Fun Summer Activities for Kids: A Parent's Guide to the Best Summer Ever

Fun Summer Activities for Kids: A Parent’s Guide to the Best Summer Ever

Key Takeaways:

• The best summer activities for kids combine outdoor time, real skill-building and genuine independence, not simply a full calendar
• Summer camp delivers all three at once, which is why it has held up as a model for well over a century
• Frost Valley YMCA offers day camp for local children ages 4 to 15 and overnight camp for children in grades 2 through 10, plus farm, horse, adventure and specialty programs
• Cost does not have to decide the summer, and tiered tuition, camperships and free local programs exist so families have options
• Frost Valley YMCA has been running summer camp since 1885, which makes it the oldest YMCA camp in the country

A good summer does not require an expensive itinerary or a packed schedule. It requires time outdoors, a supportive community and the freedom to try something a child has never tried before. At Frost Valley YMCA, we have spent more than 140 summers helping children do exactly that in the heart of the Catskill Mountains.

This guide walks through the summer activities that actually matter for kids, why camp remains one of the strongest options available, what our day camp and overnight programs look like from the inside, what they cost and how to tell which one is right for your child.

Quick Guide

• Top Summer Activities for Kids in the Catskills
• Why Summer Camp Is One of the Best Summer Activities
• Discovering Frost Valley YMCA Day Camp
• Overnight Summer Camp for Kids and Teens
• A Glimpse Into the Day Camp Schedule
• Planning Your Summer: How to Choose the Right Program
• What Summer Camp Costs and What Help Is Available
• A Summer Camp Built for Every Child
• 140 Summers in the Catskills

Top Summer Activities for Kids in the Catskills

The Catskill Mountains give children space to move. At Frost Valley YMCA, our campus covers more than 5,500 acres of forest, streams, fields and trails, roughly two hours north of New York City. That combination makes camp accessible for families and immersive for kids.

Exploring the Great Outdoors: Hiking and Nature Walks

Hiking is the most accessible summer activity there is. It needs no equipment beyond decent shoes, it works for nearly every age and it turns an ordinary walk into a discovery.

Our trails run from short nature loops for younger campers to full-day treks for teens. Along the way, children learn to read a trail, identify what grows around them and understand the watershed they are standing in. Frost Valley sits at the headwaters of the Neversink River, part of the unfiltered water supply serving more than nine million people, and our environmental science staff make that concrete for kids rather than abstract.

Every overnight camper also takes at least one night on the trail during their session. For many, sleeping under the stars is the first thing they tell their parents about.

Water Fun: Swimming, Boating and Paddleboarding

Lake Cole is the center of camp in the summer. Campers swim, boat and play there every day under the supervision of certified lifeguards.

Options include:

• Swimming, with optional lessons for campers who want to improve their technique
• Canoeing, kayaking, rowing and stand-up paddleboarding
• A floating trampoline and a giant inflatable waterslide
• Beach games, water basketball and volleyball

Farm Campers have their own version of the waterfront. They creek in our section of the Neversink River and boat on the farm pond.

Climbing, Ropes Courses and Archery

Some of the most valuable summer activities for kids are the ones that ask a child to do something slightly frightening and then support them while they do it.

At Frost Valley YMCA, campers climb our tower, work through low and high ropes elements, ride the zipline and shoot archery. Each of these is run by trained staff with clear safety protocols.

What children carry home is rarely the skill itself. It is the memory of being scared and doing it anyway.

Creative Expression Through Arts and Crafts

Not every child wants to climb a tower, and camp should never require it.

Our Program Village is a cluster of buildings dedicated entirely to the arts. Campers work in pottery, woodworking, painting, screen printing, candle making, dance, theater, music and creative writing. Farm Campers add blacksmithing, wool arts and soap making to that list.

Campers choose a specialty and stay with it for a week, which is long enough to actually get better at something rather than simply sample it.

Why Summer Camp Is One of the Best Summer Activities

Most summer activities do one thing well. Camp does several at once, which is why it has lasted.

Building Confidence and Independence in Children

Camp asks children to manage themselves. They keep track of their belongings, decide how to spend their choice period, speak up when they need something and live alongside people they did not pick.

None of this happens by accident. Campers are placed in small village communities with counselors who know them by name, and the daily structure gives them a predictable rhythm to operate inside.

Confidence gets built the same way in every child. Try something, struggle with it, finish it. Camp compresses that cycle into a couple of weeks and then repeats it.

Making Lifelong Friendships Through Shared Adventure

Friendship forms faster at camp than almost anywhere else, and the reason is simple. Children are doing hard, unfamiliar things together with no screens between them.

