Another World

It was the Rippowam camping trip again and I was just as tired as ever. Recently, for the last two years, we have to be at school for six o’clock. Despite all the excitement in the air, while we were getting ready to go it was really cold outside. Of course its cold its still the night. The teachers told us, we must leave early so we can do all the activities, so at least I understood why. We got on the bus, and it seemed like a long journey, but at least we weren’t watching, Remember the Titans or The Field of Dreams, which we seem to watch at every TV/movie opportunity.

I feel I must have seen those movies at least six times each. I am not even a big fan of football, or baseball, so it makes it all the more boring. So that livened me up a bit. So I looked outside the window, to how it would be to run as fast as this truck. Sometimes I think of running really fast for a period of time like a car and I know I am dreaming because it is impossible. Finally the interminable bus ride had ended.

This is when I overheard that we had to sleep in log cabins. I was completely all right with this until I found out the girl cabins had heating in them. Of course Mr. Duveen suggested that the girls should have suites and the boys should have shacks, but I knew that he would say that. I also discovered that some of the rooms had dead mice in them, which made it all the more exciting.

But after all rooms were chosen, and all arrangements had been made, we were ready to start. I was most excited when I heard we were doing the high ropes course. I have done these types of things before, but now that we were in 8th grade, I thought it would be a better ropes course with more difficult obstacles. As we were walking to there I looked at the trees around me. They were slightly losing their color and it made me realize summer really was over. When we arrived at the course I saw how high up it was.

It seemed to be just about as high as the sky, but that was my imagination of course. After going through all the obstacles once, the easy, why I decided to do it blindfolded. This was obviously difficult because you are trying to step on a rope or a wire but you don’t know where to go. So once I had climbed the tree and all my harnesses were set and I was ready to start. I put the blindfold on.

All seemed quiet and I felt I didn’t have control over what was going to happen. I took the first step and the course had begun. I put my foot in each rope hoping, guessing, that it might be there. Luckily, it seemed I made all the right decisions, and I made it past the first one quite quickly. The next one was the hardest and I wasn’t really sure how I was going to do it.

But I did it anyway realizing even if I did fall it did not matter because the ropes could carry a weight of three thousand pounds and I was pretty sure I didn’t weigh that much. So I started to walk across the tightrope and help on to each rope above. I had to keep reaching and reaching but sometimes couldn’t reach the rope and you had to jump to get the next one. After I finished that section, which in my opinion was the most difficult, I now only had one more left before the zip line. This one was easy though; I just had to climb across on wooden steps. Once I figured out the distance from each step to the other I was quickly finished.

There I was I had finished the whole course blindfolded and I was so proud of myself. The zip line is by far the best part but I wanted to go the extra mile. I wanted to go upside down on the zip line to the bottom. I knew it was going to be hard to do mentally but I also knew it would be incredible. So I jumped off the ledge, and as I was going, I flipped my lets up and around the cord, so I was upside down. It was an amazing experience, moving so fast, but seeing the tree leaves on bottom, and the trunk on top.

I think it was an important life experience because it made me appreciate life, seeing how beautiful it is by having fun. It was like another world and when I got off I realized how high I was and I thought I was just about as high as the sky, but that was my imagination of course.