6,600 plus Scouters, 200 plus Cadets, West Point's Lake Frederick Training ground, and again great weather made for a fantastic weekend. Our campsite (Jump Zone) was one of five different sites spread out around Lake Frederick. Each with its own water truck and sanitary facilities.
The Cadets start organizing for the Camporee in September and manage to pull this enormous event off each year on their own. It's hard to believe that these young men and women are only 3-5 years older than our oldest scouts. And a group of nicer people you will never meet. After working long hard days entertaining the Scouts they were pleasant and cheerful and friendly to the end. They all still had their end of term papers to complete and finals to study for but they gave 110% to make the Camporee memorable for all who attended. Most are former Scouts themselves so I guess that isn't too surprising.
Our two Cadet hosts for the weekend were Bill Pogue (L) and Sumner Ogrydziak (R). Bill and Sumner spent time with the Troop when they weren't busy running one of the stations during the day. Bill and Sumner arrived out our Camsite at 6:15am Saturday morning to get our Scouts "in the mood" for the day ahead by leading us In 30 minutes of vigours physical training.
After breakfast it was off to the parade field for a demonstration by the West Point Jump team.
After the opening and the jump demonstration we hit the trail. Most of the activities were centered around things that required teamwork, physical challenges, leadership reaction, scouting skills and military themed challenges.
Cole was a good sport during the camo painting challenge.
Teamwork was a theme running throughout the day's events. Most challenges were presented to the Scouts in a way that made them work together.
Prôbably the most fun was had in the mud. The Scouts had to "rescue" a comrade by crawling through a pit of mud. To make sure each scout who participated was muddy enough the cadets continued to add water throughout the day.
The final results were magnificent.
After a long day on Saturday the Cadets hosted a bonfire and DJ to entertain everyone.
Most of our scouts were in their tents and out before the end of the party, including our SPL and Quartermaster who we had to get out of bed to go attend the Scout's final leadership briefing.
The next morning it was time to start breaking down the campsite and cleaning up.
Then Sumner and Bill arrived to take our Troop to the parade field and prepare them for the presentation of the Troops to the Commandant of West Point in a parade of all the Scouts.
Finally, it was time to hike back out and end the weekend. Through a mix up on Friday one of the trucks was parked at Lake Frederick and we were able to load all our gear and drive it out saving us a lot of time and effort packing it out. The morning was hot, and the climb out was steep.
For the complete photo record of the weekend please check out our Troop photo album on the web at:
