Tumpline May 2016
Published: Fri, 05/27/16
Get news, announcements, and the latest camp scoops in our newsletter. View a web version of this issue
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Lessons from Summer Camp Jim Tilley
Lessons from Summer Camp by Jim Tilley is a book of poetry about Camp Nominingue. For each and every Camp Nominingue camper, staff and alumni, this book will bring back amazing memories of a summer spent at camp. For those who never had the opportunity to spend a summer at Nominingue, this book will give you a glimpse of the experience lived by every Nomininguer since 1925! Jim Tilley earned a doctorate in physics from Harvard and worked on Wall Street for twenty years. The first two collections of his poetry were published by Red Hen Press - In Confidence in 2011 and Cruising at Sixty to Seventy in 2014. During the summer of 2013, he returned to Camp Nominingue for the first time since the 1960s. A result of that return visit is his forthcoming collection, Lessons from Summer Camp, from which this poem is taken. A fifty-year look backward to the days spent at summer camp and the life lessons they taught us without our knowing it. Lessons from Summer Camp is available from Amazon.ca, Barnes & Noble or Red Hen Press.  Excerpts from Lessons from Summer Camp previously published in the Tumpline Portage March 2016 Before departing camp for the wild, a Counselor prepares his canoe for portaging with rope, two paddles, and a tump strap… Bullfrog Bay We were fifteen, Seniors. On the nights that refused to cool off, the bullfrogs croaked back and forth to one another in Bullfrog Bay, building to a crescendo directed against us, a dissonant orchestra shaking our eardrums, the booming beats drowning out all other sound, even the crickets’ rasping violins…  Snake and Frog February 2015 We’d congregated on the beach, none of us willing to intervene, too intrigued to see how Nature’s predator and prey would work things out. Most of us rooted for the frog as it was slowly ingested… New Boys October 2014 Blankets draped over arms, blind-folded with bandannas, the new boys queued up behind the Dining Hall at the start of the path to the Council Ring, youngest in front, oldest at the rear…  New Season June 2014 Like a horde of young wizards headed to Hogwarts (those stories still decades from being written), we gathered on the platform at Montreal's Windsor Station in late June, fathers pushing our trunks on trolleys, mothers fighting back their usual tears, to board the train… Maison-de-Pierre, 1957 Part XI Andy Webster
John Blachford drove up to Camp Nominingue on a Friday and by noon the next day, we had decided to embark on a more ambitious canoe trip than either of us had ever been on. This decision on my part meant that I must quit my counselling job, but the money I would have to forfeit was inconsequential when I compared it to the overall experience of the trip we were to take. The following is an account of the 14 days we spent out in the bush.  Friday, August 16 As we paddled across Big Carp towards the take-out to Lake Dumbell and Revelstoke, we were both in very high spirits. At the take-out, we started over the trail to Dumbell. The trail was bad to start off with and we plunged and struggled with the canoes and packs over about half of the portage, following the vague semblance of a trail which we knew must exist because of some old blazes carved on the trees. The trail soon became so indistinguishable that we had to set down the canoe and packs and look ahead for blazes. At this point, we left our equipment, and armed with a machetti – which by this time had become discouragingly blunt – we cut our way through the thick bush following the blazes. At one point, half a mile from Dumbell, it took us one hour to find the next blaze. Discouraged and exhausted, we each gulped down three spoonfuls of honey for lunch and I set out to search for the trail, leaving John as a marker by the last blaze. We yelled at each other through the bush so that we would not be separated, and I searched fruitlessly for the continuation of the trail. I then crawled miserably through thick brush and over fallen trees to where John was marking the trail. John tried his luck, veering to the right of where he thought the trail should be and then cutting sharply left so that he would come across the trail again at right angles.  