By James Y. (Scorpion Patrol)
On a Friday morning on April 17, we came to Wolf Trap National Park for the Preforming Arts. After all the volunteers signed in, we unloaded the trailer, taking out ovens, cooking gear, and tables. When participants started coming, we played a bunch of running games, and they unloaded their gear under a tent. When we were ready to start, the participants grabbed their gear while the older scouts explained the rules, concepts, and schedule. Everyone received a certain color so they could group up and make it feel like they’re in a patrol, by giving themselves names, yells, etc.
The patrols would be led by two advisers. The patrols played get-to-know-you and team-building games to bond the patrol members. Then, the patrols received tents from the park and they began to set them up in a forest area by a river. After loading all their gear into their tents, the advisors began to teach their members about cooking, knife safety, and how to set up cooking gear. Each patrol received frozen hot dogs and hamburger patties, as well as buns, lettuce, tomatoes, and garlic. The patrol members learned how to handle meat, handle a knife, and cut veggies. Some came to the Volunteer Group to take our bacon and sauces!
After lunch, the patrols cleaned up their dishes and some began to help out in making holes for Dutch ovens that would hold the stew for the night’s dinner. Everyone was to go to the greenhouse in the park to learn to plant different types of plants and water them. We had to take a hike a different, longer path about the park to get back to the campsite instead of the parking lot, and the campers learned about trail blazers and poison ivy.
When we got back, the campers had a backstage tour of the Wolf Trap Filene Center, and when they finished, they watched Bob the little Robot dance around while singing Twinkle, twinkle, little star, and added action sounds at the end. However, they didn’t suspect a giant robot named the Angry Nerd, come out and shoot a humongous yoga angry bird ball at their faces. They were all very impressed.
Everyone went back to the campsite and made a stew dinner, and soon finished and cleaned up. They did skits on a stage, and sang songs and did skits around a campfire. Some songs were pretty good. Some skits were 10 seconds and made no sense, while some songs were a real eye-opener. Soon everyone went back to bed at 11 PM after the last song.
Everyone was instructed to wake up a 7:00 AM, and had a breakfast of sausages, eggs, bacon, and hash browns. After breakfast and clean up, they had patrol competitions, and they played soccer against each other. Two patrols would play against each other, while the other two patrols would have an instructional session learning how to tie knots.
As soon as they finished the competition, they came to the forest to learn bird-studying. When the binoculars arrived, we soon learned that they weren’t fully assembled. The older scouts had to fix the binoculars, which was extremely difficult, while the campers bombarded the lady instructing bird-studying with questions. Soon, we went around two bridges over the river, and we got a close up view of a few birds. The campers came back to the camp and put their binoculars away, and hiked around a pond looking at snakes, turtles, frogs, and beaver homes, while the Volunteer Patrol had to stay back and clean.
When the campers arrived back at the campsite, the volunteer group provided lunch for the campers, which was cold sandwiches. When they finished, they went to the Children’s Theatre in the Woods, where the campers would act out and animal while the others guessed. Many of them were way too specific, but it was fun for the campers.
When they came back to the campsite, they packed up their gear, and did police lines around the campsite to look for trash and lost items. When they finished, they collect their stuff and went home around 4:00 PM. Then we cleaned up, packed all the gear back, and went home too.
I think it was a very interesting and fun experience for me and probably the campers as well!