Parents tell us this constantly. Campers meet on the first day, and years later they are still in touch. A large number of our staff started here as campers and never really left.

Learning New Skills: From Archery to STEM

Camp is one of the few places where a child can learn something genuinely new without being graded on it.

Skills our campers build over a summer include:

• Archery, climbing and outdoor navigation
• Cooking, gardening and food preservation
• Horseback riding and horse care
• Building, engineering and design in our Maker’s Lab
• Pottery, woodworking and screen printing

Our specialty camps make this explicit. Inventor’s Workshop runs children through building challenges and an egg drop project. LEGO Masters teaches construction technique. Survival Scouts covers compasses, shelter building and trail navigation. Mini Chef teaches kids to read a recipe and then write one of their own.

What Children Gain From Time Away From Screens

Overnight campers at Frost Valley YMCA have no access to the internet. That is deliberate.

Families are often nervous about it and then surprised by the result. Without a phone, children have to look at each other, fill their own quiet moments and settle their own disagreements. Boredom becomes the start of something instead of a problem to solve with a device.

We provide free postcards so campers can write home, and we run a one-way email system so parents can write in. Communication continues. It simply slows down.

Discovering Frost Valley YMCA Day Camp

For families in Sullivan, Ulster and Delaware Counties, day camp is the most practical answer to the summer question. Children get a full day outdoors and sleep in their own beds at night.

Frost Valley YMCA Day Camp serves children ages 4 to 15 across nine one-week sessions from late June through August. Bus transportation runs from several locations in Sullivan and Ulster Counties. The program has won the River Reporter Readers’ Choice Award for Best Summer Camp several years running.

Values-Based Programs for Local Children

Day Camp is not childcare with activities attached to it. It runs on the same core values that run through everything at Frost Valley YMCA: caring and connected, inclusive and diverse, honest and respectful, responsible and accountable.

Every morning opens with a core value of the day, and every afternoon closes with a reflection period. Counselors are experienced in childcare and recreation, and they lead children through the day with intention rather than simply supervising them.

Traditional Day Camps for Explorers and Pathfinders

Traditional Day Camp is grouped by age.

Explorers is for children entering Pre-K and Kindergarten, with a minimum age of 4. The pace is gentle. Short hikes, supervised waterfront time, games and camp crafts. It is designed to be a first camp experience rather than a demanding one.

Pathfinders covers grades 1 through 5. Campers choose a specialty, take part in sports, hikes, ropes elements, archery and the Healthy Teaching Kitchen, and go to the waterfront daily.

Teens and Tweens covers grades 6 through 9. Alongside regular camp activities, these campers take on community service projects at Frost Valley and in the surrounding towns, and they spend real time on social-emotional skill building and inclusion practices.

Specialty Camps: LEGO Masters, Mini Chef and Survival Scouts

Specialty camps rotate week by week, which means a child can go deep on one thing for five days and then switch to something else entirely.

The rotation includes LEGO Masters, Fort Building, Mini Chef, Dance Fusion, Inventor’s Workshop, Hiking Adventures, Survival Buds, Superhero Training, Campfire Cooks, Studio Art, Survival Scouts, Creative Arts, Dragon Quest Creators, Outdoor Cooking, Detective Academy, Performing Arts, Boots & Boats, Inventor’s Garage, Crafter’s Guild and Ultimate Survivors. Soccer camps run for our youngest campers as well.

Specialty campers still swim every day and still take part in traditional camp activities. The specialty anchors the day. It does not consume it.

Farm and Horse Camps: A Unique Equestrian Experience

Two of our day camp options are unlike anything else in the region.

Equestrian Day Camp is a two-week program for grades 3 through 8, held at Main Camp. Campers spend half of each day at the barn riding and learning horse health and care, and the other half doing traditional camp activities. Riders are grouped by skill level and paired with a horse for the session. No previous experience is required. A Junior High Equestrian Day Camp runs for grades 7 through 9.

Pony Camp at East Valley Ranch is a one-week option for grades 1 through 6, with three hours at the barn each day.

Farm Day Camp puts children on our 515-acre working farm for a week, tending animals, harvesting from the garden and learning where their food actually comes from.

Our equestrian program is accredited by the Certified Horsemanship Association, and we keep more than eighty horses across two barns.

Teen Training Through Leaders-in-Training and Counselors-in-Training

Older teens can move from being campers to helping run camp.

Leaders-in-Training is a two-week program for grades 9 and 10, focused on leadership through community building, service projects and hands-on work with younger campers.

Counselors-in-Training is a two-week program for grade 10. CITs work directly with Explorers and Pathfinders, take part in job training and finish the summer prepared to be hired as a counselor.

Both programs are free for students who attend high school in Sullivan or Ulster County.

