Winter Break Camp

We have been pretty bad about updating the blog this winter--but that is a good thing! We have had a busy schedule this winter, and it hasn't left us much time to keep up with things like the blog. Anyway, I'm going to try to cover some of the things that have been going on in the past few weeks. First up: Winter Break Camp.

After the huge success of Spring Break Camp last April, we decided to offer a Winter Break Camp during the February school vacation. So from February 15th to 20th, we hosted approximately 30 kids (the number varied by day) at our day camp!

We had a blast at camp, and we think the kids did too. (If amount of noise can be used as an indicator of whether kids are having a good time, then these kids were having the time of their lives!) Despite the lack of snow that had plagued us all winter, we were able to get in many of our winter activities, including cross-country skiing and ice fishing. (Alas, there was not enough snow for snow tubing.) We also went for day hikes, did nature walks, learned about surviving in the winter, spent a day at the 1812 Homestead, played on the frozen pond, and had our very own Olympics. I've posted some pictures below--I know there are a lot, but we had too much fun to narrow it down any further!

On Homestead Day, we made homemade soap. The kids also carved soap into original designs:

One of the highlights of going to a lesson in the one-room schoolhouse at the Homestead is when someone gets in trouble. I have never seen someone so happy to be punished!

Candle-Making at the Homestead:

Shingle-Making:

Our Olympics included many non-traditional sports, including the World-Debut of "Frizzing", which is kind of a cross between Curling and Shuffleboard. The kids were very good at it; if Frizzing is added to the next Olympics, I imagine that our kids will be the top contenders for medals.

Another Olympic event was relay races, which included pushing each other around on sleds.

The Bronze Medalists:

The Silver Medalists:

The Gold Medalists:

We'll be holding Spring Break Camp again this year during the April vacation, so if you're interested, e-mail director@pmoec.org for more information. We have a limited number of spots, and they tend to fill up quickly, so if you want to come, act quickly!

Yesterday two local girl scout troops (one from Willsboro and one from Peru) came to Pok-O for a Winter Survival program. After a discussion about all the ways that one could die in the outdoors (the girls were very creative), we focused on ways that we could avoid some of those hazards. Since this was a Winter Survival program, we focused mainly on ways to stay warm. We played a spirited game of Doubles (a.k.a. The Chocolate Game) to practice putting on appropriate layers (admittedly not the main point of the game, but we had a lot of fun) then headed out into the cold. The girls managed to scrape together enough snow to build a quinzhee, and they gathered enough firewood to build a giant bonfire (although we limited ourselves to a small fire just big enough for roasting marshmallows.)

We get several boy scout and girl scout troops throughout the year, coming in both for day programs and for overnight visits. Many of our classes can help the scouts meet badge requirements, and visits to Pok-O are a great way for troops to bond. If you're part of a troop and would like to arrange a visit to Pok-O, give us a call!

Winter at Pok-O brings many things: snow, skiing, snow tubing, evenings spent curled up beside a wood stove, and...French Canadians!

Approximately one third of our client base comes to us from Montreal (our closest "big city") and other parts of Quebec. Although we had a few Canadian Schools in the fall, this is the time of year when they start coming with some regularity. These students are native French speakers who are learning English, and they come to Pok-O to practice.

This past week, we hosted 5th graders from the Sir Wilfrid Laurier school. These kids have been in an intensive English program since the beginning of the school year, and their hard work has certainly paid off---their English was very good. (I'm ashamed to admit that their English, after 5 months, was slightly better than my Spanish was after 5 years of studying.)

The English program at Sir Wilfrid Laurier was run for years by the legendary (at least among the Quebec English Language Learning community) Wynanne Watts. Wynanne retired last year (she serves on our Board of Directors now), so this winter we got to meet the new teacher, Marie Annick Poulit. Based on the level of English that the kids were speaking, we know that Marie is doing an excellent job!

