No child left inside
Coyote Trails is a camp where adults can learn as much as kids
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Rozella and
Thomas Apel explore the labyrinth at EarthTeach Park in
Ashland during last summer's Coyote Trails summer
camp.
Pho by Jim Schlight
By JOHN DARLING
for the Mail Tribune
June 14, 2008
Coyote
Trails has all the arts, crafts, hikes and fun games you
would expect from a summer camp, but it goes beyond that,
into building self-confidence through learning primitive
living and survival skills and reconnecting with the
rhythms of nature.
Running six weekly sessions in the Cascade foothills above
Ashland starting Tuesday, the camp teaches kids and adults
how to make fire without matches, find drinking water in
leaves, build a cozy shelter out of sticks and brush — and
achieve its tongue-in-cheek goal of "no child left inside."
ABOUT
THE CAMP
Coyote
Trails, now in its fourth year, offers an Earth Art day
camp Monday through Friday for kids 7 to 13, including
lunch and snacks, at $300. The Coyote Trails School of
Nature is seven days, residential, Sunday through Saturday,
with organic meals provided, at $650. Scholarships are
available. An advanced, three-week school follows. For more
information call 541-617-0439 or go to
www.coyotetrails.org.
"It
was a time of connection with my sons that I know is not
possible in everyday life," says parent Jesse Biesanz of
Talent, who did the camp himself, occasionally sharing
adventures with his children. "It was a pretty intense
experience. I came away changed — more grounded, centered,
more confident about stepping outside the bounds of
civilization."
The camp, headquartered in Bend and operating each summer
at Earth Teach Forest Park on Dead Indian Memorial Road,
teaches students to slow down from from their fast-paced,
hi-tech, indoors lifestyles and open their awareness to the
rhythms of nature — and the fact that we have a natural
place in it.
In
learning the art of tracking, says instructor Rebecca
Moergen, "it's like putting on glasses that let you see
nature. You learn to walk quietly and use your peripheral
vision. You gather clues. You learn the different bird
calls so you know the cry of alarm of a stellar jay. You
get to know the natural world again."
The acid test of a summer camp, of course, is whether the
kids are happy — or sad — to go home. For Laura Roll of
Ashland, her son Shea "got a sense of community and
understanding of how to survive in nature "¦ and what birds
are saying to him. He also had fun and games — and he
didn't want to come home."
Students do storytelling, sculpture, painting, journaling
and silent movement. But above all, they shift out of
observer mode (as in television, game boys, computers) into
a deeper level of awareness and involvement that "brings
you back into balance, focusing on the positive, on
community, on the chickadee landing on the bill of your
hat," says director Joe Kreuzman. "Miraculous things
happen. You come to see survival in nature not as a
struggle or anything to fear,"
The
program is aimed at curing the bad habits of civilized life
— such as knowing more about the animals of Africa (from
TV) than the ones living around us — and instilling a
positive belief in the beauty, wisdom and importance of
nature that will last a lifetime, Kreuzman says.
"It's a beautifully run program, family-oriented," says
Roll. "It's about finding your place in the web of nature,
not just having fun and games, although they do have those.
It's about interconnectedness with nature, and it's
profound."
John Darling is a freelance writer living in Ashland.
E-mail him at jdarling@jeffnet.org.