BLACK CANYON CANOE TRIP

SO CAL VERSION OF THE KLONDIKE DERBY.....

WELL, THE SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA VERSION OF A KLONDIKE DERBY ONLY RESEMBLED THE REAL BSA KLONDIKE DERBY IN THAT THE SCOUTS WERE COLD... MISTY DAYS, RAIN AND SNOW MIXED, YET STILL IT WAS A 'SCOUT' EXPERIENCE, AND OUR 'FAIR-WEATHER' SCOUTS HAD A CHANCE TO EXPERIENCE SOME VERY UNPLEASANT WEATHER!

GOOD COMPANY

GRIFFIN, CROSSING THE RIVER GORGE, THOUSANDS OF FEET IN THE AIR...

ARCHERY

FIRE STATION

THE WINNING FIRE

Blacksmithing

Blacksmithing this past December was great. The boys had an entire day to be blacksmiths. They were free to be boys. After the intro, safety speech and demo, the boys were let free into the shop. There were two boys to a fire and they got to do everything. They stoked their own fire, heated, hammered, reheated, cut, bent and flattened their own pieces of metal. It was a wonderful experience and quite fun.

GRAND CANYON 2009

THE GANG

WEBELOS WOODS - OUR TROOP OFFERED 4 EVENTS!

The scouts spent the day sharing skills with younger Webelos. The four events: Fireman's chair (lashing), Acid river crossing (teamwork), slingshot shoot (skills), and rope ladder (skills)

went very well. Sunday morning there was an outdoor "scouts own" service that one of our guys helped with, followed by football and ultimate frisbee.

ANDY ADAMS LIFE SERVICE PROJECT

My service project started at 8am on Sunday the 9^th of August. In attendance were:

Name	Hours
Andy	9 hours 6 hours on site doing the project 3 hrs Picking up tools and organizing over phone and e-mail
Stewart	6 hrs
Kyler	6 hrs
Corey	6 hrs
Griffin	6 hrs
Oliver	6 hrs
6 hrs Matt	6 hrs
Mr. Gamble	5 hrs
Mr. Piggot	4 hrs
Mr. Adams	4 hrs
Mrs. Adams	2 hrs
Colleen	1 hr
Marilyn Taton	30 mins
Total	61.5 man hours

Most people worked from 8am to around 2pm. Marilyn was a resident of the trailer park we were working next to who had wanted the area cleaned up for quite some time and came out to help us shovel mulch for awhile. We managed to complete all of our goals which included:

• Clearing the area of debris and trash and putting it in a trailer to be hauled away
• Leveling the ground
• Fixing up the dry creek bed and extending it
• Recreating the rock line along the sidewalk and part of the street
• Laying mulch over the entire area
• Removing dead plants

Over all this took us 6 hours and 184 wheel barrows full of mulch. The tools that were borrowed from the city were returned to Ford Omor at the community center after the project.

KYLER'S SERVICE PROJECT @ POWAY PARK

Kyler's Life Service Project

What we accomplished: We built 6 benches for the City of Poway for Poway Park, and set railroad ties and spread mulch for the seating area.

The trench for the railroad ties was already dug, so what we did was after we built the benches, we placed the railroad ties and filled in next to them with dirt and then spread the wood chips brought by the rangers.

We were there from 9am to 3:30 pm, two and a half hours later than planned, total time for all of us together was 45 hours of work with a half hour lunch break around noon.

All in all the project went smoothly and I am very grateful to everyone who came and stayed much longer than expected.

There where 7 of us in total: Griffin Gamble, Matt and Andy Adams, Corey Pigott and David and Andrew Divjak.

EMERALD BAY SUMMER CAMP!

AQUACADE WILD!

OK now this may have been the funnest afternoon yet!
Aquacade down at the waterfront.  Probably 30 troops - very competative...
Now for the events...

Caterpiller  (Wow, was this chaos.  5 scouts in tiny rowboat with no paddles, paddling across the bay - see video at end of pics

Empty the ocean-All scouts run to ocean across rocks in bare feat, dip clothes in water, run back and wring out to fill bucket - 2nd place

Scoutmaster crosses the Delaware-Scouts outside of rowboat swimming, scoutmaster Ken in little boat standing like George Washington 

Scoutmaster Bellyflop-It speaks for itself. Wow was this fun to watch with 500 boys (Levi's judges gave him a 10, 10, 8) for 2nd place

Buffalo swim-Relay race about 60 yards each leg.  David D, Griffin, Corey and Andrew -2nd place by a millisecond.  Awesome race.

Message to Garcia  (Relay race....Canoe Andy and _____, Kayak - Griffin, Swim - Andrew, Run - Corey)  2nd place

We may have gotten a first over all.

The guys all have temporary (sharpie) tatoos now.  Someone may have crush on his swim instructor.

Levi has a really red belly from the flop (he really got some height!)

Take care you guys,

See you tommorow!   This is the best.  Thanks again to all of you!!!

Ken

Update from Ken - Friday Afternoon

K Gamble reporting in from Camp Emerald Bay.  Santa Catalina Island,  CA
Friday afternoon and another fantastic day at camp.

This morning T617 did the flag ceremony before breakfast.  They looked sharp and got many compliments.  We got to eat first because of that.  We had waffles with strawberries this morning,  however on the next table one young scout had waffles with...you guessed it fruit loops.  wow! "MY MOM NEVER LETS ME HAVE THIS!", exclaimed Andrew Divjak, as he filled three bowls full of fruit loops and gobbled them down!

David and Andrew are enjoying watersports meritbadge and have temporary tatoos on their arms in appreciation of the class and the instructor.  

For lunch a guy named "Adam" called us in troop by troop.  We have usually been able to have near exclusive "front of the line" priviledges.  David D. did grace Wednesday dinner, flags this morning....well today David had "Adam is Cool" written on his chest and stomach.  After grace he ran up onto the stage, pulled his shirt off over his head and waved it around and around...the crowd loved it. and guess what?  Adam called us next for lunch!  Thanks David.  

Most of the guys headed down to the waterfront at 2pm for swimming, lifesaving, small boat sailing, canoeing...

There are some pics of Zach making his own inflatable life vest, Cory and Kyler enjoying the beautiful sunshine.

The last pic is of JD leaving the dock.  He is taking a shuttle to Twin Harbors, then a ferry back to the mainland.  He was great with the guys.  Thanks so much JD for your instruction, your kindness, encouragement and care for the boys.

This afternoon we have an "aquacade", sort of like water olympics.  Our troop will participate.  Yahoo!  Levi is NOT looking forward to the scoutmaster belly flop portion, but better him than me!

I am really enjoying being with all your boys.  You all should be very, very proud of them. 

K.