On Saturday, November 15, Troop 5 traveled to Steamtown National Historic site in Scranton, PA to look at the steam powered and locomotive trains. We had a tour guide who was very knowledgeable about the trains. The first train we saw was the Illinois Central R.R. no.790, the only steam train preserved to survive they diesel age. Afterwards we looked at the train tracks and the way the levers could change the track direction. We even got on a locomotive passenger train for a 3 mile ride! During the ride, the tour guide told us how the train operated and how the conductor can see what is in front of him to avoid accidents. After the train ride, the tour guide led us to our lunch and I had a delicious hoagie. When lunch was finished we went into a small room to work on our train merit badge.

Next we entered the theatre to watch a fascinating movie about this person who loved trains so much that when he grew up he always rode on it for his work. As a boy when a train stopped, he went in front of the train to look at the face of the train. At the end of the movie he still did the same thing as an adult.

The movie also showed the trains could do many things like transport passengers, resources to factories, and military supplies when they where needed.

After the movie we went to the two museums, they both showed how the train operated and who worked on it and what they did. Before we left we thanked the tour guide for his tour. Most of us found it fun especially Mr. Rabsey, Mr. Schneir, Mr. Landy, Francis, Sasha and Dave.

When we got back to our campsite, we started to cook our dinner. Liamﾒs patrol cooked chili and my patrol cooked a simple stew that was easier to clean up than the chili because when we were finished , Sasha had to scrape and clean the chili pot for a very long time. Then we started a big bonfire and enjoyed the peach cobbler the adults prepared, and even better, that pot was easy to clean up.

The next morning we woke up at 7:15 and started to take down the tents before breakfast. Mr. Landy said the person who took down the most tents would get a ﾓprizeﾔ. Before we left we made sure to sweep and leave no trace of our stay since it was a national park.

Then we headed out to go to the Lackawanna coal mine where we watched a short movie about the mine. Before we started the film, Mr. Landy gave prizes for the most cheerful person on the trip to David and for taking down the most tents, Sasha. After the short film we went on the tour and the tour guide who took us down into the coal mine. When we were down there the tour guide told us the conditions of the coal mine were very harsh for poor immigrant workers as young as 8 to 30. When we got out of the coal mine we took a picture of Troop 5 at the entrance. We thanked our tour guide for his help and left to go home so I could write this wonderful summary of our trip.