Overnight Summer Camp for Kids and Teens

For families ready to send a child further, overnight camp is where the deepest growth happens. Frost Valley YMCA runs four two-week overnight sessions from late June through late August, with shorter one-week options for our youngest campers.

Traditional Overnight Camp at Camp Wawayanda and Camp Henry Hird

Camp Wawayanda serves children entering grades 2 through 7. Campers live in villages organized by age and gender identity, including a gender-inclusive village, and they choose activities based on age, interest and ability. A new one-week village, Sugarloaf Mountain, gives campers entering grades 2 and 3 a shorter first experience.

Camp Henry Hird serves teens entering grades 8 through 10. Hird campers get more freedom and more responsibility. Extended overnights on the trail, sleeping under the stars, adventure courses and a much larger say in how their days run.

Farm Camp on a Working 515-Acre Farm

Farm Camp is a genuine working farm, not a petting zoo.

Campers entering grades 2 through 10 live in Mongolian-style yurts and start their day at 7:15 in the morning with chores. They feed animals, collect eggs, muck stalls, harvest from a three-acre garden and cook what they grow. The livestock includes goats, sheep, chickens, pigs, cows and rabbits.

The rest of the day looks like camp. Boating, arts, games, campfires and a mid-session Harvest Dinner where every yurt prepares a dish to share.

Horse Camps for Riders at Every Level

Frost Valley YMCA runs four overnight horse programs.

Mustang Village is for girls in grades 3 through 6 and Durango Village is for boys in grades 3 through 8. Both sit at Main Camp, both split the day between the barn and traditional camp activities, and both welcome riders with no experience at all.

East Valley Ranch is our advanced program for girls in grades 6 through 11, with one-week, two-week and four-week options in a secluded valley fourteen miles from Main Camp.

Horse Trails is a one-week backcountry trek for experienced riders in grade 8 and up. Full days in the saddle, remote campsites and complete responsibility for their horse.

Adventure Trips for Tweens and Teens

Our adventure programs scale with a camper as they grow.

Adventure Ramblers is a one-week introduction for grades 4 through 7, based in platform tents on our property, covering the basics of hiking, camping and outdoor skills.

Adventure Village is a twelve-day program for grades 5 through 9. Campers spend the first half building technical skills on-site and the second half out on a backpacking, canoeing or climbing trip.

Teen Adventure Trips take campers in grades 7 through 12 off-site entirely. Destinations include the Adirondacks, the Appalachian Trail, the Maine coast, the Gunks and West Virginia whitewater.

A Glimpse Into the Day Camp Schedule

Parents almost always want to know what a day actually looks like. Here is the shape of it.

Morning Meetings and Core Values

The day begins at 9:00 in the morning with a Morning Meeting. Announcements, the core value of the day and a flag raising.

It is a small ritual and it does real work. It gives every child the same starting point and it names, out loud, what the community is trying to be that day.

Program periods follow. Traditional and specialty campers move into their first activity block at 9:20, while equestrian campers head to the barn until noon.

Afternoon Choice Periods and Waterfront Fun

Lunch is at noon. The Camper Choice period opens at 1:00, and this is where children take the wheel. Hikes, sports, arts and crafts, nature programs and more.

Waterfront runs at 2:00. Campers choose between swimming and boating, and if they want neither, they can take field games or arts and crafts instead. That choice is offered every single day, which matters more to a hesitant swimmer than most adults realize.

Snack and changing follow at 3:00.

Reflection and Community Building at Embers

Embers happens at 3:30, and it may be the most important half hour of the day.

Campers sit together and reflect on what happened. What they tried, what went well, what was hard. They share it with their peers. A closing meeting follows at 3:50 and dismissal is at 4:00.

Children are rarely invited to think about their own day out loud. Embers gives them the space and the practice.

Planning Your Summer: How to Choose the Right Program

The hardest part of summer planning is not finding activities. It is choosing among them.

Choosing Between Day Camp and Overnight Camp

Day camp works when a child is young, when the family lives close enough for the bus route to make sense, or when a child is not yet comfortable being away overnight. It also works well as a stepping stone. Many of our overnight campers started at day camp.

Overnight camp works when a child is ready to be responsible for themselves for a real stretch of time. The growth comes faster and runs deeper, because the child is not returning to a familiar bed at the end of each day.

Both are the same Frost Valley. Same values, same staff culture, same lake.

Signs a Child Is Ready to Spend the Night Away

No age guarantees readiness. There are signals, though.

A child is generally ready when they:

• Have slept away from home successfully, even once
• Can manage their own belongings without constant reminders
• Can tell an adult clearly when something is wrong
• Show curiosity about camp and not only anxiety about it

Anxiety on its own is not a reason to wait. Most first-time campers are nervous. Homesickness is normal, particularly in the first few days, and our staff are practiced at working children through it by building connections, encouraging participation and holding a consistent daily rhythm.

