PAM Early on, my kids went to the program that their preschool ran in the summer. After two years, we sought out an alternative. I began my search by looking at those free parenting magazines you see around the city.

GIL I remember looking at those ads and checking out their websites, and not thinking that any of those camps were for me. I started asking friends for their recommendations.

GIL Most of our information came from kids and parents. That's the best, because you get the opinions of people who have actually gone there. We found out about Downtown Day Camp when we walked by the line of parents waiting for the bus and asked them what they were waiting for. They said good things about the camp, and we took it from there.

CHUCK It really is all about referral.

STEPHEN Did you choose your camps based on the outdoor experience they offered?

PAM We chose Oasis in Central Park because the outdoor space appealed to me. The kids are in the park all day long. They do volleyball, kickball and other sports.

CHUCK But some of the camps have amazing activities that my son might not try otherwise, like jewelry making, ceramics, drama. When I went to camp, we made lanyards and pounded on a piece of metal to make an ashtray.

STEPHEN Do a lot of parents make the mistake of waiting too late to start looking?

CHUCK As soon as camp is over, you have to start thinking about next year.

CHRISTINE It helps to start early. Some of the camps like their applications in January or February. There's a kid-population explosion in New York. Sometimes you have to give a $500 deposit with your application, which might be in October, and then you have to commit by February. If you commit earlier, you get a better rate—the early-bird special. The application time depends on the camp. The pricier camps want their applications in earlier.

PAM But you can't always make a decision in the fall, or sometimes even by January or February. Last year, I realized we had this chunk of July when the kids weren't signed up for anything. In late May I called Oasis and said I was there last year, and they said, "Fine, we've got room."

GIL Some of the NYC day camps continue to accept kids late in the spring.

STEPHEN Is there a lot of pressure to get into the right camp, just like there is to get into the right school?

ALL Oh, yeah.

CHRISTINE My son went to Downtown Day for two years, and I've met families who wouldn't think of sending their child there because the camp has this notorious play area called Fantasy Land. It's notorious because there are two arcade games, and some parents say, "My God, I'm not going to send my kids to a camp where they can play two-dimensional nonsense games…." But he loved the camp.

STEPHEN What's the difference between the city camps and the suburban ones, where you send your kids off on a bus?

CHRISTINE Price, for one, and variety of experience. Suburban camps are less affordable, especially for families with two or three kids. That means that some of the Rockland County camps can seem like "camp for kids who can afford it." That's one of my reservations about them. Just like with schools, I'd like my kid to go to a camp that's as diversified as possible. But with suburban camps, the facilities are better, and the kids get far more activities.

STEPHEN Do you think more parents are keeping their kids in the city after 9/11, because they want them closer to home?

GIL That's on people's minds. The day of the blackout, my kids were in Downtown Day Camp, so I went down with my bike and carried one home in the bike seat and the other one on the back of the bike. I don't know what I'd have done if they'd been upstate.

CHRISTINE We all dread a city lockdown.

CHUCK I guess that's another argument for going to a camp outside the city. If something happens, it's going to be in the city. You want to be in contact with them, but if not, at least you know they're okay.

PAM But say there is a lockdown, you want to be with your kids. Either way it isn't perfect.

STEPHEN What's the worst part about day camps?

ALL The bus.

GIL What do you do if traffic is bad and you're waiting on the street for your child for an hour?

PAM The main reason we didn't want to do a Rockland camp was the distance and having the kid on a bus for an hour in the middle of July. That's why we chose Oasis. But I have to say, there were times that it took the bus over an hour to get from 96th and Central Park West to 46th Street, where we live. The counselor would call me on the cell phone, and I'd walk up to wherever they were stuck in traffic and get my child off the bus.

CHUCK One camp we're looking at [the 92nd Street Y's Camp Yomi, in Rockland County] makes the bus trip an integral part of the camping experience. They have a bus cheer, and radios that are tuned into other camp buses so the kids can hear their cheers as they travel.

PAM My daughter told me the only reason she might not want to go to Oasis anymore was the bus ride home.

STEPHEN So in short, day camp is a typically complicated New York experience that everyone somehow gets through?

ALL Yes, exactly.