2025 season recap

When I write these recaps I always start by scrolling through the thousands of pictures from the season. What is so amazing to me every year is that through sunshine and rain storms, chilly mornings and sweltering afternoons, beginners trying to get up for the first time and veterans messing around riding triples, new campers who show up alone and returners who seem to know everyone there is one constant…the ubiquitous signs of smiles, laughter and fun.

Water Monkey is a tiny camp but I truly believe that for the campers who find their way to us every summer there is no better place for them to be. I take tremendous pride in the experience we offer, the time we dedicate to each of our campers getting to learn and improve and to never cutting corners in our staffing, equipment, meals and safety. I hope that commitment to our campers - your kids - comes through when you hear their camp stories and scroll through the pictures each night when we upload them.

View fullsize

And now…stats from our 14th season of camp:

• 7 weeks of camp from mid-June to mid-August.

• 88.89% full (112 spaces filled out of 126 with 104 unique campers)

• Campers stayed an average of 1.15 weeks at camp

• Average number of campers each week was 16.57

• Campers were 69.29% boys and 30.71% girls

• Average camper age was 13.73

• 30.36% new campers and 69.64% returners

• Campers came from 10 states (CO, CT, MA, ME, MN, NH, NJ, NY, PA and VT) as well as France.

• 6 coaches, 1 chef and 1 director

• Average coach age was 20.33

• Campers come in all shapes and sizes so we used over 67 wakeboards / wakesurf boards / skis

• 7 sizes of Liquid Force wakeboards (10 board setups in all) 

• 14 models / sizes of Phase 5 wakesurf boards (47 boards in all)

• 5 pairs of combo skis, 3 sizes of Radar slalom skis, 2 wakeskates

• $undisclosed wagered in cabin poker

• 0 days missed due to weather (14 weekends of rain before camp started!)

• Average lake water temp during camp was about 81 degrees

• 2760 homemade meals and 750 desserts served up lakeside

• 35 5-gallon buckets of food scraps added to our brand-new compost pile, diverting about 500 lbs of waste from the landfill

• 250 hours of private lessons on our boats and client boats

• 8,905 pictures and videos uploaded and shared with our camp families

• 11,000 visitors to www.watermonkeycamp.com in the past year (9,400 unique) spent an average of 79 seconds on the site and engaged 20,313 page views

• 575 hours logged on our two Supra boats

• 27.5 hours spent washing down the boats

• Our boats had 11 oil changes, 5 raw water impellers and 5 fuel filters

• 3,932.925 gallons of premium marine fuel burned by our boats producing roughly 34.94 metric tons of CO2 (77,030 pounds). We offset this pollution through a donation to CoolEffect.org of $635.12 which has been our charity of choice for over 12 years. We also made a $75 contribution to SELT to help in their effort to conserve the entire watershed around our amazing lake.

• We have now offset roughly 500 metric tons (over 1.1 million pounds) of CO2 since 2012!

View fullsize

2026 will be our 15th season of camp! You can expect two brand-new 2026 Supra SV’s, all the boards and gear you can handle and, quite possibly, our best staff ever (we’ve already hired most of the staff)! As always, camp doesn’t happen without you so I sincerely hope to welcome each of our campers back for more good times at the lake.

-Evan

603-321-8327

2024 season recap

Summer 2024 was our lucky 13th season for so many reasons. We were lucky to have amazing campers who engaged with our program to learn, improve and have a blast. We were lucky to have an unreal staff of coaches who managed to have their best summers while always putting our campers first. We were lucky to have a new partnership with Supra for some wildly awesome boats. We were lucky to have perfect weather and crystal clear water. But, most of all, we continue to be lucky for 13 years to have the support of our camp families who send their kids to the middle of nowhere NH to play on the lake with us and keep Water Monkey going strong.

Here are some of our favorite pics from the season:

Now for some fun stats from our 13th season:

• 7 weeks of camp from mid-June to mid-August.

• 94.44% full (119 spaces filled out of 126 with 107 unique campers)

• Campers stayed an average of 1.12 weeks at camp

• Average number of campers each week was 17

• Campers were 70.6% boys and 29.4% girls

• Average camper age was 13.89

• 39% new campers and 61% returners

• Campers came from 11 states (CO, CT, IL, MA, ME, MN, NH, NJ, NY, PA and TX) as well as Italy and Spain

• 5 coaches, 1 chef and 1 director

• Average coach age was 20.4

• 6 sizes of Liquid Force wakeboards for our campers to have the perfect ride (along with one pair of size 14 boots for two campers with some giant feet!)

