‘To overcome challenges and go beyond your comfort zone’, are two of the many reasons Somerville Intermediate School offers the Year 7 students a four day residential camp, as part of their EOTC programme. Well this year’s camps certainly achieved that and more!

Our camps are normally held towards the end of Term 1, when the summer warmth and late evenings provide perfect opportunities to enjoy a range of land and water based activities. This year, with the threat of COVID reaching 10,000 daily cases in March, with borders remaining closed resulting in qualified instructors not being available, and long overdue repairs to the ramp at Yankee Wharf, meant we had to postpone until August, when bookings are not normally entertained. Having overcome the challenge of finding suitable instructors, we then had to contend with two of our three camps having to reschedule our programme to fit with the high tide necessary to allow our vehicles to unload and load at an alternative ramp.

Undaunted, each of the three camps set out with approximately 150 students, 35 parents, 5 teachers and 1 deputy principal, to brave the wind and rain, cold mornings and nights and early sunsets. You had to be there to truly experience the herculean effort displayed by everyone! Students went far beyond their comfort zone and achieved results that will long remain in their memories. In gusting winds and driving rain, students climbed, abseiled, built rafts and undertook challenges safely overseen by qualified instructors and trained activity parents. Gary Carr, our catering guru ensured that everyone was fueled and watered with three hot meals a day and group parents were on hand to help and support the students in their care.

I would like to take this opportunity to commend the students on their determination and enthusiasm throughout the three camps, the many parents who gave of their time and energy to help ensure the camps ran smoothly and my Somerville colleagues, who supported me in making this year’s camps the success they were. 

Camp 1

Camp 2

Camp 3