Retreat - first day!

"Note: any links on this page reference to various recordings. To download the recording, right click the file and click save target as. Under Windows.


Welcome to Estes park, where snow and cold mix together in creating unique experiences.

The first day has been interesting so far. I was one of the first students to arrive at the airport. We were supposed to meet at the fountain, but to our shock (and amazement) it was empty - no water! So instead of a fountain, we all stood by a railing beyond which was only empty space.

Perhaps Bryan was the first to see me arrive at the "fountain". He works with Global Explorers and will be going on our trip -- and his personality I think will bring lots of positive energy to a group if need be. In some way he is like me in terms of being goofy and serious at the same time.
In fact, while we were standing around for the rest of our group to arrive, Bryan saw a drumline not far from us - the Troopers. He kept saying, "wouldn't it be nice to get a private band?" and later on actually walked up to the band and asked if they could
Play the drums for us
Which we enjoyed and found quite entertaining!

The rest of the day went by pretty fast. I was surprised to find out that there were actually 6 girls and 4 guys instead of 5 and 5 as I previously thought. Not good. This kind of offsets the female ratio...
Everyone in the group is from different places, and this made our conversations all that more interesting. We spent quite some time in the vans talking with Michelle from Canada and how life in that nation is different from how we live in the United States. I myself spent time with a couple people, discussing philosophy and conspiracy topics with a few students during our lunch.

The YMCA we stayed at in Estes park was very nice and good with accommodations. Well. To a degree. Our food often times wasn't the best, though I enjoyed the bacon-potato soup which was served for our dinner. Our rooms, which were located in a separate building on the camp grounds, were quite nice as well. They each had 1 queen and king sized bed, with a bunk bed in the corner. I took the top bunk while my room mate Robbie slept in one of the other beds. I enjoy sleeping at a high elevation level. :)

Dinner was followed by some very interesting activities dealing with leadership.
Global Explorers has a very unique and good leadership motto. A good leader relates well with others, reflects upon the past and future of his actions, and responds in an effective manner. During the night, we explored these qualities in depth. Bryan made up an interesting activity of "saving the planet". Each of us in groups of 3 had to create a plan for a new civilization. We had to find good leaders who could lead this planet and thus use the Relate-reflect-respond model to think of proper people.
This is what really took us through the night of the first day - from 6 to around 10 PM. By the time we got into bed, everyone was very tired and I only had energy to take a shower and fall into bed. Saturday would be our ONLY full day of the retreat. All of us were excited to be meeting Erik, who was scheduled to arrive on due course around 10 in the morning.