AURORA | Pamela Rowland’s Christmas happens in June.
There’s nothing the 10-year-old Fort Morgan resident likes more than the annual Colorado Junior Wheelchair Sports Camp, which she’s participated in for five years.
Rowland and her mother, Becky, made the 80-mile drive from Fort Morgan to Aurora Central High School for the last time on June 15, the last day of the week-long camp. Once it was over, Rowland began counting the days until the camp returns in 2013, when it will celebrate its 30th anniversary.
“The first thing she said in the car today is this is a sad day. It’s the last day of camp, that’s a sad day,” Becky Rowland said of her daughter, who had a blood clot burst in her spinal cord when she was 7 months old.
“She looks forward more to camp every year than she does for Christmas or her birthday; it’s like a holiday,” she said. “She just loves it.”
The Rowlands gladly made the long drive every day. Pamela gets a chance to be active with other kids her age who are in wheelchairs, something that’s not generally possible in Fort Morgan.
The confidence gained from participating in the camp isn’t just noticed by a mother.
“At her school, the first year they said ‘what did you guys do, her confidence level is totally different?’” Becky Rowland said. “Every time they’ll say her confidence levels keeps clicking up.”
Rowland’s story is pretty much the rule when it comes to the camp, which makes it possible for kids with spina bifida, cerebral palsy and a variety of other special needs to be active and experience things they may never have dreamed of doing.
The free camp is always popular, but was virtually bursting at the seams this year according to director Mary Carpenter — who has been involved in the camp since it first began — as 120 children took part.
Counselor Mark Deschamp has a good perspective on the camp, given he was in the first group to go through it 29 years ago.
The Littleton resident — who has spina bifida — attended the very first camp and went for 10 years, all the way through graduation from high school. After several years away, as he went through college and started working, Deschamp felt the urge to return and became a counselor.
The number of sports offered now are “probably triple” what they had when Deschamp was a camper — though he enjoyed horseback riding, which wasn’t offered this year — but the underlying premise remains the same.
“The kids may have a disability, and that’s cool, but they aren’t different,” Deschamp said. “They can come here and feel like they completely fit in. When you see the kids for the first time Monday, sometimes they are shy, but by Friday, they don’t want to leave. That’s what’s rewarding.”
Casey Myers, 8, got his first taste of kayaking at the Wheelchair Sports Camp last year and it’s become one of the things he enjoys doing most.
According to his mother, Marni, Casey — who was born with a tumor which left him paralyzed below the waist and has required the use of a wheelchair since he was 1 — has taken to kayaking so much that he took a class that is offered in Golden. He put his skills on display at this year, gliding back and forth in the Aurora Central pool without assistance.
Myers also had a grand time with sled hockey, one of the off-campus features of the camp on an occasional basis over the past 10 years.
With the Big Bear Ice Arena at Lowry so near, some campers are able to make it by bus. On June 15, younger kids were able to get more than an hour of ice time under the watchful eye of Corey Fairbanks of the Colorado Adaptive Sports Foundation.
Fairbanks guided a group through an introduction.
While using a long sled instead of skates, sled hockey players propel themselves on the ice by pushing off on a pair of shortened hockey sticks, which can also be used to shoot the puck. First-timers noted how hard it was to start, but soon were gliding up and down the ice with the puck and got in an impromptu game with roughly an hour of ice time.
“It’s an absolute riot to get out here with some of these kids and introduce them to the sport I love and played for 16 years,” Fairbanks said. “What’s really cool about sled hockey is we get these kids out of their wheelchairs. We call it the most exhilirating out-of-chair experience.”
The camp continues to run free for kids with the help of a variety of grants and donations from local organizations. It also takes hundreds of volunteers such as 15-year-old Madison Mayrose of Cherokee Trail High School.
Mayrose continued a family tradition by volunteering at the camp, following her brother for the past four years.
“The kids are easygoing and it’s fun to see how much they enjoy life,” said Mayrose, who volunteers with special ed students at Cherokee Trail during the school year. “They don’t take anything too serious, they just come to have fun. Sometimes in the morning I’m not really awake, but they come up and say ‘play with me!’ and it gets me going.”
Carpenter said the plan for the 30th anniversary of the camp is to bring together some of the people who were part of originally starting it.
Reach Sports Editor Courtney Oakes at sports@aurorasentinel.com or 303-750-7555
