This weekend Troop 648 had fourteen members take our half dozen troop canoes for a voyage extravaganza along the Verde River. Camping only 2 miles and launching only 9 miles from our backpacking trip last month, the two events had only the beautiful twinkling lights of Jerome off in the distance and an extreme amount of fun in common. Oh yeah, I guess we did also see another tarantula! On Saturday morning, Troop 648 arose early and cooked breakfast in the wild. Overhearing a scout say, ‘Well we could toss it in the woods’, the curious Assistant Scoutmaster went over to further understand the issue. Discovering scrambled eggs stuck to the bottom of their pan, he quickly staved off disaster by describing them as the scout delicacy ‘crunchy eggs’, leading to all the scouts wanting to try them. This also led to further ‘crunchy’ themes the remainder of the trip (e.g. Doritos in hot dogs, and Graham crackers in oatmeal).   A bit later, upon arriving at the launch site, it was recommended by the rangers that we not send novice canoers through the class 2 rapids downstream as we had planned. Rather than go to West Clear Creek as an alternate launch site many miles away, our intrepid T648 boatsmen negotiated something no one else does from where we were – paddle upstream, and then return down on the other side of a long narrow river island. A beautiful morning of paddling through lush foliage, portaging through narrows, and bombing through ‘class 2 ripples’ coming back downstream ensued. Only one cap-size and one broken paddle occurred, and a rip-roaring success was declared by all. The remainder of the outing included an afternoon of splashing in the river, watching the space station brightly glide overhead in the night sky, completing a high desert night hike, encountering a heron, an owl and a gila monster, all while deepening friendships, building new skills, and ‘getting things signed off!’
Next month? Camporee at Geronimo!
