Dusty white gravel crunches under your boots as you walk along a crisply-edged path past a rustic log lodge. You and the other campers are gathered here for the Opening Jamboree at Camp Spirit Bear! School’s out and whether you’re here as a camper or you’ve been hired as a counselor, it’s a summer you’ll never forget.

“Gather ‘round, campers!” A massive bear of a woman shouts into a bullhorn. The fly rod strapped to her back and the embroidered salmonids on her vest make it clear who this is- Real Big Fish, Chief Counselor and fearless leader of Camp Spirit Bear. “Welcome to Camp Spirit Bear's opening jamboree! Grab a snack, play some games, and meet your cabin-mates!"
Your kin has been transformed into a human, or something that’s approximately human. Kin ears, tails, and horns are commonly kept, and your name is whatever you want it to be. You are a child again, between the ages of late elementary to early high school, or you’re here as a counselor (late high school and up). It’s a beautiful day, a day that you know will be the first of many beautiful days, and today you’re here to make new friends, eat some s’mores, and just generally have the time of your life. There’s no real responsibilities here, other than to have fun and explore.

You can read more about the camp in the main thread, but the idea is that it’s a summer camp somewhere in the Pacific Northwest. There’s a big lake to play in, all the arts and crafts you can imagine, and recreational activities from archery to zip lining. It’s a place to play, to learn, and discover- and to have a lot of fun in a relaxed setting!
To make things easy for everyone, your first post should include your camper (or counselor) choosing a cabin! Upon arrival to camp, you can choose from one of four cabins.
When they choose a cabin, each camper and counselor is given a bandanna in their cabin’s color. Campers are encouraged to wear it around their necks, as an armband, or tucked into a belt loop— but they don’t have to wear it if they don’t want to. Counselors need to have their bandannas on them at all times, though, so that it’s easier for kids to find their cabin’s counselors. Once you’ve picked a cabin, you’re locked in- at least for this ORP, since it’s the first day of camp!

“As is tradition, our opening jamboree is set to go from sunup to sundown- after which point, we’ll announce our winners and they’ll get to participate in the time-honored camp tradition of picking tomorrow night’s dinner. We’ll be having a weenie roast for tonight, but tomorrow, you will be in charge! Well, some of you will be. The rest of us are at your mercy!”

To make it easier to jump in and RP, there are some mini games! These are just simple dice rolls where you can add flavor text to rack up those word counts and get lots of participation tickets! There are four mini games, one of which is timed.

The Archery contest will be open until the end of the event. You can shoot three times, but you can’t shoot in a row- somebody has to post between your rolls. They don’t have to post a shot, they just have to post. This keeps things a little more interactive with each other!
The Tug-of-War Round 1 will go until June 5, after which round 2 starts between the two winning cabins in Round 1.
The Bioblitz goes the whole time.
The Fishing Derby goes the whole time.
Now, how do we find out which cabin reigns supreme? Through participation! And WINNING. Every person who participates wins 1 point for their cabin. Each win gets 10 points for their cabin.

Are there prizes? Absolutely not, this is for determining the camp menu. The points are literally just there to drive RP participation and make it easier for people to jump in! But… if the winning team wants to, they can collectively choose a dessert and then Scara will attempt to make the dessert. And post pictures. And a recipe. The stakes COULD NOT BE LOWER.

If you want some RP ideas, there are several prompts in the main thread. But if you need a jumping-off point, feel free to use any of these as well!
And of course, you don’t have to do any of these! They’re just jumping-off points if you want some ideas for RPing in this realm.

As she watched the campers scatter, Fish stood tall, bullhorn at her hip and clipboard in hand. "Now just to square everyone away," she said with a chuckle. The first day of summer was always the best day of summer. She flopped into a well-worn canvas chair in front of the central fire pit, ready to help direct campers and counselors... and... avoid the fishing derby. For now. She would certainly participate later, just to show the kids how it was done. But it was always so hard to resist abandoning her post and just tossing her lure with wild abandon.

For Fish, the realm seemed to have always existed. That was part of its charm, its healing nature. Things were new, but not horribly unpredictable- like the Swamp, the eternal cycle just, well. It just was. It had always been summer. It would always be summer. And she would always be here, ready to help. She was a comforting presence, the heartbeat of the realm, and she was here to be there for everyone.

