We had a great first week of Afterschool Enrichment!

Fall programs are underway! The afterschool program at the Old Town Rec is filled with fun activities for the kids. Each age group rotates between arts & crafts and sports that are age-appropriate to ensure that your child has a safe and fun time. We recently partnered with our Tactical Nerf friends and had a Nerf gun battle during our afternoon program! The kids had a blast! We are so excited for the fall and can't wait to see your kids every day!

We love the outdoors!

Some Nerf team members needed a refill of darts.

These ladies made some gifts to give away. How sweet!

What a beautiful creation!

Our counselors love to help your kids!

Even dads like crafts at the Rec!

UMaine Rock Wall

Our Outdoor Adventure Program campers explored their limits last week at the UMaine Rock Wall. We've been secretly turning the campers into mountain goats!

Just hanging out?

 Yikes! That wall is straight up!

 Think she can touch the ceiling?

 That rock wall is 32' high! 

Is that wall slanted? Looks tricky!

To learn more about the rock wall at UMaine, go to their website: http://umaine.edu/mainebound/indoor-rock-climbing-center/

Field Trip to Fort Knox

Sixty-one campers and a crew of counselors squeezed onto the bus driven by our fearless bus driver, Susan. They traveled downriver to Fort Knox in Prospect, one of the best preserved fortifications on the New England seacoast. It was built during the 1840s and briefly housed soldiers. 

Campers loved the giant hide-and-seek game on the fort grounds. A downpour cooled them off during lunch. Thank goodness for covered pavilions! Many children checked out the gift shop looking for a souvenir of the trip. Swords and harmonicas were the hot items this year. For some reason, the counselors made the campers wait until returning to the Rec to try out their musical prowess on the harmonica. No fun! 

Old Town Rec is Out of this World!

Week 6 of Summer Camp was filled with space-age adventures! We celebrated the Mission to Mars with fun and games this week. Martian Manhunt was a favorite among our older campers and our youngest campers enjoyed Attack of the Martians! Our community room now looks like a galaxy; it’s filled with papier mache planets made by our campers! During the hot, summer days, we cooled off at the Orono Pool. That’s always a special treat! On Friday we blasted off to see the stars at the UMaine Emera Astronomy Center and searched for Geocaches on the UMaine campus! The campers were amazed by the story of the stars and had an astronomical time!

We’re celebrating Around the World during week 7 of summer camp. Each day we’ll explore crafts and games related to the continents. Monday starts off with a “trip” to Africa. We’d love some adventurous campers to join us! Asia is our destination on Tuesday. Have you ever played Ninja Dodgeball? Come and try it out! On Wednesday,prepare to learn about North American history at Fort Knox in Prospect! Latin rhythms and games are the plan for Thursday as we learn about South America, and on Friday we’ll end our week with some European fun! It’s sure to be a great journey!

This week's update

News from the Old Town Recreation Center

            Old Town Recreation Center’s Outdoor Adventure group, now self-named the Pathfinders, have been busy exploring! In the last two weeks, they hiked Acadia Mountain, mountain biked on the University of Maine trails, and hung around at Extreme Adventures ropes course.

            Our younger campers celebrated Water, Water, Everywhere this week with water balloons, relays, water gun battles, and swimming. Friday’s carnival, sponsored by the Bangor Rec Department, was so much fun! Each camper had tickets to participate in fun carnival games at Hayford Park in Bangor. There were so many games to choose from! Bounce houses, hula-hoop toss, Minute-to-Win-It, a dunk tank, face painting, and so much more! All of the campers had a great time!

            The last week of July is our Mission to Mars week. We are going to the planetarium and will have lots of space-themed fun. Hope to see you soon!

Tactical Nerf

One of our new Old Town Rec offerings this year is Tactical Nerf. 

Kids are introduced to the exciting arena of competitive Nerf play.  Various Nerf missions provide them with the opportunity to learn critical thinking, team building, good sportsmanship and get plenty of exercise.  Basic missions are the focus of this session, such as Elimination and Capture the Flag. Recruits also practice target shooting. 
Each session is 6 weeks long. This current session ends at the beginning of August, so be watching for another great session of Tactical Nerf to come this fall! 


The focus is on fun and safety. Equipment is provided during sessions, including protective eyewear, a team jersey, guns and ammo. No personal Nerf equipment is needed. 

You can learn more about Tactical Nerf at their website: www.tacticalnerf.org.

Paper Plate Weaving

We tried a new craft last week called Paper Plate Weaving. Our Explorers are fast learners and caught on quickly! Some of them worked on their weaving for the rest of the week. They were seen weaving during free play and during story time. They just didn't stop! Check it out!

The First Annual Paper Airplane Golf Tournament

We tried out some new activities during our Life is Great week and the campers had a blast!

Paper Airplane Golf

Many of our campers have tried mini-golfing, but they've never golfed with paper airplanes! After a time of folding and creating, we took the paper airplanes out to the course. Our campers formed teams and golfed by throwing their airplanes toward the targets. The breeze added an extra challenge and leveled the playing field! They counted the number of throws to get their score and then added up the scores at the end. 

Our big team winner was The Llamas, a team created by Rhiannon, Emma, Jadyn, and Bella! Congratulations!

Congratulations to our top individual scorers!

4th place - Keegan

3rd place tie - Brody and Jarek

2nd place - Emma

1st place - Rhiannon

The Longhorns

The Nerf Warriors

#1/Lil Man Team

The tongue makes the airplane faster, right?

 Here's half of the Girl Power team

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The Flying Squirrels
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Congratulations to The Llamas, winners of the first annual paper airplane golf tournament!

Outdoor Adventure Program Highlights

The Outdoor Adventure Program has been busy so far this summer! 

Heres a short video recapping the last few weeks. 

Next week (July 20-July 24) starts our Mountain Biking session, so check back here for more video updates! Better yet, come join in on the fun if you are a 6th-8th grader!

OTRec Campers Live It Up During Wacky Tacky Week

What do you get when you add wild and crazy activities to a fun schedule? 

Wacky Tacky Week! 

The Old Town Recreation Center was filled with wacky and tacky campers this week, from mismatched outfits to crazy hairstyles! We played some familiar games with a wacky twist, like Backwards Kickball, Giant Four-Square, and Lawn Twister. The highlight of the week was our Wednesday field trip, which was to the Beth Pancoe Pool and Waterslides in Bangor. It was a refreshing treat on a hot afternoon.

The Explorers learned how to Dum Dum Diddy Diddy!

It's a Giant Memory game!

We have an amazing group of artists here!

How do you make a Wacky Tacky hat?

Watch out for the double-horned Wacky Tacky campers!

These ladies found a relaxing spot under the apple trees during free play.

These two campers like to play in their forest fortress during free play. 

Tee-pee building is a fun free play activity!

It was crazy hair day and this camper is all tied up in knots!

How quickly can you fish for marbles with your toes?
What if the water is filled with ice? Brrr!

Swinging is a relaxing way to enjoy free play!

Our giant sandbox is a lot of fun!

"Groundies" is a popular free play game at OTRec. Even our counselors like to play it!

Baseball season may be over, but these two are always up for a game!

We have a great group of campers. They are so patient while waiting for their turn at four-sqaure!

 Lunch time!

 Our field trip this week was so much fun! These campers had a great time swimming!