Every summer I go to a place called Sandy Island Camp. I know, I’m a little too old for summer camp, but this isn’t your average summer camp. Since before I was born I’ve been going to the island in the middle of Lake Winnipsaukee. I hope to be able to bring my kids there when I have a family.

Yes, that’s right, Sandy Island Camp is for families. Why would I, a 19 year-old college student want to go to summer camp with her parents? Because it’s my favorite place to be.

Sandy Island is a summer camp run by the Boston YMCA that originally started as a camp for young men back in the early part of the 1900’s. When World War II broke out, there weren’t enough young men to fill a summer camp, so it became a ladies camp. Through out the war years, young women from New England would travel to New Hampshire to attend “Sandy Camp.”

When the war was over, the men came back, but the women didn’t want to give up the camp they had come to love. It ran as a co-ed camp for a few years, but before long it became what it is today, a family camp.

My family has been attending Sandy Island Camp for 21 years. We’re considered pretty new. Some families have been coming for over 40 or 50 years. The new families on the Island are always greeted by the experienced campers and are welcomed to the family. We have missed only one summer (when I was 8 years old) for a family trip to Europe. I enjoyed that trip, but I was very upset about missing out on seeing my friends from camp. Even by the age of 8, I had developed friendships with the other kids at Sandy. The same families come back every year; I have known these people my entire life but only see them once a year.

Sandy is like any other summer camp: there is swimming, kayaking, canoeing, tennis, volleyball, arts and crafts, off-island excursions, and a talent show at the end of each week. Picture any other summer camp, subtract the counselors, add people 18 and up, and that’s Sandy.

It’s the most laid back place, with the most chill people I’ve ever met. They even had a day camp for us when we were little that ran from breakfast until lunch. And yes, I do drink Bug Juice with every meal.

Because the entire island contains only the camp, and all campers are like a huge family, kids are allowed a great deal of independence. Usually around the age of 7, the kids outgrow the day camp and are given free roam of the island, with exception of supervised swimming. Families get to spend quality time with each other during the family style suppers every night, but still get to have as much apart time as they want.

During the day there are all the usual camp activities, but at night is when the real fun starts. Every night there is a different activity planned. There is Bingo night where you can try to win a little extra money the day before the shopping trip to Wolfboro, N.H., movie nights, and the infamous talent show. My favorite nights are the nights we have dances.

These dances don’t include hip-hop or pop music, and people of every age are there. These dances are the most corny, but absolute best part of Sandy Island Camp. I’m talking about line dances.

From the tender age of 5 I have been doing the YMCA, the YaYa, the Alleycat and the Bossanova. The dances range in difficulty from the chicken dance and the bunny hop to the complicated steps of the Strawberry Patch or my favorite, the Salty Dog Rag.

Call me dork if you want, but I love those line dances. It’s the only place where you’ll see a 12-year-old dancing with someone else’s 84-year-old grandfather, next to a 21-year-old college student dancing with a 38-year-old mother of twin 10-year-olds.

The dancing may eventually stop, but the music doesn’t. There is a bonfire every night at a place on the island called Juliet’s Point. During the day, it’s the best view and the most romantic spot on the island, but when night falls it’s where the party is. People bring their guitars or bongo drums down to the point, and the music goes on all night. The songs tend to be the old proven greats: with favorites from Bob Marley, the Greatful Dead, the Beatles and Bob Dylan being played, the jam sessions turn into sing-alongs.

When you’re on the island you forget everything else exists. The cell phones are turned off, and TV’s are unheard of. Even sharing a bathroom with 20 other families doesn’t bother you. The walk at 3 a.m. from your family’s cabin to the closest bathroom doesn’t seem so long or cold or dark. Carrying flashlights is for wimps; we trip over root and rocks and logs along the path, but we make with as much as a stubbed toe.

I love Sandy Island Camp. Not just for the fun times I’ve had, or the great people I’ve gotten to love like a family, but for the amazing ability it has to unlock the free-spirited, laid back, hippie inside moody-teenagers, stressed-out stock brokers, or tired parents alike.

Next time you here someone say they are going to family camp, don’t knock the idea. It’s the best time you’ll have in your life.

Molly Eggleston is a Collegian columnist.