Good morning!
What a glorious weekend hiking, camping and splashing in the Fossil Springs Wilderness area!. Twenty-seven of our troop attended – the largest backpacking contingent since I have been a member of the troop - and they benefited from a fantastic camping location next to the creek, sparkling cold, clear pools, swings, ropes, slides, and a magnificent 30+ foot waterfall at the old dam which was part of the water flume which drove two hydro power plants from days gone by. There was even a grotto-like cave behind the waterfall discovered by the scouts. On the trail from the camp to the falls, the boys enjoyed wild raspberries and blackberries, and vistas of red rock, turquoise water and bright blue sky everywhere one looked. We had a number of first time backpackers, and as this was classified as a moderate to difficult 8 mile backpack, all the scouts were excellent in handling the strenuous parts of the trail, and made good time, maximizing use of the cooler parts of the mornings. Mr Benyi and the adults did a marvelous job of logistical planning to get everyone out safely, utilizing both the Fossil Springs trail and the old Flume Road trail, and we thank you for your patience in our getting back a bit later than planned. Hopefully you had a tired but happy camper returned to you, and they can be justifiably proud of their accomplishments on a most excellent weeked of development and good clean/dirty fun.
Thank you for your understanding as we have brought together our new leadership over the past couple of weekends, and added a patrol to accommodate our growth. It is important that patrols be closer to 8 in size than the 12 or so we had, so that the boys can more easily function as a unit, and allow for better boy leadership opportunities and experiences. A side effect of the re-swizzling that went along with that is that the boys will have some challenges in reforming patrol relationships. We leveraged feedback, and tried to balance the patrols by size, age, and known relationships where possible, but things such as this can never be completely perfect. Thanks for your support as we retool for the overall betterment of the troop.
This week we have our 7PM meeting, and are looking ahead to Mr. Frank’s Eagle project on September 10th. Please begin planning now to attend the Dairy Springs outing on the 23rd-25th of September – a bike outing in the cool areas in the Lake Mary area outside of Flagstaff. The fall is some of the best camping in Arizona, although it can be said that anytime is the best time of the year for camping in Arizona
Mr. Cole