This time of year, do you get nostalgic for summer camp? That magical mix of being thrown together with a bunch of strangers into the remote, openness of the forest. But also, being crammed into a cabin with 20 disgusting other kids! The skits! The bug juice! The campfires! Yep, that’s summer camp. It’s terrible! Here are redditors who weighed in with their summer camp horror stories.
1. User shortergirl06 got chicken pox from some kid, even though the kid totally covered his bases by ignoring the fact that he had chicken pox.
was a counselor at a day camp. Little shit came to camp with "all these spots and they're itchy, Ms. Shortergirl." I look, and the kid was covered in chicken pox. The camp director called the Mom to come pick him up. When she got there, she screamed at him, "I told you not to tell anyone!"
Yeah, 3 days later I was taking a bath in Calamine lotion and trying not to die.
2. Come on, Exelaustica, it could've just been water from the ol' swimmin' hole, or the ol' fishin' hole.
I was at a tennis camp when I was 12 and there was a kid standing in the middle of a circle of kids, we were playing a game or something. He randomly started urinating and asked "why is there water coming out of my pants?"
3. The Internet was made for people like poopurnickle to brag about getting beat up by a toddler.
I used to be a sports specialist, which just means instead of being a counselor with the same bunk all day, the kids would come to us for a sport of some kind and then leave and we'd get new campers. One day a little girl was crying because she wasn't on the team of her friend and I explained that these things happen in life and we gotta deal. She refused to play and was just crying so I decided to mock cry back and show this 4 yr old how dumb she looked cause that's how I get down. After about 30 seconds of really making her feel stupid she punched in me in the face. It was awesome. I was such a dickhead to a 4 year old she punched me in the face.
4. Camps take place in the wilderness, and izzielosthermind has been reminded of that many times.
I’ve been awoken by the sound of a bear trying to remove my bathing suit from the clothing line, then giving up and just licking the water drops off it.
A porcupine stalked me all the way from the showers back to my cabin for 2 nights in a row.
While I was trying to prove the lake was safe to swim in a fish bit me on the toe and wouldn't let go. I gave them a huge speech about how safe the lake was while it nommed on my flesh.
5. User campnursesbecrazy worked with a camp nature director who demonstrated how to direct nature right into its grave.
Campers decapitated a chipmunk with a bucket (supposedly by accident, never got the full story). Nature director caught a rattlesnake, then killed it and fed it to the staff (surprisingly delicious) and kept the skull as a trophy. Once a camp dog humped a female counselor to completion (he was neutered shortly after).
6. You know what's worse than a swarm of angry bees? According to qx9650, a swam of angry hornets.
Was guiding a trail group along a trail to the lake, didn't know that the group that had passed 10 minutes before had some chucklefuck kids that took turns kicking a ground hornet nest. My group got swarmed. 19 kids went one direction, and a single kid went the other direction covered in hornets. I yelled at him to stop and roll on the ground, and I caught up. Killed the hornets and probably got about 20 stings myself. The little kid looked at me from the ground and tearfully said "I'm allergic."
I radioed my colleague and had her take over the rest of the group, and I put the little guy on my shoulders and started the long hike back…and I got him back to camp before he went into shock.
7. You know that dream where you're covered in spiders and you wake up and you still think you're covered in spiders? That wasn't a dream for ronniejean1.
I went to this girl scout sleep away camp for the first time one summer. I woke up covered in daddy long legs. Apparently, that part of the camp was having a bit of an infestation lately and they hadn't mentioned it. That traumatized me for life.
8. This story from oakpath is just really gross. Oh man.
So this one kid, 4th or 5th grade, had to use the bathroom after we went on about a mile walk with about 20 campers. Luckily we were by some bathrooms at a local pond. The kid was in there for a while and me and the other counselor got tired of entertaining the other children so I walk over and banged on the door. The kid walks out and acts like everything is normal. I look at him and say "Is that...is that poo on your chin??" He shat everywhere. the floor, the toilet, the handle, the sink, all four walls, the ceiling, arms, hands, chin, clothes, shoes. I guess he had intense diarrhea. We assumed it got on his hands and he was flicking it and trying to clean it up with balled up TP.
9. Take it from hootysapperticker: if you're going to pretend to eat poop, do make sure that it is not really poop.
worked as a hiking and tracking instructor for 11 and 12 year old campers. I had this trick I would play on them where I would take a brownie and mold it to look like poop then leave it on a rock along the trail. I would then hike them by it, and stop and point out to them that poop was one way to identify animals in the woods. Making a big show of it, I would pick up the brownie and have a taste, and all of the kids would freak out. Was a wonderful joke until the one time a camper decided to try it for themselves with a poo they found along the trail.
