Boy Scout Troop 386

This past weekend was the Eagle District 2012 Webelos Woods.  This year we hosted a group of Webelos from Pack 79.  On this campout, we taught them how to cook and even clean up afterwards.  All of the Webelos were able to take part in our skit at the Saturday night campfire.  They must have had fun because they were awake at 2 am telling scary stories and at 3:30 am playing flashlight tag in the camp.  Overall, they are all looking forward to becoming boy scouts.

Our activity this year was First Aid.  We put up stations that included making first aid kits for the Webelos to take home.  Another highlight of the day was our fake wounds.  Utilizing the technique of moulage, we made some very real looking injuries and fooled many of the Webelos.  We used these fake wounds on arms and legs to teach the boys how to do first aid on these injuries.  Lastly, we put on “stretcher races” to teach them how to transport an injured person.  Overall, the first aid station was a huge success.

We had a lot of other fun activities.  First there was a “Snipe Hunt” for the Webelos. A friend from another troop played along, saying that he had seen a whole bunch of Snipes up on Jamboree hill.  We had them wait behind the shower building for the Snipe to come.  After a short delay, we ran out and scared them.  On Sunday morning, when breaking camp, we noticed a huge dead tree limb that had been struck by lightning and was dangling over the camp site.  To make the camp safe, we decided to pull it down.  We tied a long rope to it and pulled it down.  It made a big dent in the ground where it hit.  We were happy that we could make the camp safer for other scouts.

Blake H., John A., Blake L.

This year’s summer camp, Camp Cedars, was a great experience. My favorite part had to be the hammock square. We got all the hammocks we had and put them in a huge square around a few trees. I tried to get my super high so I had fun time getting in and out of my hammock. The hammock square was the top hangout spot. When we weren’t in classes we were hanging out in our hammocks. That was my favorite experience from summer camp.
-Marcus L.

 (Click for a larger version)

Congratulations to Chris F. for being elected as our new Senior Patrol Leader!  Each of our patrols has also selected a new Patrol Leader:

Flaming Icecubes             Brenner F.

Mad Cows                        John A.

Killer Bunnies                   Stephen D.

Venture                            Conner M.

The first big task for Chris as the new Senior Patrol Leader was to put together his leadership team.  The job of running the troop falls on more than just his shoulders.  Here are the new leaders:

Assistant SPL                   Scotty C., Casey M.

Scribe                               Carter

Troop Guide                     Freddy, Alex F.

Quartermasters                Matt H., Matt P.

Librarian                           Tyler S.

Webmasters                     Blake H., Blake L., John A.

Chaplain’s Aid                  Stephen D.

Historian                           Zane

Photographer                   Brenner

Service Projects                Matt A.

Trading Post                     Kellen

Leave No Trace                Travis B.

Gamemaster                     Nate G.

OA representative             Freddy

Congratulations to all of you on your new positions.  I know we are going to accomplish great things over the next six months with such an outstanding team of leaders.  Let’s get to work!!!

A few weeks ago, we held a CO2 car race.  Each patrol had a car entered into the contest.  There were some issues getting the starter to work consistently so It’s hard to say if there was a real winner.  The coolest looking car, though, was definitely the one made by the Flaming Ice Cube patrol.  In the attached video you can see it racing.  Great job guys!

Older scouts in Troop 386 had a fantastic experience in June backpacking for two weeks at Philmont Scout Ranch in northeastern New Mexico. Fortunately the fires which continue to plague parts of Colorado and southern New Mexico were far away, and both our crews had good experiences. Here is a 4.5 minute video of some hiking scenes with one of our crews, along with several photos from the trek. If you’d like to see more, I published all 200+ photos I took during our 11 day adventure to this Flickr collection, and also shared my audio journal entries from the trip in the post, “Storychasing our Philmont Backpacking Trek in June 2012 with Images, Audio & Video.” If you ever have a chance to go on high adventure to Philmont, don’t miss the opportunity!

The canoeing campout was wet and fun. We only tipped two canoes I think and the food was good due to a huge stockpile. We were staying at Camp Dierks in southeast Oklahoma.  It is beautiful there along the Glover River.  We went to the Mountain Fork River for our canoeing.  It rained for about 12 hours straight after we arrived at camp but cleared up in time to go canoeing. But we had both an excellent and fun time.

This post was submitted by brenner.

The campout this past weekend was a lot of fun.(Even though our campsite didn’t look like it had been mowed in forever). On Saturday we did a lot of different and fun activities on Jamboree Hill, there was first aid, water testing, shelter building, fire making, geo caching, etc. Each troop had to to do a service project around thier campsite. Ours was picking up a lot of brush and cutting down a tree to clear a path so the cars could turn around on the road. we also had OA call out for all of the boys who have showed great camping experience. If you did not get a chance to come, you really missed out. Hope I get to see you at the next one.

Seven of our scouts were called out for the order of the Arrow at Saturday night’s District Camporee.  The boys selected were:

• Niel Ash
• Jarrett C.
• Matt H.
• Blake H.
• James H.
• Casey M.
• Matt P.

Also Mr. Adkins was selected as an adult member of the OA.

The order of the Arrow is the BSA’s National Honor Scoiety.  To even be eligible, a scout must already be First Class rank or higher and have camped 15 nights on outings including one summer camp over the last two years.  That is not enough, though.  He then must be elected by his fellow scouts as representing the ideals of scouting by living the Scout Oath and Law.  More than half of his fellow scouts must agree that he is worthy to be elected.

The next step for all of these prospective OA members is to complete tehir ordeal.  This is a weekend event where the candidate learns some of the traditions of the order and commits to the principles of this brotherhood of cheerful service.  Once completing the ordeal,  our boys will be full members in the OA. This spring’s Ordeal will be held the weekend of May 18-20 at Camp Slippery Falls.  Follow this link to sign up now: www.lastfrontiercouncil.org/registration/calendardetail.asp?ActivityKey=993815.

Congratulations to all of our new OA candidates!

Today we celebrated the ultimate achievement in Scouting for five of our boys.  Daniel Griffin, Scott Hauge, Alex Mckitrick, Kyle Puckett, and Andrew Simpson held their Eagle Court of Honor.  We got to relive some of the many highlights of their scouting careers and then see them have their Eagle Award pinned on.  A highlight for me is always to have all Eagle Scouts who are present join our new Eagles in the Eagle Scout Oath.  We had about fifteen Eagles come up from the audience.  Quite impressive!  The whole event was a lot of fun and hopefully a great inspiration for some of the Life Scouts in the audience.  I know that each of them will continue to make us proud in their future endeavors.  Great job guys!

This weekend, we held our annual New Boy campout for the newest members of Troop 386 – Kellen, Matthew, and Jesse.  Troop Guides Alex and Freddie were in charge and did a great job of keeping all of that young energy focused.  The boys were able to accomplish quite a bit and had fun doing it.  They earned their Totem Chip and Fireman’s chit for starters.  After a day filled with accomplishment, we searched for a geocache in the park and practiced using our compasses in the process.  Kellen (eagle eyes) was the one who found the cache hidden in the stump.

The new scout dads got to see how things work in Boy Scouts.  They also learned that camping does not mean “roughing it” at least as far as meals are concerned.  The boys finished off the weekend with a breakfast of that perennial favorite, Monkey Bread.  I expect great things from these guys over the next year!