Snapshots of Spring at Camp Hantesa

The flowers are blooming, the days are warming up, and Camp Hantesa is eagerly awaiting the return of summer campers! See how things are looking here at camp!

A bird’s nest on the bridge near Pow Wow. The bird hatched a few hours after this photo!

A horse science lesson at the barn.

We’ve been rebuilding the Apprentice Lodge!

The ropes course passed our annual inspection and is in full operation, ready for summer.

More horse lessons at the barn.

Miss Sadie enjoys laying amongst the dandelions that have popped up.

We are in the process of completely renovating the shower house!

 

Pony Rides and Fun at the Barn

The rain stayed away today and we were able to celebrate “Best in the West” day with pony rides! We enjoyed our time with our furry friends and look forward to learning more this summer! Check out our Herman’s Ranch Camp and our Riding Day Camp!

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Overnight: Outrageously Fun!

The first Outrageous Overnight was a great event for middle school campers. We started the night with a pizza party and then a trip to Climb Iowa, an indoor rock climbing gym in Grimes. After our adventures scaling the walls, we returned to Camp Hantesa for a night of fun. Ice Cream sundaes, Pocket Hunt, Friendship Bracelets, Games, movies, and some intense games of hide and seek rounded out the night. Everyone was tired in the morning, but we still mustered the energy to have a delicious breakfast, play some games, and create tye dye.

We can’t wait for our next overnight experience, and we hope to see everyone back for summer resident camp this summer!

Check out pictures from the night!

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Winter Resident Camp is the Best!

Winter Overnight Camp

Many Hantesa campers joined in on our winter resident camp. These girls and boys had the ultimate camp experience as they spent 4 days and 3 nights at Hantesa. Swimming, bowling, hiking, and crafting rounded out their experience. It was a great 4 days with these campers. We can’t wait to see them back at Hantesa for our Summer Resident Camps!

On Friday evening, we headed to the bowling alley for strikes, pizza, and lots of giggles!

Some of our boys at the bowling alley

We made foil packs during a camp fire cookout. However, since the weather was so blustery, we cooked our foil packs inside over the fire.

We learned how to do copper enameling!

Copper ready to go into the kiln for the enameling process.

One of our campers turned 12 during resident camp. Happy Birthday!!!

 

No Snow? No Problem! Every Day is fun at Hantesa!

We may have been a little disappointed to not have snow, however we had tons of fun all the same!

Check out pictures below from our winter camps this week!

Human Statues Game

A morning game of Twister

Lining up for a relay in the big room

"Down Hill" Bingo

GaGa!

We made masks on Wednesday!

Our staff like to play games too!

Practicing Skits

Day campers from Des Moines have a fun time singing during an afternoon bus ride.

Tower stacking competitions

New Buddies.

Singing songs after lunch.

 

Campers dressed up their counselors as "abominable snowmen" for an epic snow-counselor race

We love our campers!

 

Winter Fun at Camp Hantesa SDOs

 

 

We’ve had a lot of fun over the past couple of days at Camp Hantesa. Check out the pictures below. Many of them were taken by campers themselves during a photography option!

Camp Hantesa woke up to a winter wonderland this morning!

 

Practicing Photography

 

 

 

Cheese!

 

 

Playing Snow Thicket

 

 

An afternoon 'roll down the hill!

 

 

Handmade puzzles

 

 

Team Huddle

 

 

New Friends

 

 

Painting Snow!

 

 

Winter Coats are Essentials!

 

Let’s Make a Deal SDO

Today we made…photograms, snowstorms, forts, and deals. It was a great start to 2 weeks of fun ahead!

We learned how to make photograms in the dark room today!

We took a trip to the pool to see what it's like to "swim" in the winter

We attempted to prompt a snowstorm by making lots of magical paper snowflakes

 

We played lots games and made deals as well

 

We also made forts

 

A Sweet Day

Thanks to everyone who came to our Holiday Gingerbread Event. We had a lot of fun building houses, making snowflakes, and sipping cocoa with all of our guests! We also received lots of donations for local youth. Thank you for helping us support our community.

Check out the pictures below. I think we have some future engineers and architects in the works

Donations

 

We would also like to thank the Boone Hyvee for its ingredient donation.

 

Hey! What’s the Big Idea?!

On the day before Thanksgiving we welcomed 20 students from Des Moines for one of our signature “School Day Off” programs. The theme for the day was “The Big Idea,” and campers were given a chance to tackle a number of momentous tasks.

The first was to create Rube Golberg machines to place a marble into a measuring cup in the most complicated way possible. Then we spent some time thinking about what we were thankful for, and using those ideas to dress our turkey.  In the afternoon, we enjoyed the record warmth by playing in the climbing tree. Enjoy the slide show and don’t forget to register for our Winter programs!

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The adventures of Sadie, the camp dog

Chewing sticks, exploring magic hill, checking out mud puddles, and puppy naps. It’s a dog’s life here at Hantesa!