Kids now camp where Rajneesh ruled

ANTELOPE, Ore. - The middle schoolers go about their summer-camp activities, unaware that all around them, thousands of followers once toiled in the service of Indian guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh.

"Some kid told me there was a cult here," said Andy Thompson, 13, who is among the youngsters visiting what is now called Young Life's Washington Family Ranch.

"Yeah, they wore red robes and stuff," said Jimmy Marble, 14, a camper from Yakima.

Like most of the kids who spend about a week at this Christian youth camp, Andy and Jimmy know little of the 6,000 disciples who followed the Bhagwan's teachings and bought him a fleet of 93 Rolls-Royces.

Within Young Life's 64,000-acre ranch is Wild Horse Canyon youth camp, a 32-acre area that has been bustling with youngsters since June 3.

Of the compound - once known as Rancho Rajneesh - campers hear a mixture of fact and fiction.

Signs of the red-clad group that constructed this citylike oasis in the middle of nowhere are quickly disappearing. The Rajneeshees' 88,000-square-foot grand meeting hall is now a sports complex, complete with four full-length basketball courts, three climbing walls and a skatepark.

The former 140-room Rajneeshee hotel has been converted into two camper dormitories. And the Bhagwan's home, which once sat on 40 acres surrounded by a 12-foot barbed-wire fence, is no longer visible.

It burned to the ground almost four years ago, and the 35 year-round staff members on the ranch keep cattle on what was once considered sacred ground by Rajneesh's devotees.

About 4,000 youngsters will have paid a visit to this site before the summer is over. Some of the camp's more popular features include a ropes course 40 feet above the ground and a 160-foot-high, quarter-mile-long zip line that campers hang from as they reach speeds of up to 40 mph.

Wild Horse Canyon is one of 22 Christian youth camps owned by the nondenominational Young Life international youth ministry, based in Colorado Springs, Colo.

The staff and volunteers admit there is irony in how the ranch has been transformed into a place to learn about God.

"I think it's ironic, but I have a faith that tells me God was involved from the beginning," said Ben Herr, the ranch's property manager. "What we believe here is that God used the Rajneeshees to build us a Young Life camp."

When the sect collapsed in 1985 after Rajneesh was convicted of immigration fraud and deported to India, the property fell into the hands of an insurance company.

The Rajneeshees left behind intact water and sewer systems, a 30-million-gallon reservoir, electricity, phone service and a small airstrip. Their ranch was purchased in 1991 by Montana millionaire Dennis Washington, who gave it to Young Life in 1998.

After $10 million and 18 months of renovation, Wild Horse Canyon camp was ready for business, with the first campers arriving last summer.

Herr said Young Life couldn't have picked a more perfect place for a youth camp.

"The Rajneeshees had everything they needed down here," Herr said. "They had the infrastructure to support 15,000 people. They also built most of their buildings using I-beams, which is a blessing because we can pick them up and move them around.

"We would have never come here if we would have had to start from scratch."