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Coed Youth Wilderness and Nature Camps In the Santa Cruz Mountains2012 Schedule
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Alex Hoskins-Frame Marin Horizon School in Mill Valley, seventh grade, age 13 |
Kids (ages 6 - 8) Wilderness Camps Kids Camps Academic Year,Weekend and Holiday Wilderness Camps |
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Winter and Spring Break Day Kids Camps
We create a safe village-style atmosphere infused with mentoring. The kids are pulled into a deeper connection with the natural world. Wilderness Skills Institutes' aim is at nurturing and supporting the development of each child’s unique gifts and passions. These emergent traits spring forth as edges are gently pulled and awareness is tenderly opened through ancient mentoring techniques. We will spend our days exploring the creeks, meadows, forests, bay, and ocean, learning hands on skills, animal tracking, wilderness safety, navigation, wild crafting, playing scout games, learning survival skills, science-based natural history, rappelling, archery, blacksmithing, tending the forest, and more. |
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Kids (ages 6 - 8) Summer Wilderness Camps |
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Kids Wilderness Day Summer Camps
These coed wilderness summer camps offer kids a great opportunity to connect with nature through outdoor adventures that are exciting and fun! We will spend our days exploring the creeks, meadows, and forests, learning hands on skills, animal tracking, wilderness safety, navigation, wild crafting, playing nature-based games, learning survival skills, science-based natural history, rappelling, archery, blacksmithing, gardening and more. Participants will learn from skilled nature mentors. |
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Pre-Teen (9-12) Wilderness Camps |
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Camps Academic Year, Weekend and Holiday Wilderness Camps |
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Pre-Teen Overnight Weekend Skills Camps
These weekends are usually offered once each month throughout the year in pristine wilderness of Santa Cruz County. Preteens will learn and practice nature core routines, including wild crafting, orienteering, animal tracking skills, shooting sports and more. Each month will have a different focus and each month the pre-teens will become more self-reliant .These camps are offered rain or shine. |
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Winter and Spring Break Overnight Preteen Camps
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Preteen Basic Agriculture and Wilderness Skills Summer Day Camps
These coed wilderness summer camps offer preteens a great opportunity to connect with nature through outdoor adventures that are exciting and fun! We will spend our days exploring the creeks, meadows, and forests, learning hands on skills, animal tracking, wilderness safety, navigation, wild crafting, playing nature-based games, learning survival skills, science-based natural history, rappelling, archery, blacksmithing, tending the forest and more. Participants will learn from skilled nature mentors. |
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Pre Teen Basic Agriculture and Wilderness Skills Overnight Summer Camps
This preteen 1 and 2 week sessions resident camp is located in Santa Cruz County. We will have camp fires, storytelling, night hikes, astronomy, remote camping trips, early morning bird sits and animal tracking. These preteen camps offer participants the same great opportunity to connect with nature as our day camps with the added experience that only an overnight camp can provide. The preteens will spend their days exploring the creek, meadow, forest, estuary, tide pools, farm and ranch. Learning hands on skills, animal tracking, wilderness safety, navigation, wild crafting, playing nature-based games, learning survival skills, science-based natural history, rappelling, archery, blacksmithing, gardening, swimming and more |
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Teen (ages 13 - 18) |
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Teen Academic Year, Weekend and Holiday Wilderness Camps |
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Teen Overnight Weekend Skills Camps
This program is a series of weekends in pristine wilderness of Santa Cruz County. Each month will have a different focus each developing the skills and tools necessary for primitive living in the forest. This series will be followed by a 7 day experience living with only the participants’ skills and the tools they have made. We do this through intensive hands-on wilderness living skills training, mentoring people how to harvest and transform the gifts of nature for everyday needs such as tools, fire, shelter, food.... in a conscientious and sustainable manner, as our ancestors did for 100's of thousands of years. These sessions will include:
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Winter and Spring Break Wilderness Day and Overnight Wilderness Camps for all ages
These coed wilderness week long camps offer participants a great opportunity to develop a deeper connection with nature and greatly increase their skills. The winter wilderness camps will build shelter and learn to be warm and comfortable in the north coast winters. In spring they will return to their shelter and continue their journey with nature practicing the nature core routines, wild crafting, orienteering, and animal tracking skills. We will spend our days exploring the creeks, meadows, forests, bay, and ocean, learning hands on skills, animal tracking, wilderness safety, navigation, wild crafting, playing scout games, learning survival skills, science-based natural history, rappelling, archery, blacksmithing, and more. Those that are in our overnight wilderness camps will also have camp fires, storytelling, night hikes, astronomy, remote camping trips, early morning bird sits and animal tracking. These camps offer participants the same great opportunity to connect with nature as our day camps with the added experience that only an overnight camp can provide. Completing this camp, with instructor approval, may make the participant eligible to attend 4Fires Rendezvous For Teens. |