(Feel free to just tag Fish at random! She's here to interact with anyone and everyone!)

He’d only wanted to visit the woods. The smell of pines, mixed with something oddly nostalgic and comforting drawing him towards a particular tree in the limitless forest. The mountains were calling, pulling at his heart like the string of a bow.

He hadn’t immediately stepped inside, obviously. Thrill of the Hunt wasn’t a fool. He’d made it this far cautiously, watching other kin as they approached and then disappeared into various mystery realms, and only once he’d decided it was safe and worth the trouble, did he finally decide it was time to try it himself.

Immediately he wished he hadn’t.

There were so many children. God, he hated kids.

Hunter grimaced and swiped the green bandana, barely listening to the explanations provided. Camp counsellor, sure whatever. Make sure the kids don’t die; make sure they win. Easy enough. If he didn’t decide to just run off into the mountains, there was no way the green team wasn’t taking the competition by storm.

He had settled into this new skin surprisingly easy, as if he had worn something similar before.

“I’ll take care of the archery section,” he informed the person who seemed to be in charge.

His fingers twitched, itching for a bow.

Scaramouche Fandango wrote: ↑Wed May 29, 2024 10:16 am

Heart and Home had gone suspiciously long without getting herself lost. In fact, so much time had passed since she last wandered and found herself turned around that she was actually missing that feeling of discovery.

Was it chance or fate that she eventually came upon the Limitless Forest, curiosity and excitement pushing her forward until she dared to go through the door that smelled of pine and Summer. Blue eyes blinked, and Joy was staring in front of the lodge. Her attention was quickly drawn to Real Big Fish (it was difficult not to, the woman had iron lungs) and the announcement that camp was officially open for the Summer. Campers and counselors alike were going to their cabin and Joy donned her Green Bandana to identify herself to the other campers.

Hearing that another counsellor from the Busy Beaver cabin, Joy smiled in relief to know someone had already stepped up to handle the archery portion. She wasn't exactly confident when it came to the more sporty of activities, nor was she particularly perceptive. But between the two remaining games, she figured one of them would benefit from a few more hands. "I can help with organizing the Tug-of-War," she said, letting her fellow Busy Beaver and the head counsellor know she was volunteering.

Ruriska wrote:

Scaramouche Fandango wrote:

------------

Thanks to her recent departure from her old den, One Big Fish had taken to roaming and getting to see more of the swamp. It was because she didn't have a clear end-goal in mind that she arrived in the Limitless Forest. And while she was apprehensive at first, the lack of immediate danger encouraged her to keep exploring.

Something about the scent of pine drew her in and after thinking and rethinking, she figured she would live the life Westward Spirit helped her realize she wanted. Adventure awaited her, and so she entered.

After the opening speech, Mary wandered to her cabin. She studied the bright orange bandana that represented her group and debated on what she could or should do now. As One Big Fish, she couldn't remember the last time she ever felt like a child. And now as Mary, she was being given the opportunity to make up for lost time.

So she opted to do as her cabin's motto. She thought about what she would do next.

Dive In | Dive

There's nothing more fun than camp, Dive is sure. She runs towards the sound of the bullhorn, ready to get started on whatever was in store for her. She's supposed to choose a cabin, and she reads the descriptions briefly before grabbing the green bandana. "Yeah, we can do it!" She says, mostly to herself. She hopes her cabinmates are ready to win.

She has never been to Camp Spirit Bear - or any summer camp quite like it - but she's sure she was going to love it all: the games, the campfire songs, doing whatever she wants in the great outdoors.

Now what to do first? She wants to do all of them but she decides to head towards the Fishing Derby first. Dive loves to fish. She nearly runs into someone she barely saw on her way. "Sorry!" She yells.



The Sound of Trees | Willow

Camp wasn't really Willow's scene. It's not that Willow minds being outdoors; actually she loves the earthy smell and the breeze through her hair. She just doesn't understand why instead of just letting her take a nap under the tree or chat with a friend, everyone wants to do so many things. It's summer break and she just wants to relax, not keep track of points or be encouraged to run around.