10. A user named thisisntnamman was a counselor at a camp so bad that it will make you want to barf.
Nighttime, 15 campers, me and a senior counselor waiting for our cabin's turn to hit the showers at the bath house. Its a chill downtime, most campers in their bunks or playing cards quietly. I'm reading.
One camper ate way too much candy, after eating way too much dinner. He sits up sharply. "I'm sick"
No sooner had the words left his mouth when he proceeds to projectile vomit skittles and hot dog 5-6 feet across the cabin onto another kid.
Kid B, who had his fair share of red cool aid that night, after being covered in vomit himself proceeds to projectile vomit, but onto the kid in the bunk next to him.
Kid C, now covered in bright red vomit, proceeds to get up and run to the back door of the cabin so he can, I presume, vomit off the balcony, but starts vomiting immediately, and frequently, leaving a trail of vomit all the way down the center isle.
11. Like many people, 5cati"experimented" at camp. It somehow involved a Nintendo DSi. (It didn't end well.)
When I was 12/13 I had a Nintendo DSi. The DSi had the capability to take photos and edit them. I decided it would be hilarious if I took a of picture of my junk and enlarge everything (it looked like I had elephantitis). I then erased the middle of my titanic sack, and turned it into a boarder for other pictures (I wanted to take a bunch of artsy pictures and have it be surrounded by my nuts). Think I forgot about the camp part? Nah. I decided to bring my DSi on a camp trip to a water park. The bus ride is long, and I needed entertainment. What could go wrong? Well, I was in a group of friends where I was the only guy, and I found most of the girls attractive. One of the girls that was all over me the entire week at camp was sitting next to me on the bus and wanted to play some games on my DSi. I'm a nice guy, so I let her play. After around 30 minutes I looked over to her and she had the blankest expression on her face. I looked at my DSi and there was an artsy picture of a forest with my "boarder" surrounding it on the screen. She found where I buried my nuts. I tried to grab my gaming consul back with shock and embarrassment on my face. But it was too late. She turned around and showed the rest of the group. Needless to say I sat alone on the bus ride home crying while playing pokemon diamond.
12. Have you ever made "flour bombs"? User stickwit has, and they're totally fun, except when they destroy somebody's testicles.
we played this game called Mission Impossible one night of each session. Basically what happened was that certain counselors were designated as Wanted, and they would wear flag football belts. The boundaries extended into the forest and the counselors could be hiding anywhere within them. The cabin that captured the most flags won the mission. The game was a blast and everyone would dress in camo and wear headlamps.
That particular year the guy counselors thought it was hilarious to hide in trees or behind trees and throw flour bombs at the other guy counselors. For those who don't know, you fill a balloon with flour and when it hits someone they're covered head to toe in white flour. That night it started raining during the game, and when flour gets wet, it hardens. So one of the guys didn't realize this and slung the flour bomb, now rock hard, straight into another guy's crotch. He immediately turned green and passed out. An ambulance had to come and we later learned that he lost a testicle. Because of a flour bomb.
13. There's just so much talk about testicles among the boys at any camp that beaverfever14 was totally right to think it was a "boy who cried wolf" situation. (Spoiler: This is another story that ends in testicular trauma.)
This kid in my bunk one day screamed from the shower, "Hey, guys, I think this is bad, one of my nuts is bigger than the other!" Like any of us wanted to take a look at his nuts. So we, and all of the counselors ignored him.
Throughout the course of the week, this kid keeps going on and on about his enlarged testicle. Still, nobody cares, and we all figure he just wants some attention. Finally, one day, he runs buck-naked into the middle of the cabin with what appeared to be a tennis ball between his legs. A pink, enflamed tennis ball.
The counselors called an ambulance and then made the kid call his parents, since none of them wanted to tell a bunch of scared parents that their kid's testicle was large enough to play wall-ball with
14. LumpySpacePrincess14 shouldn't have let something like a kid cracking his head open ruin a perfectly good hike in the woods.
I was a counselor for a weeklong trip with a class of 5th graders. We all split off into groups; some stayed at camp and others went hiking. We ended up finding this gorgeous rock pool with a waterfall. One of my kids asked me if he could jump from a rock into the water and I said sure. Big mistake. Well, now there's about 25 5th graders jumping from 20 foot high rocks.. I didn't think much of it until one of them slipped, smacked his head on a rock, and unconscious, fell into the water. I had to perform CPR while single handedly trying to call for help and calm down the other 24 little kids.
Not my proudest moments.