Dining Hall – Mitchell's thoughts, photos, etc.

But Not Gone. The Memories Will Live Forever. Maybe Longer.

A few days ago, I went up to the camp I spent my pre-teen and teen summers in. It was there I made some of the best friends I ever had. We are still friends. At our campfire, I was sitting with people who said, “We’ve known each other for over forty years. We are old.” We are. For those of you that saw Chris Rock’s show, “The MotherF**ker with the Hat,” you might recall when Rock’s character told another you make all your friends from when you’re about five until college. That’s it. I agree. However, I have made some great friends after college. They are right up there.

I took a few rides to my section of the camp; parts have been shuttered since 1988. Other sections a decade plus later. As we drove in, tears fell out of my eyes. When we traveled along the trails and saw where many buildings stood, all but one have been knocked down. All are pieces of wood and cement foundations.

My site was the one closed in ’88. It used to have a dining hall, office, old school latrine, and many leantos (sleeping quarters). We had a terrarium. As a staff member, I helped build it many times. We had a giant treehouse.

Below our hill was a no longer functional dining hall, ball field, shower house, and usable dining hall. We had our own shower. We even had hot water. I say this because my first 2.5 summers or so we didn’t. You took ice-cold showers. Or walked to the shower house for hot water. I froze.

We had lots of fun singing songs in the dining hall. And no fun eating in it. Camp food was not enjoyable. The camp had several dining halls. Mine had the best food. But it wasn’t good. I walked by most of these sites.

The main site had movie nights in a once fully operational dining hall beneath my hill. My group did our movie nights in our palace (camp office). We often brought in McDonald’s, pizza and sandwiches from El Monaco’s, an Italian restaurant famed for its red sauce. BTW, the main dining hall was kosher. We were so reverent when we brought in other food.

After spending some time in my section, I went back to the main section. The next day, I went back. I went with one of my pals from a long time ago. We first went into the lake. Our section was closed off. We went into another site’s section. At different times, there were several operational camps around that beautiful lake. When I went, there was one.

Foundation Block for Double Decker Tip Pan Latrine

We walked through a swamp to get to the entrance of the lake. I found a spot with some rocks to leave our towels. We jumped in and swam like it was many years ago. We exited and walked back to the car. We spent some time by the now boarded-up main dining hall. We walked over to the old rifle range and found the foundation blocks that once held a two-floor, 8 – or 10-seater tip pan latrine. My site had the last of the tip pan latrines. It was a five-seater.

Our ball field where we played softball, volleyball, and ultimate Frisbee now looks like a tree farm. We went up to our site and looked where the terrarium was and where our small fields were where people sunned themselves. From the trail, we walked into our site. We saw the foundation where the shack was. Years before I got there, it housed tick tubes. That’s about all we saw. The site was laden with ferns, weeds, trees and mud. Am I happy it is gone? No. Am I happy nature took it back? Yes.

We hopped in the car and drove to the gate. I jumped out of the car, turned around, looked at the trail, locked the gate and said farewell as we drove away.

Today, I spent the day at the American Museum of Natural History (AMHN). I got there at about 1:00 p.m. There were tons of camp groups wandering through the museum. I knew this would happen. This would piss off some museum-goers. But I loved it.

I wandered through the mammal’s wing. A bunch of kids stood in front of the wolves. They shrieked, “Wolf”. They all tapped on the glass and yelled, “You can’t get me”. They all smiled and went to the next exhibit.

Most of these kids were day campers. I did see a group wearing t-shirts that said their camp hailed from the “Old Dominion” state. Maybe they were on a trip into the City that Never Sleeps.

I too went to camp. Camp Chappegat (aka “Chappy Hill), part of Ten Mile River Scouts Camps, located in Narrowsburg, N.Y. Mine was a summer camp. I lived there for many weeks during my summer. It was the greatest experience of my life. Nothing can replace it. I was 12 when arrived on the Hill. Sometimes I still feel like I am 12, and on the Hill. I made more lifelong friends than I can ever count. I still speak to dozens of them every day.

So while these kids in the AMNH were on a camp field trip, I thought back to the trips we took. We went on many. Yeah, we went to Hall of Fame in Cooperstown to pay our respects to the team that the building was built for, the 27-Time World Champions. We went to Callicoon to bowl. We went to Action Park. I fell off the Alpine Slide. It was painful. And, who can forget our, Super Week banquet in El Monaco’s? Man how I miss the red sauce.

We enjoyed these trips. But I must say and I surely hope my fellow “Scouuuuuuts” will agree that our best trips were the ones we did right in the vicinity of our blessed camp.

We had bog hikes. What could be more fun than playing in a bog? We went to Father Meyers Swimming Hole. It had a giant tree with a rope tied around it. We climbed up the tree and grabbed the rope. We swung on it until we fell into the swimming hole. We swam around a little and climbed right back up our tree.

On Saturdays, we had leanto inspections and hiked out to Bob Landers. Most of us had the two hamburgers, fries, and soft drink special. Then we hiked to the Delaware and Ten Mile Rivers to swim. We hiked back up to our beloved hill. We had a great BBQ and then our famous campfires. We had skits that would have won more Tony’s than any Broadway drama or musical. We were that talented.

TMR is huge. We went on many hikes. My favorites were lead by an alumnus. He used to come up and stay on the Hill each summer for about three weeks. He used to teach me all sorts of things about the camp. He became my mentor. I still consider him my leader.

He would take us to D-1. His camp. On the way, he would point out historic sites, the dining hall, old cabins, and other stuff. Sadly, None of these buildings remain. One was actually moved to our Camp Museum in headquarters. He took us to the “Asshole”.

The Asshole is two large rocks with openings that resemble, the aforementioned. I visited about three summers ago. It is still there.

We went on other great trips in camp. We went to the old saw mill, we hiked through closed down sites and dreamed of what went on there.

Sadly, camp Chappy closed after 1988. But every day, especially during the summer, I still dream about the fun we had there. Oh Chappy, boy do I miss you.

I would love to carry a scouuuuuuts’ trunk up the hill.

CH CH CH AP AP AP EG EG EG AT, Chappegat, Chappegat, Yeah Chappegat.

Tag: Dining Hall

Farewell

Camp