Over The Wall Summer 2007
What a summer, one thing is for sure which is that we had an amazing summer we really have brought the magic not to mention fun, friendship and fulfilment to more children and young people this year than ever before and that was down to our fantastic volunteers!!
We started the summer with our first ever Scottish camp which although had a few teething problems was a resounding success we are planning 3 weeks in 2008, 2 weeks for the seriously ill and 1 week for siblings. It was then on to good old Bryanston for our 4 sessions and although at times the weather really was awful we managed thanks to the volunteers to achieve a great camp spirit. All the weeks were amazing. Extending the age limit on session 4 allowed OTW to continue the great work that we do by increasing the camper age up to but not including their 18th birthday. Feedback from the young people, their parents and the volunteers was amazing, saying that they all enjoyed the week immensely. We structured the week slightly different and introduced horse riding and more kayaking. We also had more chill out time. Due to the success we plan to run at full capacity inviting 60 young people with a serious illness in 2008 to attend. In total we will be running 4 weeks at Bryanston in the summer 2008.
Our new project in 2008 will of course be in the Midlands where we are planning to run 3 weeks, we will be busy in the next couple of weeks researching where to hold the camp, we will be researching many sites including schools and outdoor centres. So as they say watch this space for more news…
As always none of these camps would be possible without our amazing volunteers and as you can imagine we need even more now so please tell a friend about the work that OTW does. Due to the expansion plans please note the closing dates for the camps in 2008.
Finally, as I said at the training days when a volunteer agrees to come for a week this in turn enables a child to come to camp, enabling a child/young person to be just that. In the words of one of our campers, “this week I was able to be me, Stephen and not my condition, the volunteers treated me as a normal person” I personally think that sums up exactly what we strive to do, rebuild dreams and restore confidence.
If you have any queries/questions/ideas then please do not hesitate to contact us!