How to Balance Structure and Play During School Breaks

Children need both, and a summer that leans entirely one direction tends to go badly.

Too little structure and the days blur into screen time. Too much and a child never reaches the unscheduled space where imagination actually lives.

Camp is built around this balance on purpose. The day has a spine, with meals and program blocks and a bedtime, and inside that spine there are choice periods, free time and long stretches where children decide for themselves. A week or two of camp inside an otherwise open summer often gives a family the structure it needs without turning July into a second school year.

What Summer Camp Costs and What Help Is Available

Cost is the reason most families rule camp out, and many of them rule it out before finding out what is actually available.

At Frost Valley YMCA, our aim is that no child misses camp because of money. Here is how that works in practice.

How Frost Valley’s Tiered Tuition Works

We use a voluntary three-tier fee structure. Families select the tier that fits their situation.

• Tier A covers the full cost of running camp for one camper
• Tier B is a partially subsidized rate
• Tier C is a modestly subsidized rate

Every camper receives exactly the same Frost Valley experience regardless of which tier a family chooses. No one else knows what any family paid. Nothing about a camper’s day changes.

Camperships and Financial Aid

When all three tiers are out of reach, financial aid is available. We call it a campership.

Camperships are funded by donors and awarded through an application completed during registration, which opens on October 1 for the following summer. Assistance can be awarded for up to two weeks of camp.

Day Camp also runs its own sponsorship program, which provides financial assistance to hundreds of local children every single summer.

Free and Low-Cost Options for Local Families

Some of what we offer costs nothing at all.

• Counselors-in-Training and Leaders-in-Training are free for high school students in Sullivan and Ulster Counties
• Weekend day visits are free for Denning residents, including immediate family and grandchildren
• Free community events run through the year, including Halloween Community Day, the Community Holiday Dinner, the New Year’s Day Polar Plunge and Healthy Kids Day

Weekend day visits for other local families run $65 for a full day, which covers grounds access, all scheduled program activities and every meal from 9:00 in the morning to 10:00 at night.

A Summer Camp Built for Every Child

“For All” is not a phrase we put on a wall. It is a set of programs we have been running for decades.

Mainstreaming at Camp for Children With Developmental Disabilities

Mainstreaming at Camp, run in partnership with the Young Adult Institute, welcomes children with developmental disabilities into the wider camp community.

MAC campers take part in daily activities alongside every other camper and live in their own village with trained staff at night. The program has run at Frost Valley since 1983.

What we hear from counselors and year-round staff is consistent. MAC does not simply serve the children enrolled in it. It changes how every camper at Frost Valley understands what a community is supposed to look like.

Kidney Camp and On-Site Medical Support

In 1975, Frost Valley YMCA opened the first mainstream camp experience in the country for children with kidney disease, in partnership with the Ruth Gottscho Kidney Foundation and the Children’s Hospital at Montefiore.

More than fifty years later, we have welcomed over 2,000 kidney campers. The program operates out of a dialysis unit inside our Guenther Wellness Center, staffed by experienced pediatric nephrologists and nephrology nurses. Treatment schedules are built around camp activities rather than the other way around.

Every kidney camper attends on a full campership.

For every camper at Frost Valley, licensed medical staff are on-site at all times, with a structured medication management system and daily health monitoring.

140 Summers in the Catskills

How Frost Valley Became the Nation’s Oldest YMCA Camp

Frost Valley YMCA began in 1885, when Sumner F. Dudley led a group of boys on a camping trip to Orange Lake near Newburgh, New York. That trip started the Boys’ Camping Society, and it started YMCA camping in America.

The camp that became Frost Valley took the name Camp Wawayanda in 1901 in northern New Jersey. Development crowded it out twice. In 1956, the YMCA acquired Julius Forstmann’s Catskills estate, and the first summer camp opened here in 1958.

We are the oldest YMCA camp in the country. That is not a line we use for marketing. It is a hundred and forty years of learning how to run a camp properly.

Traditions That Have Lasted Generations

Some things at Frost Valley have not changed in decades, and campers would not let us change them if we tried.

Every session has its own all-camp event. The Small World Fair and fireworks over Lake Cole in the first session. The Olympix in the second. CarniValley in the third. Hirdstock, a camp-wide music festival, in the fourth.

Campers still write home on postcards. They still take a night on the trail. They still sit around a closing campfire on the last evening and try to put words to what the last two weeks meant.

Parents who came here as campers now send their own children. That is the clearest measure of a summer activity we have found.