Her goal this year? To get away with doing as little as possible while finding herself a camp best friend or two to be lazy with. She grabs the red bandana and heads to the nearest shade. As she reaches it, another camper races past her, almost knocking her over. She sidesteps the other camper and flops onto the ground.

She surveys the other games from a distance. Archery actually does sound interesting.

Dive In | Dive

Dive loves fishing. That doesn't mean she's any good at it. As she gets to the lake, she hardly pays attention to the rules. Grabbing a fishing rod, she throws in a line without hesitation and with such gusto that it scares away most of the fish, skittish as they are. Oops.

Where she lives, fishing is a common pasttime. But Dive is far too impatient and clumsy. She loves the feeling of catching a fish, but she doesn't like the sitting around silently and waiting part. And however those around her tries to teach her the techniques, she's also not very good at listening or doing the same motions over and over again. She does however have almost a fifth sense when it comes to figuring out where the fish are. It comes with fishing a lot with people who know how to fish maybe.

Finding little initial success, Dive tries to throw it in more deftly and finally manages to catch a fish. A very small one, but it was a good start. She finds better success after, but pulls in only small fish. Twice, she gets quite a tug but the line breaks because she reels it in too eagerly. She ends up with just seven fish, one a little larger but could only be describe as modest at best.

It doesn't dampen her enthusiasm for camp though. She'll just have to do better at the next thing.

As the second counsellor announced her intentions, Hunter gave a shrug of his shoulders as if to say ‘don’t tell me about it’ and then he was striding off, making a beeline to the archery field.

It wasn’t long before he had a bow in his hands and was inspecting the line of targets. With any luck, none of the kids would even bother to show up and then he could just spend the day here taking shots and avoiding any actual work.

He pulled out an arrow, testing the weight and fletching. Not ideal but could have been a lot worse. It would pass.

Heart and Home || Joy

While waiting for sign ups for the tug-of-war to go up, Joy set off to familiarize herself better with the camp grounds itself as well as to check on the campers, be they from her cabin or another's. While there was the spirit of competition, it didn't mean one should turn your back on someone in need just because they weren't on the same team.

She perked up when she saw there were some campers and a counsellor was at the archery range, considered popping over to help but figured the counsellor already there knew what they were doing and had things well in hand. Not wanting to step on someone else's toes, Joy headed off to where some campers were fishing. Maybe she can encourage more kids to try it out by doing some fishing as well.

Joy wasn't much of a fisher, but it wasn't about being good at something. It was about the experience and getting to try things out. So it was wonderful to see a camper from her cabin had the same idea. "How're they biting?" she asked, setting her own equipment down in an open spot. She made sure not to sit too close to anyone else, thinking that it would somehow affect the bait. Maybe she was right, maybe she was wrong, maybe her technique could use a lot of work as all the fish she ever caught also got away.

Actually, it might even be the same one coming to try to steal her bait each and every time! What were the odds that that was what was happening? She might have to ask some of the other counsellors about it, it would be too embarassing to ask a camper.

xIllusei wrote:

Ruriska wrote: ↑Wed May 29, 2024 10:26 am

Fish breathed a sigh of relief. The archery section was always extremely popular and needed supervision- and she could always trust her wonderful counselors to help. That was really one of the things she valued most about the experience. She might be in charge, but it wasn't her show. Anybody could lead, and she loved to see people flourish and bloom where they found interest.

"Wonderful!" she boomed, beaming. "Thank you for the initiative! I'm sure our campers will be in great hands- just holler if you need help with any of the targets and someone can pop in for an assist.

Strange Creature had an extremely happy childhood that had evolved into a mostly-happy adulthood, and she had always been at her happiest when chasing after animals. Lizards, primarily. Any reptile or amphibian was good. Birds had... become an issue, but they hadn't always been.

And that was something she noticed here. The reversion to fearlessness. The eagerness, the anticipation, the sheer willful determination to have a Pretty Good Time. This realm, with its fresh pine scent and crisp summer breeze, was a place of healing and nurturing and nature...ing? That was the bit she was most excited about, was getting to spend so much time in a new environment.

Choosing a cabin wasn't a problem at all. Even though she wasn't particularly fond of orange, per se, she was extremely fond of gopher snakes. So she grabbed an orange bandanna and sprinted, shoes heavy and unusual on her legs, to the bioblitz station.

