Teen Ranch

Teen Ranch

In 1966 the construction of Teen Ranch begun. 43 years later Teen Ranch is still teaching 12 year old girls and boys about community living and how to get along with each other. Being away from our friends and families for five days caused us to be independent and responsible. We did many activities, and most of them taught us something such as the map orienteering which made us work together. All of the activities at Teen Ranch were fun, some I like, but there were only a few of them that I loved.


Over the course of our five day Teen Ranch adventure we went skating four times at the hockey arena. The first time we went skating everyone was getting used to the ice. Most people clung to the walls, but the children that knew how to skate were already doing tricks and having races. After ten minutes if some kids were still having trouble skating, some of the children and adults that could skate started to help. It took me about five minutes to get use to the ice. Following those five minutes I began to skate faster, the problem with me skating faster is I don’t know how to stop. Since I did not know how to stop I would bump into people, then we would both fall down. By the end of that first skating period my knees were full of bruises. A half of a hour after the second ice started on Tuesday Abigail was helping me twirl. At first she made me do it in one spot, but that did not work out. After five minutes of this I decided to quit. When I started to skate away she called me back so I tried to turn and I did it, I twirled, and then I fell down. For the rest of the skating period I was practicing my twirls. On Thursday and Friday Agatha said we could play hockey. As soon as we started playing I thought ‘What did I get myself into?’ After playing for a few minutes I realized two things, one it was very fun and two, I still could not stop. At the end of the hockey I had a lot of fun, more bruises, and I scored a goal. The next time I get the opportunity to go skating I won’t hesitate before I say yes.

I’ve always wanted to go horseback riding and at Teen Ranch I finally got the chance. On Tuesday morning right after breakfast, we were the first group to go riding. For the first ride Agatha spent 30 minutes explaining to s how to control our horse. To get the horse to move you would lightly kick the horse and click. If you wanted the horse to stop you would pull on the reigns and say whoa. After Agatha finished explaining everything we all thought ‘This is going to be easy,’ boy were we wrong. When I got on my horse I looked down and said, ‘This horse is too tall.’ After everyone got on their horse that is when the song started. All you could hear was ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa,’ because the horses were bunching up together and backing up into each other. My horse, Rascal, would shift its weight from one side to the other while standing still. In doing so it felt like he was about to fall over. Rascal was very big; he was brown with a small white patch between his eyes. Nikki, the horse instructor, took us through the forest to see our controlling skills. At the end of our ride Nikki took us into the field. At the field Nikki told us to be careful because the horses may try to eat. While we were in the field Nikki said we could trot. Trotting was so fun, but before we started I thought it was going to be scary, but it was not. The second time we went riding, on Wednesday Nikki took us into the hills. Going up the hill was terrifying, I was so nervous it felt like my heart was going to pop out of my chest. I was scared there was a lot of rocks and mud, and I did not want my horse to slip. Half way through our adventure we had to stop because one person was falling behind. We were stopped for about 30 seconds, all of a sudden my horse jerks away from the horse in front of us, and almost ran into the trees. I started to freak out, then I realized my horse moved because the horse in front of us started going to the bathroom. Going down the hill was even scarier than going up, especially since my horse slipped. The only think that was really unfortunate was we did not get to trot again. I hope I get to go horseback riding again no matter how scary it was.

Everything at Teen Ranch was fun, but some of the best events took place in the forest around the area. One of the events was wilderness survival, which took place just inside the forest. Before we went outside to ‘survive’ Mr. Mash spoke to us inside the dining room about the ‘The Rule Three’. The Rule Three is that everything an emergency, whether time or communication has three. It takes a human to die of hypothermia in three hours, of dehydration in three days, and of starvation in three weeks. When in an emergency to get attention you cold whistle three times, make three fires, or righting S.O.S. in the soil, if you are lost. If you are at home you dial three numbers, 911. When Mr. Mash was finished explaining everything we finally went outside. Outside we split into three groups. There was a group of all boys, which Mr. Mash called the hobo group because there were no girls. There was also an n all girls group and then there was the group I was in which was a mix. We moved our shelter twice because we could not all agree. First we had it on a big rock by two trees, but the heavy branches were too hard to lift, so we moved it to beside the rock. We moved it again between two trees because the old spot was too cluttered. When we started to build the shelter it was a little hard, placing the branches correctly so they would not slide down. We actually had a problem with this, when we were almost done one person in our group put a branch on an open spot. The branch slipped and the whole shelter fell down! In five minutes it was back up, the only thing we needed to do was put pine needles to cover the holes. After we showed Mr. Mash we could all fit inside we started making the fire. First we found some rocks and put them in a circle, forming the fire pit. Next we gathered wood. When we finished this Mr. Mash gave us a match. We tried rubbing the match against a rock for friction, but we broke the match. Mr. Mash gave us another match, but this time he tried to start the fire. The fire was so warm I did not even need my coat. While we were enjoying our fire we noticed the girls were having trouble starting their fire. Mr. Mash had given them three matches already. We noticed they gave up when they came to our fire and Mr. Mash said, ‘If you can’t make a fire, make a shelter near people who can.’ After sitting there for 15 minutes the fire still did not burn out so we poured water on it. Just like that our survival experience was over. If I was ever lost in the wilderness I could survive the night thanks to these new skills.



My stay at Teen Ranch was the best five days of my 12 year old life. At Teen Ranch I was able to try new things such as horseback riding and hockey. I also learned new things like survival skills during wilderness survival. I even tried some new foods, for example the raspberry and peach cobbler and iced tea. I would do anything to go back to Teen Ranch, but unfortunately there is nothing I can do to go back, the only thing I have left are my memories of that special place. Teen Ranch is a place that I will never forget.



Christina P