Is it worth it
An honest answer — with a quick quiz to personalise it for you
Most people who go to Camp America describe it as one of the best experiences of their lives. That’s not marketing copy — it’s a remarkably consistent finding among alumni of all backgrounds, ages and personality types. Andrew went twice, wrote two books about it, and still talks about it like it happened last summer rather than a decade ago.
But the honest answer is that how worth it it is depends almost entirely on what you put in. It’s not a holiday. It’s not a gap year filler. It’s three months of real work, in a foreign country, responsible for children — and it is absolutely brilliant for it.
- Friendships form at warp speed
- Resets your perspective completely
- CV gold — independence, youth work, international experience
- Pay increases significantly for second summers
- Travel window at the end to explore America
- You’ll talk about it for the rest of your life
- First-summer pay is genuinely low
- You are always “on” — limited real downtime
- Sleep deprivation hits hard by week 3–4
- Zero privacy for months
- Homesickness is real, especially early
- Second summer is different, not just better
Click each phase to expand:
Andrew Waterhouse is a computer science graduate from the UK who had no outdoor experience before Camp America. He applied, got placed as an Outdoor Living Specialist at Camp Honeystone in Georgia, and spent two summers there. The books that came out of those summers — There’s No Place Like Summer Camp and Camp America: Second Summer Shenanigans — are the most detailed first-hand account of the experience that exists in print.
If you want the unfiltered answer to “is it worth it” from someone who went, loved it, went back, and then dedicated a significant chunk of time to writing about it — the books are the answer.