The campground’s coming to life — we can smell coffee and hear the muffled voices of our neighbors. It’s a beautiful day, we’re in the Alps, and we’re going for a hike.

We load up with snacks and lunch: fruit, bread, cheese, hummus, peppers, sliced meat, and chocolate. High above is the Schilthorn — James Bond rode the cable car up there. Yeah, we think, that’s cool, but we’d rather hike.

Dark forest gives way to green meadows, then steeper grades. High above, it’s all rock and ice and snow.

Carefully Crafted Challenges with Clearly Defined Goals

Every Overland trip is a set of carefully crafted challenges with clearly defined goals. The challenges are thoughtfully calibrated, and the goal is always to have fun and make friends.

Snack time. Water, gorp, an apple, more water. We check in — everyone feels good, spirits are high.

Lunchtime: out comes today's high mountain picnic. Lots of talk. Laughter. Smiles. It’s easy, and fun, and summer.

Who knew that hiking down could be hard? Well, not like hiking up, but still hard. We walk into our campsite and get organized — it’s stir fry tonight, and I’m on cook crew.

Student Ownership

An Overland trip is guided by our leaders but driven by our students. With their leaders’ support, our students share daily tasks, creating spirited, close-working groups where everyone contributes.

Being on cook crew for dinner means a solid two hours of work — and it’s the best two hours of my day. We always talk about how food is love — how the preparing and sharing of a meal is this subtle but important way to show your care and consideration — your love — for others. I’d never thought about a meal that way, until now, and I don't think I'll ever see a meal any other way.

We always look back on the day, all of us together, sitting in a circle, having dessert. Each of us talks about our high and low of the day. And then we thank someone for something—big or small. We call that cheers.

Somehow, tonight the highs were higher, and the lows just weren’t that important (okay, my low was how my feet felt at about 3:00 this afternoon... but they’re fine now… so does it even matter?).

And the cheers?

Well, when a kid you met just twelve days ago thanks you for the thing you said, and you can’t really remember what it was exactly, but he said it was just what he needed to hear when his feet were sore and he was tired and he was wondering why it was so hard to go downhill, well, that’s when I knew that the trip actually wasn’t about the hiking.

It wasn’t even about the Alps.

It was about that.