Cadet rappelling from climbing wall.

Summer High Adventure

Historically offered during daily sports time, our High Adventure program has long afforded boys the opportunity to experience unique outdoor adventures with highly trained staff. For the 2023 Summer Program, High Adventure activities will be offered during the weekends and included in the price of tuition for all students. Below is a sampling of some of the activities offered through the High Adventure program.

Canoeing and Kayaking

The Hargrave Pool and our on-campus pond provide the venue for summer students to learn paddle techniques for both kayaks and canoes. Students will learn how to rescue a capsized canoe with a T-save, how to read a river, and compete in a friendly canoe/kayak race.

A short one-mile paddle on the Dan River and a water hike down a stream in Anglers Park is the first off-campus trip. Campers will discover nature while finding frogs, turtles, crawfish, and lizards.

Weekend Trip: A nine-mile paddle on the beautiful Horse Shoe Bend section of the James River.

Rock Climbing and Rappelling

Learn how to rock climb, rappel, and belay on our own 35-foot climbing tower. Skills such as rope set-up, maintenance, and how to tie the major rock-climbing knots will be practiced.

Weekend Trip: Triangle Rock Club in North Carolina is a massive indoor rock climbing gym with over 27,000 sq. ft. of climbing walls and over 6,000 additional sq. ft. of bouldering walls. The highest walls at this gym top out at an incredible 55 ft.

Shooting and Rafting

Summer Cadets will practice archery, basic target shooting, and play archery challenge games.

Gun safety training will be followed by skeet shooting on our on-campus skeet range.

Weekend Trip: An overnight White Water Camping & Rafting trip on the New River located in Oak Hill, West Virginia. Wake up early for an amazing breakfast buffet then venture off to the river for an all-day excursion tackling the Class 3 and 4 rapids. Halfway down the river, enjoy a barbecue lunch on the water’s edge. After whitewater rafting, the rest of the day is spent at the lake water park, which includes zip lines, inflatable rock walls, trampolines, water slides, blob launch and more.

This trip will include an overnight camp out in tents where campers can cook s’mores and stay up late telling stories around the camp fire.

SCUBA and Obstacles

High Adventure campers will take part in a Discover SCUBA Day which provides basic SCUBA instruction and they then practice their new skills in our massive 100-meter pool.

Campers will also go through our military grade obstacle course as well as navigate the Hargrave Leader Reaction Course which teaches teamwork and problem-solving skills. Summer campers will all have a chance to fish for bass, catfish, and bluegill in our on-campus pond.

Weekday Activities: Trip to Danville for a fun day of ziplining on a 400-foot zipline that flies through the forest and features both single and tandem rides.