Guest Post: Florence Levy - Memories of Penwood

There is no better place than Camp Penwood.  My earliest childhood memories are swimming at the beach, swim lessons at the Inlet beach, anticipating Fridays when our dad would arrive with a car full of toys, visits to Enchanted Forest, getting to know my parents' friends on their weekend visits, stopping at Kayuta on the way into town, getting my boating license and spending hours on end in the Fulton Chain of lakes, meeting local residents, working at the ACE Hardware, creating lifetime friendships (Jenn Stoll), spreading the love with my high school friends, and the list could go on and on. There is truly no place I would rather be. Camp Penwood is majestic in beauty and calming in spirit.  I feel so fortunate that now that we have our own kids (twins who will be two at the end of December), Camp has taken on a whole new meaning.  I want them to be able to experience the same kind of childhood magic my brothers and I were able to experience. It breaks my heart being so far away in Colorado, but my goal is to get to a point where we can spend at least a month there every summer.  The girls have already had a taste of its wonderment - a month there as 6 month old babies, and 2 weeks there over Rob and DJ's wedding when they were 20 months old.  They played at the beach and finally started to enjoy days on the boat!  There is nothing that Joel and I can say or do to make Hope and Campbell appreciate Camp, but I know that there is also nothing we can do to keep them from loving it. Just from spending time there with our family, the girls will inevitably grow to be Old Forge residents at heart. I look around the property and I see many more years of Burstein Family memories to be created.