Our program with Sir Wilfrid Laurier was three days packed with lots of activities. We did the full range of winter activities, including cross-country skiing, winter hiking, snow tubing, winter survival, and ice fishing. Below are a few pictures from ice fishing and winter survival:

In this picture, kids are using the ice auger to drill a hole for ice fishing. Because you need to both turn the auger and exert downward pressure in order to effectively use the auger, you either need to be tall, or work with a partner.

Here are some kids ice fishing. Unfortunately, we didn't catch anything on either of our early morning fishing expeditions. Fortunately, Chris had prepared something else for breakfast, so we got to eat anyway!

One of the highlights of Winter Survival is building snow shelters. Usually we build Quinzees, which are shelters that are built using loose, powdery snow. Given the weather lately, however, the snow was perfect for cutting blocks, so we built igloos instead. In the photo below, you can see the process of cutting snow blocks.

Here we are building the igloo...

Here is the finished igloo! Building a domed roof was beyond our engineering skills, so instead we built straight walls, then made a lattice with branches and topped it with more snow blocks. All in all, we were all pretty proud of our igloo!

Winter Ecology

Winter has arrived at Pok-O full-force, and with it comes our winter curriculum! Although we still offer many of the same classes regardless of the season, during the winter we lose some of our fall/spring classes (canoeing, for example) and gain some new ones, including Winter Ecology.

Winter Ecology is a class that looks at the challenges animals face in the winter, and the strategies that they have developed to address these challenges. We discuss migration, hibernation, and other adaptations, all the while doing some hands-on activities to help the kids really understand what the animals go through.

In the photo below, we are checking the results of an experiment about finding warm places to hibernate. Students are each given a small container filled with hot, liquid jello, and need to find a place that will keep it warm over the next 10 to 15 minutes. If they find a place that will keep their "animal" warm, the jello remains liquid. If their burrow is too cold, however, the jello congeals.

In the next picture, you'll see students playing the "Tracking Game." In this game, the students pair up, with one playing the role of the predator, and the other the prey. The "prey" walks across an area of clean snow, leaving tracks that they hope will confuse their predator. Then the "predator" gets a chance to try to follow the tracks, and see if they can end up in the same place as their prey. (In the picture, the predators are trying to figure out which way their prey went.)

After students track each other, we head into the woods to look for, identify, and follow real animal tracks. In a recent class, we followed a set of deer tracks for quite a distance, and were able to find branches that the deer had nibbled on and places where the deer had gone to the bathroom. (The students were especially excited to find the deer poop, as pictured below.)

Winter at Pok-O is a great time to head outdoors and learn more about what's going on in the cold. We'll try to post more about our other winter classes soon!

The Crux is Open!

This weekend was the grand opening of the Crux: Champlain Valley Climbing Center! We had a great turnout...appoximately 200 people came by to climb or check out the building, including a number of people who came on both Saturday and Sunday!

If you haven't been by to see the new facility, stop in at some point this week for the rest of our opening week celebrations. You can find a full schedule of the events we have planned here.

Below are a few pictures from the opening weekend:

Da CRUX!

The time is creeping closer and closer....
....for the opening of.....
THE CRUX!

The grand opening is scheduled for this Saturday, December 5th from 10am-8pm. There will be food, drinks, music, and most of all CLIMBING!

There is over 1000 sq. feet of climbing, 17 routes, a bouldering cave...we've got it all. We are the Crux, Champlain Valley's climbing center! Come check us out!!!!

Working on the Snow Tubing Hill

We had our first snow fall last week. Although it wasn't much, it has turned our thoughts to winter fun: cross-country skiing, building snow shelters...and snow tubing!

Our snow tubing hill isn't a place that we spend a lot of time in during warmer months, but we've been up there in the last few weeks getting this hill in shape for the winter.

Maintaining and improving the hill is an ongoing, multi-year project. Last year we rebuilt the berm to change the path that the tubes took down the hill, allowing for a longer ride. We also started putting in a new drainage system at the bottom of the hill, which tended to be a little swampy.