• We used and abused around 40 Phase 5 wakesurf boards this season (12 models)

• 2,800 water balloons were hurled during Monkey Ball

• 3,276 homemade meals and 910 desserts served up lakeside

• 300 hours of private lessons on our boats and client boats

• 8,001 pictures and videos uploaded and shared with our camp families

• 16,000 visitors to www.watermonkeycamp.com in the past year (14,000 unique) spent an average of 83 seconds on the site and engaged 27,919 page views

• Winterizing our property took 19 gallons of antifreeze

• 675 hours logged on our two Supra boats

• 36.5 hours spent keeping the boats shiny!

• Our boats had 14 motor oil changes

• We had 1 wrecked propeller due to low water at the boat launch (2 props in 13 seasons)

• 4,389.620 gallons of premium marine fuel burned by our boats producing roughly 41 metric tons of CO2 (90,000 pounds). We offset this pollution through a donation to CoolEffect.org of $765.82 which has been our charity of choice for over 11 years.

• We have now offset roughly 455 metric tons (over 1 million pounds) of CO2 since 2012!

I am so excited for our 2025 season and to welcome back our campers. Always feel free to email, call, text or write with camp questions, to sign up for next summer or to just say hi!

-Evan

617-855-9253

2023 season recap

We are happy to report that the 2023 summer (our 12th season!) was the best one yet and it is all because of our amazing campers and the greatest staff in camp history. We witnessed wild watersports progression with campers achieving so many of their goals while also thoroughly enjoying swim parties, rope swing breaks, intense games on the field, SUP voyages and countless meals, snacks and desserts. I hope that all of our campers went home tired and happy with new skills and lasting friendships.

After years of running at capacity our goal for 2023 was to slow it all down. Having a full camp is great but the hustle and pressure to give everyone enough time behind the boat meant always watching the clock. This summer we aimed for 16-18 campers each week instead of 20 and it made a massive difference in our program with campers and coaches not only getting more time behind the boats but also more flexibility to do other stuff like pull ten campers at once for over an hour, surf bowls, extended swim breaks, bonus beach time and, maybe, occasionally sleeping in on a rainy morning.

Here are some fun stats from our 12th season:

• 8 weeks of camp from mid-June to mid-August.

• 81.875% full (131 spaces filled out of 160 with 118 unique campers)

• Campers stayed an average of 1.1 weeks at camp

• Average number of campers each week was 16.375

• Campers were 73% boys and 27% girls

• Average camper age was 13.55

• 48% new campers and 52% returners

• Campers chose to wakeboard 40%, wakesurf 50%, waterski 10%

• Campers came from 10 states (CT, MA, MD, ME, NH, NJ, NY, OH, PA and TX) as well as Italy and Mexico

• 6 coaches, 1 chef and 1 director

• Average coach age was 20.33

• 3,200 delicious meals served by Chef Cher

• 55 five-gallon buckets of non-meat food scraps diverted from the landfill and fed to our local pigs

• About 175 hours of private lessons on our boats and client boats

• 1 retired Sunday River chairlift won at auction for charity (our winning bid was $800)

• 9,040 pictures and videos uploaded and shared with our camp families

• 21,000 visitors to www.watermonkeycamp.com in the past year (18,000 unique) spent an average of 82 seconds on the site and engaged 36,000 page views

• Winterizing our property took 20 gallons of antifreeze

• 577 hours logged on our two boats plus 23 hours on loaner boats after our new boat blew and engine!

• Our boats had 15 motor oil changes, 2 transmission fluid changes and 1 blown engine

• 3,636.269 gallons of premium marine fuel burned by our boats producing roughly 32.27 metric tons of CO2 (71,132 pounds). We offset this pollution through a donation to CoolEffect.org which has been our charity of choice for over 10 years for carbon offsets.

• We have now offset roughly 410 metric tons of CO2 since 2012!

Before we wrap this up here is a little gift…a Fall Recipe from Chef Cher.

We have some big plans for camp in 2024 and we sincerely hope to see you next summer!

Always feel free to email, call, text, message, write or visit to say hello.

-Evan

2022 season recap

The 2022 season, our 11th summer, was epic. We had so much fun working with our campers in their watersports progression. It was also equally rewarding to see the campers...returning and new...grow as individuals and as a group in the camp setting. Add to that nearly perfect weather and a dream staff and we could not be happier with how things went.

