A Retreat with Beach Newman

Last weekend I went on a retreat with people from the Newman club at Long Beach. Since CSU Long Beach often goes by the name "The Beach," they are called Beach Newman. Since I added Beach Newman as a friend on Facebook, I have some pictures from her to share.

The retreat ended up being more like a camping trip than a retreat. The theme was discernment. All of the speakers talked about how they discern things in their lives. Most of my comments will focus on the camping aspects. If you want to hear more about the retreat programming, ask me and I can fill you in.

On Saturday we hiked a path at the top of some hills while praying the stations of the cross. As we walked the trail, we stopped at crosses along the way. At the end there was a big cross and a great view of the surrounding area including Irvine Lake. We could see all the way to downtown LA.

To give an idea of the area, this is taken from where we parked. The big cross of the earlier picture can be made out at the top of the center mountain.

It also shows how the girls had no sense of adventure in pictures. While they all stood next to a fence for pictures, the guys piled onto a merry-go-round. You can also see the friendly dogs who followed us the entire way and knew all the right places to be for pictures.

The club had some military surplus tents for everyone and brought food. This kept the cost down to $30 per person. All of our food was pre-cooked, so it just had to be warmed up. The warming was done on fires we made from wood and fire logs we brought along. There was spaghetti, hot dogs, sandwiches, and even some eggs and bacon someone drove in one morning. Our food prep area was half of a room with a couple of fridges. We had to use a hose if we wanted water. I would say we had half a kitchen, but I think it was less than that.

On Saturday night the rain rolled in. We decided to move out of the tents and into the room where we had our presentations. Since everything was either dirt paths or grass, there was mud, water, and more mud.

In the morning I was one of three people from our group of around 17 who took the hike down the hill to take a shower. Everyone else thought it was too cold and the walk would be too muddy and too far. I do not think a little cold air and mud is too much to get through for a cold shower.

Overall the retreat had too much free time and not enough planned activities. Since I did not know anyone going into the weekend, I did not like the free time as much as many of the other people who already knew each other well. However, I met some good and interesting people I would like to get to know better.