This year we've been continuing work on the drainage system. The drainage ditches have been dug, and now we're working to spread a few inches of gravel on the bottom before we cover them with dirt again. This is slow, back-breaking work: we can't get a tractor down there to work (actually, we'd be able to get it down the hill, but it would never get back up again), so we're using person-power instead. We got a load of gravel dropped off at the top of the hill, and have been taking it down to the ditches one wheelbarrow-full at a time.

As you might imagine, this is a big job, and we only have a limited amount of time before the snow flies. We'll get as much done as we can, but I imagine that this will be a job that continues into next year!

Rock Talk and Walk

Despite the chilly temperatures outside, myself, Ed Romanowicz from SUNY Plattsburgh, and three others trekked up Rattlesnake mountain to learn all about the geology of the area. We started with a brief intro here at Pok-O, where we got to look at maps of the area. We talked a lot about how there used to be a sea here in the Champlain Valley, the glaciers that once enveloped the area, and the rifts that are forming the mountains around us.

After that, we bundled up and headed out to the mountain. Along the way, Ed stopped and showed us some interesting features. More commonly, we stopped him, with the phrase "Whoa! What is that rock? Why is it pink/black/green/spotted? What did that to the rock? How did this rock get here?" and more. We reached the summit, and despite what looked like dreary gray skies created a gorgeous winter view. Mt. Mansfield of Vermont was snowy and beautiful, the slides on Giant Mountain were bright and white, and the sunlight streaming through the clouds lit up Lake Champlain.

We stayed on the summit for a little bit, but the wind chased us down. We hiked down the trail (asking just as many--if not more--questions as on the way up) and made it back to the van.

My favorite fact of the day: The Adirondacks are comprised mostly of anorthrosite, a granite composite. This is one of the few places in the world that this rock is found. The only other place that it is found on the crust so predominantly is in Labrador, Canada. But (and here comes the coolest part) anorthrosite is also the material that makes up the rocks on the moon! Out of this world, eh?

All in all...it was a "rock"ing good time! (I couldn't resist!)Here's a picture of Ed and our guests on the top of the mountain.

See you next time!
Liz the Naturalist

First Snow!

Snow has been falling in some of the higher elevations for a few weeks now, but down in the valley where we are...not yet. Until Now!

The Pok-O Staff woke up to snow covering the ground, our cars and all the trees! It was just a dusting, and it melted away by lunch time, but its a sign of fun times to come!

Snowshoes, cross country skis, and snow tubes here we come!

What are YOU excited about for winter?

SEAD

A few times each season, we have a SEAD day here at Pok-O. SEAD stands for "Staff Enrichment and Development." These days are days for us to expand our own knowledge about topics we teach about here at Pok-O, both to provide professional development for staff members and to further improve our program.

On Monday we had a SEAD day in Montreal. Our primary destination was the Biosphere, Montreal's Environment Museum. Most of the current exhibits focus on the St. Laurence River Watershed, which includes Long Pond! Most of what we teach about watersheds in our Pond Ecology class focuses on the water that is going into Long Pond...so it was really interesting to learn more about where our water is going when it leaves Long Pond.

We also were fascinated by the structure of the Biosphere. The museum is housed in a giant geodesic sphere. The sphere was originally built as the U.S. Pavillion at the 1967 World's Fair. After the Fair, it remained a popular tourist destination, until a fire destroyed that outer covering in 1976, leaving only the frame of the sphere behind. Eventually a new building was built inside the sphere to house the Environment Museum, though the outer covering was never replaced.

The sphere was designed by R. Buckminster Fuller, a visionary architect, engineer and inventor. Fuller was devoted to sustainable design, and spent his life designing buildings, cars, and other technology that would help reduce the number of resources used by people in their everyday lives. Fuller was well ahead of his time on the issue of environmental sustainability...he was thinking about these issues as early as the 1920s!

After we left the museum, we took some time to walk around the old city in Montreal. Perhaps the highlight of this point in the day was when we passed a restaurant that had decorated for Halloween with gibbets! Brian was very excited to see them. (Read the post about Haunted Homestead to find out why...)