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Teen Summer Wilderness Skills Camps |
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Teen Introduction to Nature Overnight Camps
These are light hearted fun camps for teens, with much time for wondering and exploring the forest, nature games, music, and nature crafts. These camps do not have the same intense survival atmosphere that our other teens programs have. |
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4 Fires Rendezvous
This is by invitation only For those that are not familiar with the 4 Fires Teen Rendezvous, currently there are roughly 150 schools, nature programs, institutes and organizations around this earth that are invested in the future generations, that mentor the youth in their community with nature as a premise. These various programs use cultural elements that have direct lineage to skills, stories, songs and ancestry. As separate entities these programs have had untold affect upon the health of our youth and their future. In times past, our ancestors, regardless of what land we came from, journeyed to meet other tribes and nations. The rendezvous often formed the foundation of peace in a region as ideas and items were traded. Old agreements were given new strength and new alliances were made when fresh faces met each other for the first time. There was stories and songs shared around the fire, competitions, skills shared, and rites of passage. In our own way we are reinstating the concept of a rendezvous through our youth. Wilderness Skills Institute will join the staff and teens from Wilderness Youth Project (Santa Barbara), The Riekes Center (Menlo Park), and Four Elements Earth Education (Grass Valley) to collaborate to share skills, adventures, music, and friendship. This is by invitation only and the teen applicant must have been in at least 3 weekend skills, a week long wilderness skills intensive camp, or one of our home-school teen programs. Not all that apply will be accepted. To attend the participant must not only possess wilderness and scout skills, be able to work as a member of a tribe for a common goal, cook their own food, work independently, and must be resilient to being pulled way past their comfort zone, be responsible for their own needs, sleep under the stars, and keep a positive mental attitude under stress. . If accepted it will be an experience remembered the rest of their life. There will be no more then 5 participants from Wilderness Skills Institute.
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Wilderness Skills Intensive Teen Overnight Summer Camp
This 7 day teen summer camp is in the pristine wilderness Santa Cruz County. Teens will learn and practice wilderness living, wild crafting, orienteering, animal tracking skills and pushing their comfort zones Survival skills is what you learn to keep yourself alive if you are waiting to be rescued. Wilderness living skills is what you learn to thrive as a long term resident in the wilderness with using only what you find and your skill set. We teach the camper to thrive in the wilderness not just survive. Specific areas of practice will include debris shelters, identifying and cooking edible plants, safe drinking water, friction fire, cordage made from plants, orienteering, animal tracking, tending the forest, archery, rabbit stick, atlatl, firearms, rappelling and more. The will be ample time for music, ceramics, adventure, swimming, and just being a teen. This is a primitive camp and a week of roughing it and pushing edges, of learning and applying wilderness skills and becoming comfortable as a resident in the wilderness and working as a team. This week is good preparation for the 4 Fires Rendezvous. |
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Teen Primitive Intensive Week
Enrollment: Limited to 10 participants. This program is a follows a series of multiple weekend and week long sessions throughout the fall, winter, and spring focused on developing the skills and tools necessary for primitive living in the wilds. This camp 7 day experience living with only the participants’ skills and the tools they have made. We do this through intensive hands-on wilderness living skills training, mentoring people how to harvest and transform the gifts of nature for everyday needs such as tools, fire, shelter, food.... in a conscientious and regenerative manner, as our ancestors did for 100s of thousands of years. These sessions will include:
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Teen Brackpacking.
Details TBA
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Family Programs |
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Family CampsPlease contact Toni or call 831-431-6454 to arrange dates, times, and activities for you, your family and friends. |
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| For udates about our youth wilderness and nature programs join Coyote Tracks, our informative e-newsletter. It contains wild craft projects, wilderness safety, native plants, and animal tracking sections to better connect your family to the nature of the Pacific North Coast. |
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© Wilderness Skills Institute LLC Wilderness Skills Institute LLC Reserves the right to change dates, times, locations, and pricing. |
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The thwack of the bow string, the hack of the tomahawk hitting the log, the swish of the branches hitting the side of the lean-to shelter. All of these things excite me. At Wilderness skills we do all of these things and more. Whenever I get there the first thing we do is get in sync with nature and then the fun and education starts. With the help of Brian King and his staff we learn how to survive in the forest with nothing. We learn the art of shelter building and how to make one warm and comfortable. We also learn how to make fire with a hand drill and with a bow drill. My favorite activity is the bow making and bow shooting. We get to experience the feel of hunting whenever we want to and get better every time. Brian is trained by the American Olympic archer coach and brings his skills to the students. Every time I go to Wilderness skills camp I learn something new. And every time I go I am ensured a lot of fun!