By this method, we finally found the trail and I cut a trail towards the sound of his voice and then followed him down a gently sloping hill to the lake. While doing this, I carefully blazed the trees so that, if another party should come this way, they would be able to easily follow the blazes. The trail at this last part was easy enough to follow, but was in terrible condition. It was necessary to manoeuvre the canoe over many fallen trees and through thick masses of brush. When we started on the trail at Big Carp, we had not bothered to blaze even though the trail was barely distinguishable and I thought that in one or two or three years, the portage would be rendered impassable. Never have I been happier to see the blue clear water of a lake as I was that day coming into Dumbell. The happiness and the joy and the feeling of having surmounted an insurmountable obstacle was unimaginable. We had left Big Carp at 12:00 and reached Dumbell at 5:00, and those five hours were the worst canoe-tripping hell I have ever been through. Carrying the canoe over parts of that miserable trail, John and I had fallen over stumps and logs concealed by the thick brush and then had struggled to our feet countless times, using every available particle of our waning energy.  John and I shook hands in exultant triumph, and then followed our blazes back to the canoe which we had left about a mile back on the trail. No sooner had we paddled out into the middle of the beautiful, spruce-ringed lake than we observed moose and two deer drinking the crystal-pure water. The moose and one of the deer sauntered slowly into the woods when we approached and the other deer gracefully leaped n beautiful strides along the muddy beach and vanished into the woods. Our spirits soared again and we saw two more deer in the next bay, as we leisurely paddled down the lake. Alumni Profile : Jean-François Perrault 1977
I was eleven years old the first time I came to Camp Nominingue and my knowledge of English was very limited. This was 1977 and being unilingual was prevalent. I didn’t speak English and, as far as I remember, almost none of the counsellors spoke French in those days. I distinctly remember Mr. Wilson, in the craft shop, on my very first instruction day, trying to explain what the word “feather” meant, mimicking a bird. But he was asking me a question – the same he had
asked everyone else – that I didn’t understand. I felt everyone staring at me, waiting for me to give an answer. I was embarrassed. Finally, Mr. Wilson smiled and gestured that it didn’t matter and proceeded with his instruction. I later caught on that he was asking me which feather I was going for. But to understand this, knowing what a feather is isn’t sufficient. I also had to learn that I would get a shield and that I would earn feathers for this shield with points. And this situation – not knowing what was going on – repeated itself over and over. I didn’t know what a “blindfold” was, and I needed one for my first “council ring”, another unknown concept. And when I was told to find a “buddy” to go swimming, I drew a blank.  Still, counsellors came over to my tent at free swim and invited me to try walking on stilts or taught me how to play tetherball. I was never left alone and gradually made friends. Yet my first canoe trip was a disaster. Not only did I spend three days in the forest with people I didn’t understand for the most part, but it rained the whole time. Water ran underneath the floorless Gilbert tent and soaked my sleeping bag. On our last lunch, I stood by the campfire on Boy Scout Point trying to steam off my wet clothes. I felt miserable. Considering some of my first experiences at Camp Nominingue, it’s a wonder I ever went back! But in my first camp session I had learned everything I needed to know to get by; from the bells to the gong, from the instructions to the all camp programs and from candy line to the Voyager Games, not to mention the counsellors’ play and the campfire songs. And most of all, I made friends. Friends who helped me understand what was going on, friends who invited me to join in a game, friends who introduced me to more friends. Friends who would later on be counsellors like me.  All of these experiences left a strong impression and I went back to camp for ten summers over a twelve year period. In my last year as a camper, I was given the Leader award, an achievement I’m still proud of 35 years later. The most obvious thing I learned at Camp Nominingue is English. And it’s more than a useful thing to learn a second language - any second language. In the case of English, it opened up for me whole new worlds of cultures from – of course – English Canada, but also Ireland, the United States and other countries. Worlds of literature and philosophy and the fine art of translation. But perhaps English isn’t the most important thing I learned at camp. While at camp, I learned many skills I could never have developed in the city like canoeing and chopping wood or building a fire – cooking on an open fire even – and orienteering and shooting with bow and many other skills. But still, all these skills aren’t the most important of it all. On canoe trips, I learned to adapt to an unfamiliar environment and to be resourceful. I learned more than working in a team; over the years, I learned team-building.  