Cub Scout Camping Trip

Derek and Adam hanging out at the tent

Whittling sticks was a big hit

Targeting an inflatable deer with a nerf crossbow

Enjoying all the good food. The guys really get into the cooking.

All dressed up in their class A uniforms and ready for the cult like assembly

I ditched the assembly and worked on getting the fire going

Adam, the little firebug, is never far from the flame

In the morning warming up and eating donuts

Packed and heading home

This weekend we went camping with Adam's scout troop (and what seemed like every other scout troop in Atlanta) to Bert Adam's Scout Camp in Covington. Helen and the boys got up at the crack of dawn on Saturday and made the 1 and 1/2 hour trip. I played tennis in the morning and joined them in the late afternoon - just in time for dinner...and Helen already had the tent up...perfect.

Derek was in scouts for a year or so, but we got him to "agree" that, with all our other activities, it was just too much to do scouts also. When Adam started elementary school he mentioned wanting to do scouts a couple times, but we just kind of glossed over it by mentioning how we already had too many activities. This year he told us that he really, really, really wanted to do cub scouts. It's just not fair. They show the kids a picture of a BB gun and a campfire and the kids are brainwashed.

The reality is what happened this weekend. You wait in line for an hour to take about 10 shots on a BB gun. You wait in line another hour to shoot a bow and arrow a couple times. The kids ended up having fun, but it wasn't the structured activities as much as just the hanging out with their small den around the camp. The kids were supposed to go back to the structured activities after lunch, but decided to just hang out around camp and whittle. Helen was happy that she was able to get plenty of papers graded.

In scouts there are, what seems to me, to be more than the average number of strange kids. When I arrived at the camp, one of the kids went walking by me as he picked his nose and then proceeded to discreetly eat his bounty. I thought...perfect.

In the evening, the boys (and men) put on their formal scout uniforms for the big cult gathering. I was chatting around the camp and ended up arriving late as all the groups were lining up along this long bridge over a lake that lead to an amphitheater. For some reason, they weren't letting the groups enter the theatre and it didn't seem safe having all those people on that bridge. Helen later told me that the railings were giving somewhat. It seemed like a disaster waiting to happen. Then more groups started arriving and winding around the lake. When the line finally started to move and the throngs of people started squeezing across the bridge, I decided I had to get out of there. I went back to our camp and helped get the fire started. Helen came back and thought I intentionally skipped the "seance", but I told her that I went to the lake and intended to go in the theatre, but it was just too much of a zoo.

There were many people that we knew from our area that were there and the kids all had big fun running around from camp to camp playing with all their friends. The weather was perfect and overall we had a good time.