Troop 5 – Bronxville, NY

Valley Forge was a very rewarding and windy experience. After leaving the Reformed Church parking lot right after school, we set out for Valley Forge. The drive was extended due to heavy, bumper-to-bumper traffic on the NJ Turnpike. After finally arriving at the campsite despite confusing directions and frustrating logistics, we set up camp in the pitch black and had dinner at 10:30 pm. Both First Class Cooking chefs (Cameron Smith and Charlie Vorbach) cooked delicious meals that were devoured by everyone. However, cleanup didn’t go so smoothly and it took us a while to figure it out. Thanks to “Super-Chip” Cushman, cleanup finally was completed and the campsite was organized. Since this was Troop 5’s first Camporee, many lessons were learned. Lesson 1: Go to McDonalds on the Friday night of Valley Forge. We were all exhausted and slept very well that night.

We woke at 6:00 am and started cooking breakfast. Once again, the meals were delicious; however, our cleanup time wasn’t beaten by much. Super-Chip came to the rescue again and recommended that we take the cover off of our cooking canopy, which would have been blown away in the 50 mph winds. We tied down everything and our work paid off. Unlike some other troops who had to check out early because of excess wind damage to much of their gear, our tents and canopy withstood the gael force winds. We then walked to the bus that transported us to Valley Forge National Park. Before the opening ceremony, Philadelphia Fife and Drum played numerous patriotic tunes. They taught us many interesting things. Did you know that the British sang Yankee Doodle Dandy (aka deceitful fool) as an insult to the American patriots, yet the Americans eventually sang it for motivation? After the Philadelphia Fife and Drum’s performance, the Squires of Song, an acapella group that was made up of a bunch of singers who could have been as old as George Washington, sang “You’re a Grand Old Flag”, “Glory Halleluiah”, and “Proud to be an American”. After several speeches by the Chairman of the Event and Tom Harrington, the Scout Executive of the Cradle of Liberty Council, Joe Landy of Connecticut was recognized for being on the National Board of the Boy Scouts of America and for being present at the BSA’s 99th Valley Forge Pilgrimmage.

We then set off to participate in a number of demonstrations. In the seven stations that we went to we learned many things about being a soldier at Valley Forge. For example, at the medical station (voted most popular by Troop 5), we learned that George Washington died because he had too much blood taken out of him (almost 128 ounces!) when he had a fever. This apparently was state of the art medical treatment at the time that only Dracula could appreciate. Next, we saw an authentic cannon being shot, which was very cool to see, and finally, we learned that soldiers would have to listen to the beat of a drummer for commands so that they would know what to do on a noisy battlefield.

After the seven stations, we visited a few extra places to earn the 2011 Encampment Award. The most memorable attraction was Washington’s headquarters. Approximately thirty people lived in this small house (including Washington’s Aide de Camp Alexander Hamilton) during the Continental Army’s encampment at Valley Forge. We also saw replicas of huts in which ordinary soldiers would have stayed. When we arrived back at the campsite, we relaxed for a few hours then ate dinner (courtesy of scouts Brian Chrystal and Jack O’Neill). We finally went to a somewhat cheesy campfire show (they couldn’t light a fire because it was too windy). However, Troop 5 represented themselves well in their Water Conservation Skit. We went to bed after the campfire and woke up early the next morning, broke down camp, and went home.

While none of us would probably admit that we would have enjoyed living through the hardships that Revolutionary soldiers experienced, we had a great time and learned a lot about winter camping.

Christopher Landy

On Friday January 28, 15 scouts and 8 dads left Bronxville for the annual ski weekend at Gore Mountain. We drove up in three brand new SUVs provided by Council. The SUV’s were all black and we looked like part of the secret service. Half way up we had a delicious dinner at a rest stop along the way. Later that evening we arrived at the Boy Scout Farmhouse.

The farmhouse was located at Camp Read where we camped last summer. The winter sports staff, like in past years, was very helpful and hospitable. The weekend included a a professional cook on staff who cooks great breakfasts and dinners. For breakfast we had pancakes, french toast, bacon and sausages. Some us us wanted to stay forever. For dinner we had roasted chicken parts, mashed potatoes, and a veggie. Lunches were bagged and included 2 sandwiches, an apple, a drink, and a snack.

The camp has a volunteer staff who were incredibly helpful and provided information about the mountain, ski lessons, and rental equipment. They thought of everything down to the finest paid detail and helped us get to the mountain in the morning.

On Saturday, some of the scouts took lessons although most scouts and parents ended up hitting the slopes on either skis or “boards”. It had snowed about a foot and the conditions were great all day Saturday. After dinner on Saturday we had a movie night (Ferris Bueller’s Day Off) and topped it off with ice cream sundaes.

On Sunday, we awoke to even more snow which improved the conditions with the freshest of powder. We skied until 1:00 and then met up at the SUV’s for our departure.

During the weekend, the scouts used some free time teaching themselves First Class requirements and sharing good times. The Dads had a great time overseeing the boys and getting to know each other better.

Given how much fun everyone had, this sure seems like a trip we’ll repeat every year!

Steve Ircha, Sr.

On November 20, 15 scouts and 3 adult leaders went to a Hudson Valley orienteering meet in Fahnestock State Park just off the Taconic State Parkway.   If you’ve never been to one of these competitions before, they are a lot of fun and intensely competitive.  The object is to work your way around a course that has been set up in the woods moving from checkmark to checkmark as fast as you can.  All you have is a map, a compass, a scoresheet, a few friends and a lot of intuition.  I would describe it as a timed scavenger hunt in the woods.

When we first arrived, we saw a lot of army soldiers who were practicing on very difficult orienteering courses.  We were then assisted by a man who had been teaching and practicing orienteering for 50 years.  He gave us a little tutorial on what we were supposed to do.  Little tricks like always holding a  map with it oriented properly (ie even if it is upside down), the meanings of certain symbols and how to fold a map properly came in handy.  After the lesson, we split up into three groups of five and went on the beginner white course while one group braved a more difficult yellow course.  The course was pretty easy and essentially just circled the lake.  There were a half dozen or so checkpoints where we had to carefully mark our cards with special stamps so that we could prove we visited the checkpoint.  After lunch, everybody decided to go on a harder course.  Naturally the adults got lost along the way but we eventually found one another.  Some scouts went with Mr. Landy on the hardest course and some went with Mr. Hopkins and Mr. Weir.   

Orienteering was a lot of fun and a useful skill.  Best of all, all of the scouts on the trip passed their advancement requirement for orienteering where we had to follow a course with a map and compass for at least a mile.

After climbing, we hiked back to our campsite, put up our tents as the sun was quickly setting and made a fire.  Dinner was cooked by Tim Weir (First Class Cooking), who made tacos, and Jason Cushman (First Class Cooking), who made hobo burgers.  After that, we had S’mores and attempted to stay warm by the fire.  Since we weren’t very successful staying warm, we all decided to go to bed and hoped that our sleeping bags would keep the frigid night air out.  We were wrong…  The temperatures dipped below 32˚ and many of us scurried in the middle of the night to put another layer of clothing on.

We woke up bright and early, restarted the fire with some left-over coals and ate a hearty breakfast by those First Class cooks and Chris Miller (Second Class Cooking).   After breakfast, some scouts went geocaching and found a cache in the hollow of a tree overlooking a huge swath of the Hudson Valley – simply beautiful.   We finished packing up and hit the road for home.

Tim Weir