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KANUGA guest period Lucy Dempsey 
In addition to its year-round schedule of conferences, Kanuga
holds eight one-week summer guest periods; See the Leaves, a
fall guest period; and Thanksgiving and Christmas at Kanuga. The
Dempsey family attended week one of summer guest period. For more
information about Kanuga, see their Web site,
www.kanuga.org. This summer my family went to Kanuga Guest Week. My mom and my
dad went with my sister who is six and me (I am 11). Here are some
of my reflections. Kanuga is a very interesting and exciting experience to have. It
is up in the mountains of North Carolina near Hendersonville. At
Kanuga there is an inn for newcomers who are waiting to get a
cabin, because you have to have been there a couple of years before
you can have a cabin. Everyone eats together in the inn dining
room. If you do not know anyone, (like us) you sit with a family
you don't know; we sat all week with a family from Texas and
one from Florida. They already knew each other and had been going
to Kanuga for a long time. We sat with them our first year and by
the second year we had become good friends. After breakfast, at about nine o'clock, the children go off
to various programs and the adults have time to do whatever they
wish. My sister was in the Children's Program, which is for 5-8
year olds and I was in the Youth Program, which is for 9-12 year
olds. There is also a Teen Program for 13-18 year olds. In Youth
Program we did lots of fun things like climbing at the Rock Quarry,
swimming in the lake and doing a low-ropes course. At her program
my sister played games, tie-dyed T-shirts, made crafts, played on
the playground, and swam in the lake. In the afternoon there is another children's program time
and the adults can attend workshops in wood carving, watercolor,
and soap making. There is also a lake at Kanuga that is made by a
dam in the river, and every half hour or so there is an adult swim
out to the dam, it is called - you guessed it - a dam swim. There
are also fun tubes for kids and grownups to play in and sit
in. At Kanuga there is something for each family member to do and
they can do it alone or together as a family. After dinner there is
an evening activity every night; one night it was bingo, one night
it was square dancing, and since this summer the 4th of July was on
Monday, my mom and my dad and I sat and watched fireworks go off
from the dam and sang songs about America. It was a lot of fun and
we thought that there would just be a couple of small fireworks but
actually there was a half hour display that ended in an amazing
finale!! The last night we were there an entertainer came and juggled and
rode unicycles and did lots of amazing tricks. The first unicycle
he rode was of a regular size, the next was double that, and a big
man from the crowd had to stand and hold the unicycle while the
entertainer jumped up on it and pretended to be about to fall.
While he grabbed on to the big man's neck and pretended not to
be able to stay on, he secretly undid the man's watch and hid
it in his pocket. Then the entertainer told the man to go and sit
back down. When he got back to his seat the unicycle-rider said
"Hold your hands over your head, grab both of your wrists and
say, 'what happened to my watch?'" The man did this
and then started to laugh, because the entertainer had completely
fooled him. The evening ended as we watched him ride a giant
unicycle that was 15feet tall!! He had to lean it against the wall
and climb up using footholds stuck on to it. There are many hiking trails in the surrounding mountain woods
and one day my whole family went on a trail all the way up a
mountain and looked down at the valley below. While at Kanuga we
sometimes go away for a day trip to go white-water rafting, tubing,
sliding down Sliding Rock, or to see an historic place. This year
we hiked to a gorgeous waterfall!! Over all, Kanuga is a fun place to go for a week or even two!!!
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