2012 Bus Story - Sequel

You will be pleased to know that the bus, complete with new battery thanks to a Good Samaritan with black-grease-stained hands called Phil, performed admirably for the week of camp, taking 20 teenagers at a time to and from electives.  "Performed admirably" in this case involves the bus shuddering and shaking along the road while roasting its sweaty, red-faced passengers and melting Mr de Elba's Thankyou Chocolate which was given by the camp leaders to thank him for driving the "Bucket 'o' Bolts" all week without once uttering a bad word.

The only Bus Incident that occurred while actually on camp was this:

The bus ran over our Family Sunscreen.  But it was still useable despite the bottle being squashed flatter than it was, the lid being blown off and, I suspect, a good amount of sunscreen being splattered all over the road.

And that's the end of The Bus Story.  How underwhelming.

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The children had a blast on camp, even though they were only hangers-on at a camp which was really for high-schoolers.

There was a lot of beach swimming:

 

Bimi insisted on swimming with her handbag one day.  

It even went out in the surf with her.

 Counting heads: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 ...

...6, 7...

  No, no, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8... plus Rex makes 9!  Nine?  Oops we counted someone else's kid ...

 In the middle of the nights I didn't want Rex to wake anybody up, so I took him to a little room to settle him.  In the darkness without my contact lenses, I could see practically nothing.  I named the room "The Pineapple Room" because it had fruit in it (including pineapples) waiting to be used for The Masterchef Challenge one night.
How tropical, how fun, how happy does "The Pineapple Room" sound?  How disappointing to see it already had a name, heralded by the sign on the door which could be clearly seen in the light of day:

This camper made a corn cob stack with all our leftovers.  Clever.

On the day that Buzz and Jessie went with the campers to Wet'n'Wild, Woody and Rex and I packed the day full of activities with Justamum and two of her kids Boris and Bimi.  At the big local shopping centre, Woody spent half an hour on a bouncy bus before being bored stiff at a dreadful Lorax stageshow involving two perky dancing girls and a person in a huge Lorax suit saying "Redooce, Reuse, Recycle" in a fake New York accent.

Buzz and Woody loved the bowling:

Belle, who had never been bowling before, won the game.  After we got home, we realised that the final round entitles you to three bowls, not two.  Fail, Givinya, Fail.

Here are Jessie, Banana, Buzz, Belle and Bimi dressed up for Formal Night at camp.  Blurry phone photos again.

Little Rex spent most of the week in his new wrap. I got a Storchenwiege after finding my way out of the babywearing culture I accidentally got immersed in as part of my research into the type of wrap to buy.  I just want to be hands-free, not subscribe to a culture!  Babywearing Institute?  Babywearing Conventions?  For real?

Formal Night: the de Elbas weren't prepared and had to make do with regular holiday clothes:

The children took a joking suggestion that they were traveling in the trailer as the honest truth, and were disappointed to hear that it wasn't going to happen:

Dear Baby Rex.

Completely exhausted after a week at camp, Rex slept for 11.5 hours straight as soon as he hit his comfy cot.  Here he is the next day saying "Keep your bassinette.  I will sleep right here thanks."