I learned respect: respect for the environment and respect for others – for everyone in general and in particular for First Nations people – and respect for myself. And then, there’s something I can’t quite put my finger on; something extremely special that all Nomininguers share. I know because I have met Nomininguers from the past 60 years (because when I was a counsellor 30 years ago at Family Camp, there were returning campers and counsellors from 30 years earlier!). Perhaps it comes from all of us having made the same pledge when we first arrived at camp, to always do our best, and to be courteous, industrious, honest and brave. (Of course, I didn’t understand what I was saying that first summer, but it did sink in afterwards!) Or maybe it comes from the Henry David Thoreau verse we always recited and that really became my moto in life: Rise free from care before the dawn and seek adventure. Let the noon find the by other lakes, and the night overtake thee, everywhere at home. Whatever it is, I believe Nomininguers share similar values and the same desire to explore new territories. And, amazingly enough, we share many, many camp stories. Two Nomininguers who are 50 years apart could sit together by a campfire and talk all night about their camp experiences as if they had been tent-mates.  There’s not enough room here to tell you all of my camp stories. But the important thing to remember is the bonding experience that makes you a Nomininguer for life. You see, stories are the fabric of heroes. One day, many years after my last summer at camp, I was going shopping with my wife. As I was turning into a parking space, another car did the same thing, like a mirror image, directly in front of us. There was Frank Bolduc and his girlfriend! We both jumped out of our cars and hugged each other. We were so excited to see each other after almost ten years. And then, Frank turned to his girlfriend and looked at her intently and said, pointing at me: “This guy fought with a bear!” Believe me, I’m not making it up! 2016 Boys’ Camp Senior & Intermediate Staff – Directeurs et moniteurs en chef du camp de garçons 2016
Senior StaffGrant McKenna Director Directeur Elisa Van Wagner Business Manager Directrice commerciale Jennifer Miller Program Director Directrice de programmes Graham Hutchison UC Director Directeur des 13 à 15 ans Rafic Dagher Craftshop Director Directeur de l’atelier Scott McIlveen Waterfront Director Directeur de programmes aquatiques Charles Weyman MC Director Directeur des 11 et 12 ans Philippe Rioux LC Director Directeur des 7 à 10 ans Mat Easey JC Director Directeur des assistants-moniteurs Michael Patenaude Trip Director Directeur des excursions  Intermediate Staff David Krug LC Head Counsellor Moniteur en chef LC PK van Aanhout LC Head Counsellor Moniteur en chef LC Maxime Perrault MC Head Counsellor Moniteur en chef MC Louis Lescure MC Head Counsellor Moniteur en chef MC Troy von Breitenstein UC Head Counsellor Moniteur en chef UC Chris McEwen UC Head Counsellor Moniteur en chef UC Maxence Frenette Assistant Waterfront Assistant natation et sauvetage Thomas camp Assistant Trip Director Assistant excursions de canot Preparing for Camp – La préparation
Follow-up formDon’t forget to complete the final three forms: Travel Information, Parent Form and Camper Form. They can be found at the same place as the registration form, by clicking “Register Online" at the bottom of each page of our website. In these forms, you confirm how your son will be getting to camp and also confirm any tent-mate requests. Payment of Balance Have you authorized the payment of the balance? The balance was due on May 1st. When you registered, you might have authorized this second payment. If not, you can return to your account to make the payment using the same credit card or by sending a cheque. Clothing List A CN Clothing & Equipment list to help you with your packing is found on our website. There is pdf form to print as well. FAQ The FAQ section of the website has some good information about finding a trunk, if you are thinking of purchasing a trunk for your son – “What should we pack all of our son’s belongings in…” While trunks work very well for our tents, campers today arrive with suitcases, knapsacks, hockey bags and plastic bins. There are lots of options available to you. It is important that you label your son’s clothing. You may print out the Label Shop order form in the FAQ section – “How should we label…”, if you are looking for clothing labels.  