Mission & Activities
Connected to the rest of the world only by a dirt track, Flying Cloud finds home in a mountainside clearing surrounded by hundreds of acres of wilderness. Living at Flying Cloud isn’t easy, but it is simple. Every day we work hard to build a strong, loving, joyous community, way out in the woods on our own. Our activities are simply about living together in nature. We collect our own firewood to cook our own food over open fires. We pump our own water to drink, and we spend nights in shelters we put up and take down by ourselves. We do activities based on the landscape around us, and our best games are the ones we develop ourselves.
The rules that guide our community are few but powerful.
- Work for peace.
- Work for unity.
- Carry a good message.
We strive together for higher standards, and we learn from one another what it means to be good people and good men. Through our daily actions, we discover what it is to work as a community and to lead a group forward from within. Our ceremonies and conversations create a space where we can learn from one another. The time we put into honoring the spirit, both internally and in the world around us, makes Flying Cloud a place of amazing growth. When a boy or a man spends time at Flying Cloud, he learns that he himself is a sacred being, to be cared for and treated with respect.
Flying Cloud's Programs
Wood Skills
Campers can learn to start a fire with bow drill, track animals through the woods, build a shelter with natural materials, stalk without making a sound, and gather wild edibles to prepare a tasty salad.
Handmade Crafts
Campers collect materials from the woods to create dazzling crafts to take home, like clay pots, wooden spoons, gourd water bottles, birch bark baskets, and much more.
FC Games
Frisbee golf, sticks, zairi and canball are just a few of the many active games played and enjoyed by all. These games thrive on high energy and a non-competitive spirit.
Simple Living
Knowing that each individual's labor affects every other individual, Flying Cloud campers work hard gathering and cutting fire wood needed for cooking and light, hand pumping water to drink, collecting ice (cut from the pond during the preceeding winter) to keep our food cold and taking turns cooking delicious meals over an open fire or in a wood fired oven to feed the entire camp. Campers harvest saplings in the surrounding forest that become the bones of the round lodges that they sleep in.
Traditions and Ceremonies
At the beginning of each summer a returning camper-the firekeeper- uses a bow drill to spark the fire which stays lit throughout the summer. This fire becomes the center of Flying Cloud's naming Ceremony. Here each camper receives a unique name, inspired by the natural world, that reflects his strengths and potential.
Leadership Skills
Flying Cloud has a very active camper leader program in which older campers earn significant opportunities for leadership within the community.
Trips and Adventure
With a fleet of canoes on nearby Lake Ninevah and the Catamount, Appalachian, and Long Trail systems within easy reach, all campers have opportunities to go on day hikes as well as extended, overnight trips.
