Camp+Angora


 * [[image:IMG_6478.JPG.JPG]][[image:IMG_0237.JPG]][[image:IMG_6384.JPG.JPG]]Camp **** Angora **

We had a very good camp in the Angora, this year it was great. The children worked exceptionally well as a team, they were positive, they displayed and excellent level of camping skills, they had fun.

We also worked very hard and in three days covered some important areas of the curriculum including: Much of the camp is about camping. Each tent group planned and cooked their own food and cleaned up after themselves. Food was a highlight of the camp, we had some great menus and not one failure.
 * 1) A study of the Angora Stream where we looked at the health of the stream. This included studying the animals present and using them as an indicator to the stream’s health (some animals only live in very good quality water so we measured their presence). We also measured the pollution level, the ph, the stream’s flow and the nature of the rills and ponding. We worked for a morning with Anna from Horizons who brought excellent knowledge to help us.
 * 2) A study of the geology which included such things as sedimentation, tilting, uplifting, erosion and identification of some rock types. We also know that the area was formed in the Pliocene era and that its development took 150 odd million years.
 * 3) We studied the geomorphology of the area and mapped things like river terraces, ox-bow lakes, fords, river cliffs and many other things. We worked to understand how the Angora Stream had created the landscape.
 * 4) We used a map to locate places (a fun but frustrating mapping course).
 * 5) We learned how to read a compass and found our way.

At nights we went eeling which was a highlight. We eel with a string and meat on the end, no hook as we do not want to damage the precious long finned eels in the creeks. We have many good fishing stories, the big ones that escaped, but we caught four which we naturalized into Brian’s wetland.

We also did a little tramping, swam under the waterfall and found lots of insects and birds including mosquitoes at night.

Our thanks to Tahi Sciascia our pare nt help, Karena Sciascia for helping get our gear back to Porangahau and of course Brian Hales for the generous use of his farm and time.