In case any of you are looking for wonderful summer programs, I highly recommend Cottonwood Gulch in NM. Its expeditions for 10-18 yr olds are the lowest cost I've seen (partly funded by the foundation), have the best staff from all over the country, etc. DS 11 went last summer and learned about ecology, archaeology, geology, as well as meeting kids from all over the US (only one other was from NM; most were from the East Coast). He loved it. It's been around for 80 yrs www.cottonwoodgulch.org and I think it offers scholarships if you apply before the end of Dec.

Cym-

It truly sounds lovely, but we get the wilderness experience dirt cheap through the scouts. I think it was $250 for a week of sleepover camp last summer. The boys did all kinds of watersports, hiking, orienteering, rock climbing, first aid, meteorology, botany, leathercrafting, etc.

My dd didn't click with girl scouts, so we'll have to look for alternatives when she gets older. There is a local audubon society camp, but they don't do overnights.

So many kids don't get outdoors much these days; I think nature camp is a wonderful idea!

Boy scouts has so many great opportunities (I still get the Boys Life publication and see such cool projects and trips). Unfortunately it did not work out for us, as least through 3 sons. We got burned out with cubscouts and now my kids refuse to try scouts. I found each of the dens for cubscouts of my oldest 3 boys to be so incredibly annoying as the leader or assistant leader (not just the kids but the parents would do things like leave their kid with me for two extra hours after the meeting was over and be unreachable)...I know it has worked out for many people on this board, and that's great.