HAPPY CAMPERS

A CAREFREE VACATION IN THE ADIRONDACKS The pilots are wearing polo shirts and Bermuda shorts so you know you’re going somewhere fun.

The Adirondacks’ Lake Kora is the adult camp of your childhood dreams.

A smooth hour and 15 minute flight from Manhattan, and our chartered Fly The Whale seaplane splashes down. We’re in a lake surrounded by pines in the Adirondacks. The only buildings in sight are a cluster of timber and stone lodges: Lake Kora, a historic great camp built in 1898. Lake Kora’s staff waves from the boathouse dock as a speedboat ushers me and my friends ashore.

Lake Kora was originally called Kamp Kill Kare, implying that the rustic luxury lodge is a place to kill your cares. (It’s much easier to carve a K into wood than a C—an important aspect to consider in 1898.) The carefree vibe is immediately apparent. Cell service isn’t happening and the air is fresh. The property is allinclusive, booked only for groups of up to 35 guests, July through October. So, it’s just my friends and me, plus the personable staff who become our friends, and 1,000 acres of lake and forest. My sense of duty is gone. No obligations. No work. My friends left their kids at home (they’re allowed, just not along for this reunion trip). We are the kids now.

If my 10-year-old self dreamt up a resort, this would be it. It’s the summer camp I never went to, staffed by people who allow you to feel you’re a playful child. I've emptied my mind of everything except the next activity. The forested property houses a million possibilities: boats, billiards, tennis courts, a baseball diamond, pickleball, a unicycle.

We’re not only getting younger and sillier, we’re stepping back in time, to the Gilded Age. The great camps of Upstate New York pioneered the now widespread style of bringing wilderness textures, scents, and materials indoors. In the 1890s, architects took what was local and natural and created large-scale, audacious great camps that are equally sophisticated and rustic. It changed the perception of how elite vacationers regarded wild places. Many aspects of the original camp are preserved; craftsmanship and details are impeccable. A sweet woodsy scent permeates the lodges. Libraries are lined with books belonging to past owners of the property, the Vanderbilts and Woodruffs. The Casino, where pre-dinner cocktail hour is often held, is filled with roulette, pool, backgammon, and taxidermy galore. Several French 75s and you might trip on the bear rug.

Before lunch, we mountain bike the three-mile trail encircling the lake, then gather on the boathouse dock for family style steak frites and tuna niçoise salad. It’s the best steak I’ve ever had. Yet I’m sneaking looks at the glistening lake and water toys. Water skis, inner tubes, kayaks, fishing rods, electric boats, original restored canoes...

We canoe across the lake, out to the island with its idyllic twostory cabin and Adirondack chairs. Adam (the Guest Services Director but we call him the Dictator of Fun) guides us to the adjoining lakes. They’re implausibly remote and secluded. A bald eagle launches from the top of one of the several million pine trees lining the lake, flaunting its wingspan. We bring the boats ashore and walk along the grassy shoreline speckled with flowers and wild strawberries, reveling in the beauty of the Adirondack Park.

Immediately on return I have a hankering for inner tubing, and without batting an eye they load up the speedboat and five minutes later we’re bouncing off the inner tube. I joke that we should stay out on the boat until dinner. Adam simply says we have a full tank of gas.

But after many failed waterskiing attempts, the wellness building sounds especially appealing. I soak in the jacuzzi surrounded by ferns, lilies, and bay windows, then walk upstairs to the sauna, bypassing the fitness center, whose irrelevance to this trip is only surpassed by that of the boardroom.

Playtime is balanced by meals exquisite enough to warrant visiting for the food alone. Menus are tailored to our preferences and sophisticated comfort food predominates; Chef D'Anthony’s Texas upbringing comes alive in dishes like roasted poblano soup with avocado mousse and decadent

“We bring the boats ashore and walk along the grassy shoreline speckled with flowers and wild strawberries, reveling in the beauty of the Adirondack Park.”

shrimp and grits. The dining room has a fireplace big enough to walk in and a long table. Formal settings are always in place, whether it’s a family style BBQ dinner or a candle-lit seven course meal with wine pairings enhancing the flavors in salmon garnished with morels, succulent venison, and baked Alaska.

After dinner we gather in the 120-year-old bowling alley for a truly uncompetitive game of bowling. We’re barefoot, cheering the loudest when others get a strike, and when they get gutter balls too. Having heart to heart conversations between frames. What’s incredible about the bowling alley is you manually aid the apparatus that replaces the pins and returns the balls. Champagne glasses and Manhattans multiply along the railing. There’s no last call and only a two minute walk back to our rooms.

My 1,000 sq ft room in the boathouse has two bedrooms—a master and an adorable kids’ room upstairs, two fireplaces (one adjacent a soaking tub in the bathroom, one in the living room), a balcony overlooking the lake, and no lock on the door. To keep out what? Bugs? Your friends and family with equally whimsical and spacious rooms?

I wake up to birds chirping and water lapping at the dock. The lake view lures me out of bed. I pull on a sweater that still smells of last night’s crackling campfire, and sink into an Adirondack chair on my deck, without a care in the world. *