7th Grade Kin Camp

Querétaro

The seventh grade trip helps students learn how to cooperate in order to achieve common goals and get along well with classmates for the rest of the year.

Students engage in a variety of athletic, cultural, and team building activities prepared by highly trained camp counselors. 

Students will gain a deep appreication of Mexican culture and the diversity of the Mexican landscape by visiting the following sites:

• Tequisquiapan: City in the south-central part of the Mexican state of Querétaro. It is famous for its thermal waters, and for being the center of a wine and cheese producing region.

•  Peña de Bernal is the second-largest monolith in the world, after Mt. Augustus, Western Australia. At 350 meters (1150 ft) it is also the fourth-tallest monolith in the world, after Mount Augustus, the Rock of Gibraltar and Sugarloaf Mountain. It is located in San Sebastián Bernal, a small town in the Mexican state of Querétaro.   According to Leonor López Domínguez of México Desconocido, the porphyrytic monolith was formed some 100 million years ago during the Jurassic period, when it must have been at least three times higher than today.  Many people make a pilgrimage to the highest hikeable point, visiting a little chapel about halfway up. On the Spring equinox, people gather all dressed in white to form a human belt around the monolith. 

• Cadereyta botanical garden: This is the largest collection of cactus in Mexico. The owners have implemented a conservation project to protect the future of five of the particularly threatened species, including the iconic Mammillaria herrerae (golf ball cactus) which is taken from its natural environment for use as an ornamental plant.

• Visit an Opal Mine: The greek "opallious" literally means “to see a change of color”.  Opals have been in the world since the beginning of humanity; there is no doubt that the world of opal is ancient. Pliny describes the world of opal about 55 A.D. in his book Natural History. There are opal mines in different places of the world, including Germany, France, Spain, New Zealand, Australia, England and Mexico.

We look forward to instilling and reinforcing a Mexican identity in our community’s students by having them learn about the history of this great country in which they live.