Yar mateys!! Saturday started out like any other Saturday at CTT – sweet Saturday breakfast, no cleaning, and services – but then the theme song from Pirates of the Caribbean blared over the speakers and a pirate ship came screaming around the corner of the art shack! A few minutes later, Captain Insano barked out the teams and the rules for the day and it became clear that it was Pirate Day at CTT!!!
Early in the day the teams had to come up with team names and build a pirate ship from materials they were given. The teams had to use each piece they were given in order to build a boat and, in the pirate spirit, cheating and sabotage were encouraged. After the crews dispatched everything from spies to kamikazes to give the other teams a disadvantage, it was time to put the boats on the water. All but one team was able to stay up for more than five minutes and the black team picked up a five-minute bonus because Miller Friedman was able to ride the boat for fifteen seconds before it sank. It wasn’t enough to beat the orange-clad S.S. Kirby, however. Their boat would float indefinitely and after ten minutes Captain Insano and the other judges declared them the winner.
After an afternoon rotation that included Human Battleship, kickball and ultimate Frisbee, all of the teams gathered at the lake for the Battle of Lake Tall Timbers. The battle included a land, sea and air portion and combined campers’ skills at riflery, boating and water balloon tossing (in individual events). The Blue-Bearded Pirates came away with the win thanks to an extraordinary effort by Jordyn Chace and Reece Dennison to maneuver a heavy aluminum canoe and find the Ultimate Treasure, which was hidden in a bucket floating on the lake.
After dinner, the whole day was decided by an event which hasn’t been seen at Tall Timbers in many years. There were four fire pits and a rope tied high above – it was a spectacle known as Rope Burn! Three-person crews gathered wood and the team who was able to build a fire high enough to burn through their rope was the winner. In addition, the rest of the team was judged on how spirited they could cheer on their fire crews.
The black team and counselor Tim Allen (yeah, he has heard the jokes) were able to burn through their rope in less than ten minutes. They won the burn portion, but counselor Katie, Jacob and Marc Blitz, Aaron Forest and the rest of the Blue Beards wrote two original songs for the cheer portion. When the final scores were tallied, the Beards took the win!
The kids really got into Pirate Day and we all had a lot of great times. There were battleships, water balloons and big fires. When you add all that to the Parlay in the Gym social afterwards, what more could you ask for? If, for some reason, you wanted to ask for a soft pretzel – we had those, too.
Although Pirate Day is done, there is plenty of fun to be had this week. Tuesday night is skating night and later on in the week there is a counselor hunt – but that could turn into anything. Who knows how things will shake out at Tall Timbers?