She heard about the game from one of the counselors on the bus. A contest to see who could spot the most species in a short amount of time? Count her in!

[will edit oncei have rolls...]

One Big Fish || Mary

The idea of looking for things without needing to eat them was appealing to Mary. She couldn't remeber being able to just look at things to appreciate them without needing to be all pragmatic about it. Even though a certain totoma was helping her slowly learn to take things as they were, it was going to take a long time to unlearn things.

Despite being alone, she was going to do her best. She might even argue she did her best work by herself. Pen and scorecard in hand, a jug of water strapped to her hip, and a towel draped over one shoulder, she started searching through camp. She approached the task methodically, trying to map the best route to find as many as she could in one go. She liked to think it was skill that she was able to find a good variety of critters and plants, lichen and moss, a beetle, three spiders, a squirrel and a chipmunk. She was grateful that in searching for spiderwebs up in the trees she was able to spot three different types of birds flying overhead.

Not bad, she didn't get all the kinds but this was a decent haul.

Dive In starts slightly at the voice, having been staring quite intently at the water, hoping for a fish.

"Not as much as I hoped," Dive responds to the new competitor joining the fishing derby. Looking over, she notices the same green bandana. "Oh, we're in the same cabin! We can do it!" She adds excitedly, recalling the motto she likes so much. She sees that the other individual was a little older. A counselor perhaps.

However, Dive watches with disappointment as they both have little luck in fishing. "Maybe there aren't many fish," she says, in an attempt to comfort them both.

"I'm going to Bioblitz next! Do you want to come with?" She asks. Running around the forest sounds like fun too. She doesn't really wait for a response before she dashes towards it.

HuniPi wrote:

After a nap, Willow feels ready to stretch her limbs. Let's try archery, she thinks. She needs something to pass the time.

She approaches the range, where someone seems to be lost in his own world with a bow. He looks to be the one in charge, although he pays her no mind.

How hard could it be to just figure it out on her own? She picks up a bow and an arrow and pulls experimentally. Okay, maybe a little harder than it looks. The bow feels heavy in her hands and the string more taut than expected.

She tries to get more comfortable, looking over at the older archer to mimick his form and watch him shoot. He is really good, Willow thinks, impressed.

After she thinks she has the hang of what he's doing, she gets ready and shoots. Here goes nothing.

Ruriska wrote:

Heart and Home || Joy

"Absolutely we can do it!" Joy replied in kind, beaming from ear to ear. "I think a lot of campers have been trying to fish before us. Might have scared them away. Don't worry, tomorrow's a new day!" She hoped she was being encouraging when they both fared poorly with the whole fishing bit.

Whether she was effective was to be seen but she was glad that the younger girl was happy to participate in the other activities. She figured she could be nearby, even if she wasn't particularly good at spotting things. She did make sure to mark where they would go once they entered the wooded area. Less for the camper's safety and more of Joy's. Look, she did her best work in the heart of the camp where there were cabins and tables.

Trees had a habit of looking like each other and getting Joy turned around. But she was taking steps to mitigate that whole "I got lost in the woods. Again." bit.

Illusei wrote:

Dive rushes into the forest, not worried about getting lost at all. All she sees, at first, are trees. "Fir tree," she says, looking up. Then looking down again, she realizes, "Oh, fern too. And milkweed!"

She has better luck with the mosses, having just learned it in her biology class. Dive In likes moss. They look weird and cool, so she remembers a lot of that lesson. Cat-tail moss and yellow moss and badge moss - there is a lot to look at.

Then she crouches down onto the ground looking for little critters. It is like another world on the forest floor, she marvels. She stares at each one closely, watching them crawl around. She finds a lot of spiders, which gives Dive the creepy crawlies. "Ew a centipede," she says. Even worse.

With that done, she runs towards a small lake to look for fish and frogs. Dive In sticks her head near the water, watching fish swim by. A few birds are also by the water, looking for fish themselves.

In fact, birds are everywhere now that Dive is looking around. She hears them chirping as she walks through the forest. She also sees chipmunks and squirrels running up a tree and a small mouse and a rabbit too.

Dive turns around to see the other girl walking carefully behind her. "Do you count as a mammal?"

Looking around her, she realizes also she has no idea where camp is.

HuniPi wrote: