Thanks for a great (and impressive) week of summer camp

Troop,

We’re back from Oregon, and 682 had a great week at Camp Meriwether. 28 boys and 2 girls went to camp … though only 27 boys and one girl came back (more on that later).

Parents: first let me say that this was the easiest week of summer camp I have led. All of your Scouts did a great job following the Scout Law all week and I had no major issues. I got compliments on their attitude and behavior from several camp counselors, from the Scoutmaster of the troop we shared Lookout campsite with, and from the bus driver. Scouts, you should be proud of yourselves because that definitely does not happen every time, even when I think you’ve been good.

But not only did you follow the Law, you had fun and took advantage of **everything** camp had to offer.

• Most of you went sandboarding
• A bunch of you slept on the beach Monday night
• You did a great job with the flag ceremony one day
• You won the “Hullaballoo” at lunch on Monday
• You got the highest score in the last three years on the scavenger hunt
• You won the sand castle contest
• You did service by helping with the beach cleanup;  by clearing larger stones from the waiting area in front of shooting sports; and by making Enter and Exit signs for the rifle range.
• A few of you cleaned up at the Magic tournament Thursday night, eliminating the other troops in the first round
• Four of you did the crate stacking contest; Robert got to 9 crates (the winner was 12 I think?)
• Four of you participated in the Frontier program, which involved a lot of activities and tasks at the Fort and around camp
• David earned the Vi et Concilio award, which is a big accomplishment.
• Damian, David, Nick, Liam, Kayne and Mr Semelroth all completed the Mile Swim (682 was 6 out of the 10 swimmers!)
• Kayne got an award for her work at the backsmith forge
• We had three teams in the camp triathalon
• Several of you built an island for a contest
• Some of you went mountain biking
• The troop adults participated in the stake break (with muzzle loaders); the Scoutmaster shootoff (Mr Semelroth placed second); the leader vs staff archery contest; and the Scoutmaster bellyflop contest (thank you Mr Barger!)
• The troop adults took a bunch of training classes too, including IOLS (outdoor skills for SMs/ASMs); Safety Afloat; Safe Swim; Climb on Safely; and Nap Safely (seriously!) (well, almost seriously)
• Because of all of that, Troop 682 won the Hullaballoo Contest, with well over 10,500 points (the highest other troops were about 6,000 points)
• And — most importantly — you had fun together.

Finally I have to thank the ASMs who came with us on this trip. Mr Barger, Mr. Collins, Mr. Liu, Ms Manju, Mr Salazar, Mr. Semelroth, Mrs. Stephens and Mr. Wallace all took a week off from work to come, and their help made the trip run incredibly smoothly. Thank you all for your time, for your attitude and patience with the Scouts, and for jumping in to help wherever the troop needed it.  And a very special thanks to Mr Swami Balasubramanian who made all of the reservations – for camp, for the flights, and for the bus — even though he and his Scouts were unable to attend this year. Thank you for going above abd beyond to make this trip work.

Oh, and about the two Scouts who didn’t come home. Nick and Kayne were both asked to stay for an extra week as part of the waterfront staff. It is not at all common to have a camp be impressed enough to ask one Scout to stay, let alone two — plus they asked Damian and Ethan to apply for next year. That is a great reflection on our older Scouts, but also on the whole troop. Great job, all of you.

Best,
Mr Dickson