Here are some fun stats!

• 95.71% full (134 spaces filled out of 140 with 121 unique campers)

• Campers stayed an average of 1.11 weeks at camp

• Average number of campers each week was 19.14

• Campers were 67% boys and 33% girls

• Average camper age was 13.68 years old

• 46% new campers and 54% returners

• Campers chose to wakeboard 45%, wakesurf 45%, waterski 10%

• Campers came from 12 states (CT, MA, MD, ME, NH, NJ, NY, OH, OR, PA, RI and TX) as well as Canada and Italy

• 1 new camp game (beach kadima foursquare)

• 6 coaches, 1 chef and 1 director

• Average coach age was 20

• 3,950 meals served by Chef Cher

• 75 five-gallon buckets of non-meat scraps fed to local hungry pigs to divert food waste from the landfill

• 10 day campers joined 3 coaches for a week of fun on Lake Sunapee

• 17,428 unique visitors to www.watermonkeycamp.com

• 7,706 photos and videos uploaded and shared with camp families

• We clocked 514 hours on 3 boats…Maverick (Marley), Iceman and Bob (thanks Wheelan family for letting us have Bob back for a week while Maverick was in the shop)

• Our boats had 18 motor oil changes, 1 transmission oil change, 1 blown water pump and 1 blown engine (yikes)

• 2,997.878 gallons of premium gas burned producing roughly 27.196 metric tons of CO2 which we offset with contributions to the Society For The Protection of New Hampshire Forests and CoolEffect.org . Our contributions this year will offset about 75 metric tons of CO2 with the extra going towards camper travel to and from camp!

• We have now offset around 375 metric tons of CO2 since 2012!

And as a parting gift…here is a great fall recipe from Chef Cher: Apple Cider Muffins

We sincerely hope to see all of our campers back here in 2023 and to welcome many more fresh faces to the camp family.

Always feel free to email, call, write, DM, text or stop by to say hello!

Evan

2021 season recap

View fullsize

Our 2021 season is just winding down and it was by far our best...the best staff ever assembled, the best boats and equipment, the best groups of campers we have had the pleasure of working with and the best attitudes from everyone involved dealing with five weeks of rain from June through July! A lot goes into making a summer of camp happen so take a look below at some fun camp stats:

• 140 campers over 7 weeks (plus 10 campers at our Sunapee Day Camp)

• Campers stayed an average of 1.125 weeks at camp

• Average number of campers each week was 20

• Campers were 27% girls and 73% boys

• Average camper age was 13.66

• 54% new campers and 46% returners

• Campers came from 16 states (CA, CO, CT, DC, FL, GA, IL, MA, ME, MT, NH, NJ, NY, OR, PA,RI and TX) as well as Washington, DC, Mexico and the U.S. Virgin Islands (we were closed to most international campers in 2021)

• There were 7 coaches, 1 chef and 1 director

• Average coach age was 19.7

• 3 coaches had their birthdays during the summer (Sam, Zoe and Elijah)

• 3,960 ridiculous meals prepared by Chef Cher who used approximately:

  • 1290 eggs

  • 370 pounds of flour

  • 110 pounds of strawberries

  • 60 pounds of chocolate chips (mostly in 860 homemade choc chip muffins)

  • 250 pounds of chicken

  • 150 gallons of lemonade

  • 65 hours a week of cooking (plus countless hours shopping)

  • 75 five-gallon buckets of non-meat scraps fed to local hungry pigs to divert food waste from the landfill

• 5 pallets of concrete used to pour new cabin footings

• 11,309 unique visitors to watermonkeycamp.com in the last 12 months

• 9,278 photos uploaded and shared with camp families

• 540 hours on our 2 2021 MasterCraft NXT22's (Bob and Marley)

• 16 boat oil changes (plus 1 water pump)

• 3048.935 gallons of gas burned producing roughly 34 metric tons of CO2 which we offset with contributions to the Society For The Protection of New Hampshire Forests and CoolEffect.org Our contributions this year will offset about 75 metric tons of CO2 with the extra going towards camper travel to and from camp!

• We have now offset around 300 metric tons of CO2 since 2012!
  

Those stats do not really do justice to all of the fun we had this summer but hopefully it was a good read! We are hard at work getting ready for 2022 and I sincerely hope to see all of our campers back again for great times on the boats!

-Evan