August and I had attended the Aurora District Boy Scout Camporee the previous two years as a WEBELO, and now that he has crossed over into Boy Scouts we were both looking forward to how this new status would affect our experience.
The Boy Scout troop August joined was fed into directly from the Cub Scout pack August was a member of. He knew the scoutmaster and many of the members of the troop pretty well, and they knew him. Going into this year’s Camporee August wasn’t shy about volunteering to help out. This particular troop helps to run Camporee, and since he was on the receiving end of the that assistance the previous two years, he really wanted to do his part to help out.
Since we have the big van, and this was something we knew would happen when we bought it, I was personnel transport. I left with a pretty full van and despite traffic we made pretty good time. We arrived, set up our tent and hung out a little bit.
The weather was decent, but something didn’t feel right. Turns out the boys in the troop don’t actually help with the kitchen. While the boys in August’s troop helped run the Camporee, the feeding of all the staff actually fell on the adults of the troop. There was only one adult manning the kitchen and it was his first time. Thankfully a couple of other vehicles had preceded us so the kitchen was already set up.
I jumped in to help feed the staff of Camporee that Friday night. Including the boys in August’s troop all told there was about 40-45 people on the staff of Camporee. That is a lot of cooking. And a lot of clean up.
To say it took a while before the two of us were done would be an understatement.
Finally getting to bed I was woken about 1 or so in the morning by a light rain. And then an ever increasing intensity of a downpour. Finally about 4 in the morning is when I discovered the tent wasn’t as waterproof as it was supposed to be. Thankfully it wasn’t a full leak, simply some water coming in through a seam. Perhaps it could be considered heavy condensation. Whatever you want to call it, it was inconvenient, but it also could have been a heck of a lot worse.
After some more fitful sleep it was somewhere between 5:30 and 6 when I got up. I took care of my personal business (a bite to eat courtesy of a Pop Tart, pouring myself a cup of coffee, etc.) I then began help get breakfast for the Camporee staff together.
Between prep work, serving then cleaning up three meals I had about 30 minutes to myself all total on Saturday. There was no downtime for me. August, however, had a bit more free time and hung out with his Boy Scout peers when he wasn’t helping run Camporee or teaching things to the younger WEBELO scouts.
Helping teach a WEBELO how to build a fire
While it was fun, August had been looking forward to doing some of the things we had done in years past, such as BB guns or knife throwing. I was looking forward to those activities as well. Instead August spent most of the day working and helping, keeping busy, and having a good time doing it.
Saturday was a very long day, and I didn’t get to bed until almost 11. Thankfully the rain had stopped about mid-morning.
Helping to gather some firewood
Sunday I was the first one awake at 5:30, so I started the water for coffee or whatever else people might need. Then a couple of hours later after breakfast had been served it was time to start breaking down camp. It was almost 11 in the morning when things had gotten to the point where I was about ready to go. And I was ready.
Next year it will be different, as Ciaran will be getting ready to attend Webeloree so I’ll be back on the other side of things. But like last year (and this) I’m sure I’ll have a van full of Boy Scouts on the trip.