Highlights from Slide Ranch Summer Camp 2024
From June 10 through August 16, over 900 Bay Area children and teens age 5-18 got a delightful dose of fresh air, a spoonful of splendid scenery, and a bucketful of inspiring nature nurture experiences at our Summer Camp. We loved having them all here! We hope our campers have many cherished memories from their summer experiences we shared at Slide Ranch. We've put together a collection of photos from all 10 weeks of Summer Camp to show you the variety of activities and exciting adventures we got up to--it was a blast! Enjoy.
Did you know every program at Slide Ranch is subsidized by donations?
Your gift of any size directly supports our education programs so that ALL Bay Area children, including those from low income and underserved communities, get equal access to nature education.
It costs $75 to cover the costs for a child to attend a Slide Ranch education program.
Help a child experience what your campers experienced at Slide Ranch. Thank you in advance for your generosity.
Summer Camp Summary
We welcomed campers, ages 5-13, and Junior Environmental Educators, ages 14-18, throughout the summer to engage in all aspects of our ranch. Our weekly themes ranged from Junior Ranchers, Farm to Belly, Pollinators & Plants, and National Park Lands. Campers’ days were filled with discovery! Children learn best and create the most vivid memories when they engage their senses and our campers learned about the natural world by touching, tasting, smelling, hearing, seeing and doing.
Campers spent time with our goats and sheep - often cheering them on as they did pasture run-out, milked our goats, played with our kids (of the goat variety) - Georgia and Charlotte, visited with our baby chicks, found clues about all the wild animals that live in our coastal ecosystem; made sculptures with beach clay; learned about skeletal anatomy by re-creating bony animals at the Bone Grove; learned about bees and other pollinators, decomposers, composting, garden plants, created fairy houses in the garden, played in our forts, roasted s’mores over a campfire, made sun tea with herbs from the garden, and talked about how we can take care of the earth.
Some campers went on a trash hunt, meandered through the Fennel forest and all through the tidepools; listened to the sounds of crashing waves and sea birds; felt sand under their feet and built sand and stone habitats, rainbows of rocks, and learned a little geology along the way! We painted using water from the ocean; created native bee habitat from fennel, washed and carded wool from our sheep, and participated in many scavenger hunts and spontaneous explorations.
We saw so many whales! Wow!! Observed a great-horned owl visitor swooping through our pasture. We practiced principles of organic gardening and animal care, undertook stewardship projects, and investigated life cycles and reciprocal relationships with the animals, plants, and the wild lands. We harvested zucchini, kale, chard, rhubarb, fresh herbs and more to make a ton of yummy food including homemade pizza dough, lemon poppy seed cookies, zucchini muffins, honey cakes, rhubarb cakes and jam, delicious stir fries, seed muffins and crackers, butter and cheese, and more! We made herbed popcorn, learned where popcorn comes from (it’s growing in our garden!), that people and goats eat alfalfa (at different stages of it’s growth cycle), and to give thanks for the foods we eat and be mindful of all the processes and people involved in getting it to our bellies.
Slide Ranch is a really special place where kids get to ask and answer many questions. We celebrate these inquiries and rich, sensory adventures for children, and hope all of our campers have special Slide Ranch memories and experiences they will carry with them forever.