Today was a bittersweet day for us here at Camp Manitoqua. Cabins G & H, the first 30 beds on the girl's side of our grounds, came down today. In less than an hour, thirty bunk beds were demolished along with about 60 years of camp history. What once was a place where a camper laid their head down after putting their faith in Christ for the first time after the campfire during overnight camp has now been reduced to a large pile of splinters, toothpicks.

All that wood, painted in the radiant "Manitoqua Red", that was used to allow kids to process the grief of losing a parent or being bullied at school will probably get recycled and turned into a sheet of plywood to go up on a house.

Change is normal and part of business, ministry, and life.
Change is hard.

A broken down cabin will give birth to something new. We are excited about what God has laid on our hearts as a ministry to serve our campers and guests. What once was cabins G & H and thirty beds will soon be a larger building. Within this building will be sixty beds, showers, and toilets within the cabin, and more accessible bunks (we are no longer able to have the triple high bunks).

If you want to purchase parts the cabins to help remember your time, check out the options here. 

Here are some of the most common questions we get from people:

1. Why are you knocking down cabins?
2. What was wrong with the current cabins?
3. How many cabins do you plan to build?
4. Why not knock them down all at the same time?

Here is our best attempt to answers those questions...

Why are you knocking down cabins and what was wrong with the current ones?

Our ministry context is unique and is hard to compare to other camps in areas similar to ours. We have 100 acres of property that is entirely surrounded by upper-middle-class subdivisions. Our surrounding neighborhoods and schools come with certain amenities and accommodations that a rustic camp like ours are not equipped with.
Over the years the concern regarding campers and guests having to leave the cabins to walk to the bathhouse has increased. Getting away and "coming to camp" for summer camp or a retreat is hard enough, to begin with. Anxiety is already high for both the camper and the parent.

We work hard to decrease people's anxiety while they are here to have the best experience possible. We believe these new cabins will accommodate that type of experience for our guests.

How many cabins do you plan to build and why not knock them all down at the same time?

The master plan at this point has us building three total cabins like what you see above. Two on the west side of our grounds (boy's side) and one on the east side (girl's side).
We can't knock them all down at once and build all new for a few reasons. One being that our retreat side of camp has been growing and we have over 150 guests on our grounds from the beginning of February through Thanksgiving. Therefore we don't have the capacity to be down that many cabins at once.

Also, we don't have the money to build all these cabins. At this point, we have the funds to build this one cabin. If you are willing to help us build this cabin and make a donation, you can do so here.
_ _ _

With all that to say, we could use prayers for this process. Pray that the trades can all work safely and timely as they tear down the old cabin and build the new one. Pray for the Village and their inspections to make sure these are as safe as possible for our future guests. Pray for the campers and guests that will stay in these cabins and make new memories just like the old version of the cabin was able to provide. Above all, pray that God is glorified by our faithfulness to His call on this ministry.

We will keep you posted when there is more to share!