goheelz

Get them making their own gathered end hammocks! About half of our scouts have their own. On our Appalachian Trail weekend, every scout slept in a hammock. Check out hammockforum.net to find plans. It can be thrift if you shop around for the ripstop.

Make sure the staff has the resources and training they need. A day by day guide would have been useful for the staff at the different badges. Last year at the camp our troop frequents, space ex was a disaster because the staff in charge was not given the appropriate support. He had scouts making their rockets on the last day. This was with one bottle of Elmer's glue for attaching fins to the rocket. Since this wasn't working another adult and I provided duck tape to make the needed attachments. Of course on launching day, none of the three launchers worked. The staff leader should have been supported with a syllabus that would have him guide the boys in assembling rockets earlier in the week to allow the glue to dry and deal with mishaps. Functioning equipment was needed as well. Climbing was likewise backloaded making it difficult for the boys to get their require repels and belays in. They should have been on the tower no later than the beginning of day two instead of the end of day three. Our troops feedback was that you have a large group of ready made volunteers (adult leaders) sitting around. Ask for help-with the proper coaching not to take over from the youth instructors.

Definitely the hammock for me. If you are interested in the gear, check out hammock forums.net for advice. I'm not looking forward to our spring camporee since there is no place to hang.

We use Troopkit for email and calendar (from the guy at boyscouttrail website). It also does event sign up tracking. It has select groups and you can create your own as well. Love having the PLC set up the meeting agendas in there.

I'm 6'6", 270 and I sleep in a trek light ten foot hammock. they are not expensive The best sleep ever when camping. Definitely look on hammockforums.net for suspension advice. I use whoopie slings combined with polyester straps from harbor freight to hang the hammock. Once you learn, it takes no time to set up. Avoid the ENO slap straps. They stretch far too much. Saw a 125lb scout sink to the ground over night using them.

We use hog feeding pans ($7) from tractor supply company on top of bricks for dutch ovens. works great.

We just bought a supply of hooligans after a bad experience at a camporee with our old tents. Rain and 25 mph winds made for a bad evening. The troop next to us had hooligans and had no leaks or other problems. You can register as a non profit at www.coleman.com/nonprofit to get a good discount. the hooligan 4s were under $70. I'd recommend getting the $2 bags on the site for storing the tents since its hard to get them back in the original bags.