CN clothing Each year, we offer our campers CN clothing for purchase. We have sweatshirts, t-shirts, a baseball shirt, pyjama pants and a baseball cap. The deadline to order clothing is the end of May, so don’t wait too long to order, if you are interested in buying something! Preparing for Camp A Camp Nominingue experience is an adventure for the whole family! Read the information available on the website. Watch the videos and visit facebook, where you will find a number of photos of the past summer and earlier summers. Call the office or send an e-mail with your questions and concerns. Talk with your son about any concerns he might have. Discuss about what to do if and when he misses home – most campers do at some point during their stay. A good place to start is the page “Preparing your Son for Camp” Videos Two particularly good videos to watch are “Travelling to Camp” and “Meals & Dining”. All of our videos are found on Youtube. – click on our Youtube icon, found on our website.  Rappels aux parents Derniers formulaires à compléter! N’oubliez pas de complétez les trois formulaires additionnelles: Informations voyage, Formulaire parent, et Formulaire campeur. Vous les trouverez au même endroit que vous avez complété l’inscription de votre fils, en cliquant « Inscrivez-vous en ligne » en bas de chaque page notre site internet. C’est sur ces formulaires que vous nous indiquez comment votre fils se rend au camp et où vous indiquez s’il a des amis avec qui il veut partager sa tente. Paiement du solde Aviez-vous autorisé le paiement du solde? Le solde devait être payé le 1er mai. Quand vous avez complété l’inscription, c’est possible que vous avez autorisé ce paiement. Si non, vous pouvez retourner à votre compte en ligne pour autoriser ce paiement avec la même carte de crédit ou en envoyant un chèque. Liste de vêtements et d’équipement La liste des vêtements et équipement requis pour le camp est sur notre site internet. Il y a aussi un formulaire pdf que vous pouvez imprimer. FAQ La section FAQ du site a de l’information utile si vous voulez vous procurer une malle pour les vêtements de votre fils – « Que devrions-nous utiliser pour transporter… ». Même si une malle fonctionne bien dans nos tentes, les campeurs aujourd’hui arrivent au camp avec toutes sortes de valises, de sac à dos, de sacs de hockey, de bacs en plastique ainsi que des malles. Vous avez toutes sortes d’options pour les bagages ! C’est extrêmement important que tous les vêtements de votre fils soient identifiés avec son nom. Vous pouvez imprimer le bon de commande du Label Shop, trouvé dans la section FAQ - « Comment devons-nous identifier… », si vous êtes à la recherche d’étiquettes. Vêtements CN Chaque année, nous offrons à nos clients l’option d’acheter des vêtements Camp Nominingue. Nous avons des cotons ouatés, des t-shirts, un chandail de baseball, une casquette et un pantalon pyjama. La date limite pour placer est la fin de mai, alors si vous voulez commander quelque chose, n’attendez pas trop longtemps ! La préparation Une expérience au Camp Nominingue est une aventure pour toute la famille! Lisez les informations disponibles sur notre site internet. Avec votre fils, regardez les vidéos et visitez notre page Facebook, où se trouvent plusieurs photos de la dernière saison et des fils d’étés moins récents. Appelez-nous au bureau ou envoyez-nous un courriel avec vos questions et vos craintes. Parlez avec votre fils pour vérifier si lui, il a des craintes. Discutez de ce qu’il peut faire quand et s’il s’ennuie – les statistiques nous disent que la majorité de campeurs à un moment donné s’ennuiera. Un bon endroit de commencer est la page de notre site « La préparation de votre fils ». Vidéos Deux vidéos à regarder en particulier sont « Voyage au camp » et « Repas et salle à manger ». Tous nos vidéos se retrouvent aussi sur notre page Youtube, accessible à partir de notre site. Alumni Association News / Nouvelles de l’association des anciens
