This year’s summer camp took place at the Helping Hand Cheung Muk Tau Holiday Centre in Sai Kung from Friday 17th to Sunday 19th August, Camp Quality with the kind assistance of long-term supporter and rotarian Ramesh Chugani was able to secure the whole campsite for the three days.

A group of over 170 campers and companions arrived at the campsite early Friday afternoon and after a quick briefing by camp staff regarding rules and regulations of the Holiday Centre as well as our camping program for the next three days, everyone one was then organized into their respective sleeping accommodation which was mainly shared rooms of 4 per room with bathrooms and air-conditioning. Afterwards, free time was given to relax and renew old friendships as well as perhaps make a few new ones!

Before you knew it, it was time for dinner and everyone quickly descended to the main dining hall for our first meal of the camp. After dinner, we all moved to the main recreational hall where a group of senior campers were going to present to us all a personal reflection of a unique comp which they had attended.

Last month, Camp Quality had lead a delegation of 20 senior campers on a goodwill cultural exchange to “Ying Tak” mountain region in rural China. This 3-day camping trip offered them the unique opportunity to develop their understanding and awareness of some poverty-stricken parts of rural china. For this exercise, they were all split into four groups and each group was required to give a 5-minute presentation on their experiences and what they saw. We were all touched by their stories and experiences from this expedition and to thank the groups for being so diligent, Prof. Patrick Yuen and Nurse Lau Hing Wah presented an award to the best group’s work

To end the evening, everyone was eagerly waiting to participate in our night Orienteering competition. Armed with a map and a torch, campers were required to find clues from each checkpoint in the grounds of the Holiday Centre and go in search of 10 special symbols which were all discreetly placed all over the grounds of the camp. This provided the teams with lots of social interaction in the dark and it was a fun and wonderful way to end the first night.

Normally, if you asked any of our happy campers, what they look forward to most at summer camp, the answer was likely to be the hot-air balloon rides. However, the weather wasn’t too kind to us this year and unfortunately; we only managed to get the balloon up for a very short time before we were all told that it would be unsafe to continue due to very windy conditions. It was a great disappointment to those who hadn’t been on it before but Camp Quality fully respected and supported Captain Nigel Black’s professional decisions!

In the afternoon, a full adventure program was arranged through collaboration with the people from the “The Kids Experiential Ltd” adventure academy, who specializes in adventure based training for children and adults from all walks of life. Camp Quality invited them to host a special afternoon session for our campers with the aim of increasing their leadership skills, identifying personal strengths and building friendships with other campers in similar situations and backgrounds. Their activity based learning and team-building tasks and games were a big hit with everyone at camp and the games helped to build teamwork, unity and trust amongst campers and companions. It was definitely an active, energizing and thoroughly enjoyable program for all participants.

After a hectic afternoon program, in the evening, through the kind support of Music Nation, Camp Quality were able to secure some special charity tickets to see one of HK’s favorite animated characters – Hello Kitty. The Hello Kitty’s Fantastical Adventure was a colourful interactive musical performance held at the Baptist University Hall in Kowloon Tong. We were treated to an hour and half of song and dance and it was an appropriate way to end the night after a very early start to the day.

Sunday morning, an array of activities was again offered to the campers, including: pottery, arts&crafts, table tennis, indoor and outdoor recreation areas for ball games or to the delight of many, it had to be a splash in the big indoor pool!

Finally, our weekend long summer camp had to come to an end - We’re not sure whether everyone got much sleep, but we know all had a fabulous time! One could just watch the campers’ play and witness their excitement as they all took part in the exciting activities that were planned especially for them – See you all next summer!