This took us to lunch and the much anticipated Devil's Punchbowl walk and river crossing. Several children had been worried about these activities, especially the walk up the hill as, while it's not a long hike, it is reasonably steep. We were so proud of all of our children as they all made it to the top and back down. They also took on the river crossing with confidence. Thursday was a busy day, but after dinner, complete with a delicious chocolate self saucing pudding compliments of Mrs Higgins, there was still plenty of energy left and we were able to go across the road and watch the antics of a group of playful teenage kea!

Our last day came all too soon. Once everyone was up and packed, we made our lunches and had breakfast. It was time to farewell Alex and this wonderful part of our country and head home, via Castle Hill. After eating our lunch among the rocks, we then spent time exploring. Mr Campbell sent us in search of sharks, elephants and dragons. We could have stayed there all day, but we knew we had to get home. After a quick stop at Springfield, we then continued onto school to a lovely welcome from our school friends and families.

We would like to extend a huge thank you, not only to the parents who accompanied us on camp, but also to all our families who worked hard preparing gear and baking. All the support offered went towards making this a wonderful experience for us all.

If you are keen to hear more about our camp experiences come along to our next assembly where we will be sharing more about our time away.