Claire and Julie’s Great AdventureClaire Hazan and Julie Cameron have been on staff at Camp Nominingue on and off over the last five summers. This spring, they set off on their greatest adventure yet!  Hello Nominingue Community! We are 2 Nominingue staff alumni, Julie Cameron and Claire Hazan, planning to cycle across Canada this spring. We first met at Camp Nominingue in the summer of 2011 as first aid attendants at the camp hospital. Before camp, we had never been exposed to such a degree of wilderness adventure. Our experiences at Camp Nominingue have inspired us take on this cross-Canada voyage. On May 5th in Victoria, B.C, we will start our journey, and make our way East to St John’s, Newfoundland. The journey will span over 7000km. The plan is to stay mostly in campsites, but we may indulge now and then in a roof over our heads. Our gear will be carried on our bikes, including tents and camping equipment. We are very excited to take on this adventure in the Nominingue voyageur spirit! We will document our journey on a cycling blog. We would love the opportunity to get in contact with Nomininguers across the country along the way, or even to join for a leg of the journey! Please feel free to check out our blog and contact us!  Please share with us news that you would like to include in the Tumpline that you think might be of interest to other Nominingue alumni. SVP envoyez nous des nouvelles que vous aimeriez inclure dans une prochaine édition du Tumpline. Alumni Socials Each spring and fall, we try to hold at least one Alumni Social in Montreal, Ottawa and Toronto. It is always great to renew with recent and less recent alumni. Dates and locations of future get-togethers will be posted on Facebook on the Camp Nominingue Alumni page or on the Alumni Socials page. CN Alumni Weekend will take place from Friday, September 2nd to Sunday, September 4th. To register, go to any page of the Camp Nominingue website and scroll to "Register Online".  To get involved with CN Alumni Association, please contact John Christou at [email protected]. Family Camp 2016 - Camp familial 2016
Since 1984, Camp Nominingue has been holding its family camp each summer at the end of August. It's a great opportunity for parents to introduce their children to summer camp or their sons to Nominingue; it's a relaxed, rustic holiday for the whole family, with exciting programming each day and ample, healthy meals; and it's an opportunity for alumni to re-visit Nominingue and re-live their boyhood experience.Hilights in 2016 Wednesday, August 24 Sean Dagher in concert - an evening of Celtic music Thursday, August 25 Steak & Corn Roast Craig Cardiff - music workshop and concert Friday, August 26 Wine & Cheese; Overnight canoe trips for kids Saturday, August 27 Council Ring & Pillars Presentation In 2016, the CN Alumni Association will be recognizing Peter Van Wagner for his role in ensuring the survival of his father's legacy for 50 years  Depuis 1984, le camp familial a lieu au Camp Nominingue à la fin de l'été au mois d'août. C'est une opportunité pour parents de vivre une première expérience de camp de vacances avec leurs enfants; ce sont des vacances rustiques et décontractées pour toute la famille, avec des activités excitantes et de bons repas; et c'est une opportunité pour les anciens de revenir à Nominingue et de revivre l'expérience magique de leur enfance. Faits saillants en 2016 Mercredi 24 août La musique celte avec Sean Dagher Jeudi 25 août Repas steak et blé d'inde Atelier de musique et concert avec Craig Cardiff Vendredi 26 août Vin et fromage; excursion de canots pour les enfants Samedi 27 août Council Ring avec présentation d'un pilier du camp En 2016, l'Association des anciens reconnaîtra le rôle de Peter Van Wagner dans la survie de l'héritage de son père, soit le Camp Nominingue, durant plus de 50 ans. Tumpline Submissions - Soumissions pour cette lettre de nouvelles
We are looking for submissions for our newsletters from campers, staff and parents… from this summer, as well as from recent and less recent alumni. These submissions may be general memories of camp experiences or specific memories about a canoe trip, about a favourite program or a funny experience. Please send your submissions to [email protected]. You may submit your stories and memories in English, French or Spanish. Nous sommes à la recherche de textes de campeurs, parents et de moniteurs de l’été 2015… et de souvenirs de nos anciens campeurs et moniteurs des années récentes et moins récentes. Vos textes peuvent décrire vos expériences en générale ou une excursion de canot, un programme favori ou une expérience drôle. SVP envoyez votre texte par courriel à [email protected]. Votre texte peut être écrit en français, en anglais ou en espagnol. |
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Camp Nominingue | Tel. 450-267-2555 | Toll-free 866-910-1551 (Canada & US)
Email: [email protected] | Web: www.nominingue.com |
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Ce courriel est destiné à tous les campeurs, parents et moniteurs, actuels et anciens. Si vous voulez vous désinscrire de cette liste d’envoi, svp cliquez en bas de la page.
Camp Nominingue
Winter Address: 112 rue Lippée, Les Coteaux, QC J7X 1J4 Summer address: 1889, chemin des Mésanges, Nominingue, QC J0W 1R0 |
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