Our crew has been training and working hard getting ready for their trek.
Under 2 weeks to go. They will have an amazing journey.
I tell all crews that they will be tested physically, emotionally and spiritually.
I tell the parents to look at their scouts now, because the scouts who return will not be the same scouts. This has been a life altering experience for more scouts than I can count. It’s a good thing.
We are ready for high Adventures. Last month, our Council held another class for Wilderness First Aid. We had about 20 participants. I really believe in this class. I think the material is very important.
The first time I took the class, it was 16 hours of lecture and a written test. I love the current format with more hands-on and scenarios.
Been happy to be on staff for the last 10 years. We have an amazing team that teaches the class. I am the only physician on the team, but we all bring so much experience, that it works. We have members who have done Philmont, hiked the Grand Canyon, and many other treks.
Out of 5 trips to Philmont, I have only needed to use Wilderness First Aid once when a leader fell about 10 feet off Tooth of Time into a crevasse in front of me. I was glad we had 5 members in my crew who had done the training and it worked exactly as it should. My training kicked in and everything worked as it should, despite everyone else on the mountain freaking out. It turned out fine.
This true scenario has become one of our test situations.
If you have the chance to take the class, do it!
Its been a busy last 2 months.
We have a crew going to Philmont later this year. We now have that crew filled! Awesome!
OKPIK 2022 – we have 2 crews going. The cabin stay has 1 spot left unless we increase to 11. The lake stay crew is up to 10, we have room for 1 more person. Hoping to fill both crews.
Philmont 2022 – our crew is filled.
Last weekend was our Councils Wilderness First Aid training. So much fun to help with as one of the instructors. If you haven’t taken the course, do it. Its an amazing course, and you may need it on an outing at some point. We had 19 attendees. Happy to see so many scouts taking the course.
Its hard to believe it is coming up, but in under 6 months,our crew will be hiking in Philmont. We submitted our trek requests through the lottery. Early this year. We found out that they got their top choice. It looks like an amazing trek and they should have lots of fun.
Unfortunately, 3 member had to back out, so we are in the process of trying to find a few more scouts to fill out our crew.
For 2022, we were only able to fill one crew and turned the other back in for another crew to be able to go.
We just got back from enjoying OKPIK 2021 and it was time to put in our preferences for 2022. We were able to get 1 cabin stay and 1 lake stay trek for 2021. we have nearly both of them filled and hoping to go from 8 person crews to 11 person crews. Looking forward to many scouts and adults who have not had the fun of experiencing OKPIK and winter camping finding out how much fun it is!
Payments are due soon for Philmont 2022. Hard to imagine. We were fortunate enough to get 2 treks for 2022, but with the timing could only be sure of filling 1 crew, so we had to give back 1 crew.
It’s hard to believe that our Philmont trek preferences are due in 10 days. Seems very early. Lots of work to due until then. Our crew is looking at the trek options to decide their top 6 choices. Not sure you can go wrong with any choice. They are all fun. The area is so beautiful that just being there is worth it.
