family camp outs

[mbscoutmom]

How do you make a family camp out fun for everyone and not too much work for those running it? We had our second one of the year last weekend, and once again my husband and I came away from it utterly exhausted!

 

[Its Me]

Sometimes the other parents act as if they are a vacation when the den leader plans, organizes and does the meal plan/shoppoing for a campout.

 

Divide up the responsibilities. Have each family be responsible for a meal. Give someone the responsibility to plan and run a morning activity and another to do a afternoon activity. Put an adult incharge of the fire.

 

Delegate, delegate, delegate

 

 

[FScouter]

Have you taken BALOO training?

[mbscoutmom]

Yes, I took BALOO training last weekend, AFTER our cub family camp out. My husband and another leader had taken it previously. I learned a lot from it, including some things we could do better on future camp outs.

 

I know that better planning and communication with families would help, but I wonder if we should continue to prepare all the food as a group. Does that work well if you have more advance planning and get the parents involved, or is it better to just have every family responsible for feeding themselves?

[fotoscout]

Someone will always end up exhausted after one of these things. The conscientious leader will be concerned about everything; there is simply no way around it. Delegate may in fact be an oversimplification. In order to delegate, you must have people who are willing to take on added responsibilities. Sometimes thats not too easy.

 

Next time try this: make up sheets for the different things that you need done. For instance: Flag Ceremonies, morning activities, afternoon activities, Campfire, Scouts Own. paperwork & permits & etc Dont let your leaders and parents leave until someone has signed up for every item. Push it to its end point, Folks, I cant and wont do all this work by myself anymore. Its your choice I get some help or we dont go! Trust me, you will get help.

 

As for food, I strongly believe that food on Pack trips should be done at the Den Level, unless you have a group of parents that are really into mass feedings. Cooking at the den level is not overwhelming and tends to foster a great sense of camaraderie within the den. Much more so, than if you do this at the pack level.

 

Remember, you have den leaders, you dont have to entertain their kids while on a camping trip. Leave that responsibility to them. Your flag ceremonies, campfire, and Scouts Own will be done as a Pack. Aside from that you only need one or two additional activities for the entire group. Let the den leaders spend time with their boys.

 

[ScoutNut]

Let's face it, if you are in charge, your are going to be tired. Heck, even after a camping trip with just my family I'm tired! But it should be a HAPPY tired, not a chicken with no head tired.

 

As others said delegate. You need a trip committee to help with the work. You now have 3 BALOO trained leaders, get some more trained and work together.

 

Cooking den vs pack. It depends. How many boys do you have? How many from each den? Is the pack paying for food? What kind of facilites do you have? If you have a turn out of about 40-50+ folks with a good # from each Den, a multitude of camp areas & numerous campfire/cooking areas then you could maybe look into cooking by den.

 

However, contrary to fotoscout's view, I feel that Den (Patrol) cooking & activites should be better left to Boy Scouts. A Pack Family Campout should be done as a group. Most of the activites during the weekend should be done as a Pack (maybe split into Dens for round-robin type things). Cooking for a large group will take more planning, but it can be done. I've cooked for 100+ folks on Girl Scout School-Wide campouts. Kaper charts are the way to go!

 

Some structure, some free time, activites for all ages, ranks & genders & you have yourself a Cub Scout Family Campout!!

 

I've been starting to plan our Adult & Me Tent campout & then our summer Family (have cabins will camp) Campout. I'm really itching to get out there, it's been a L-O-N-G winter!! LOL!!

 

[Piedmont]

My wife and I are both DL's in a pack of about 33 boys. We decided to be the "chuck-wagon" on a recent campout to a historic state park about an hour away. As we had a total of about 75 people sign up, we reserved a very nice picnic shelter with fireplace, playground, water and electricity, a huge grill, and spent about a week and $600 at SAM's and Wal-Mart (much of the money was covered by a $5/person meals fee, the rest by the pack). The people who came on Friday were responsible for their own meal, and we provided the next four:

 

Saturday breakfast and lunch: homemade granola, fruits, coffee and juice for Saturday breakfast before a long hike to the Revolutionary War battlefield, a movie,test and patch. Most also elected to make a picninc lunch from the "deli" we set up on a couple of picnic tables to take along (assorted sandwich stuff, chips, fruits and juice-bags).

 

Saturday Dinner-My Webelos II's and I (w/help from some Dads and mons) grilled and served hot-dogs, hobo's dinners (we'd made them at the previous night's den meeting and packed them in dry ice), chips, drinks and fixin's under the picinic shelter.

 

After a delicious meal, our CM and his Webelos I's hosted a flag retirement ceremony, followed by marshmallow s'mores over the fireplace in the picnic shelter, a slide show of many beautiful pics from the campout (our CM is a techno-weenie!), and even a camp movie w/hot cocoa on a cold early spring night.

 

Sunday breakfast was just assorted cakes and muffins, fruits, leftover granola, juice and coffee (w'a fire sale on leftovers!)followed by a short inter-faith service provided by our ACM. Were we exhausted? You bet!!! But parents knew ahead of time that all were expected to chip in and help, and nearly all did! Having the meals together DEFINITELY helped us follow a very ambitious activity schedule and helped the Pack bind together in an amazing way. Many said it was our best campout ever! So, yes, get the BALOO training, scout your facilities ahead of time, plan meticulously but be ready to roll with the punches. Give people jobs matching their talents; my wife and I are good with advance planning and logisitics, while another DL is a genius for council paperwork and planning/executing fun activities for the boys. I'm still high on that campout a month later. If anyone wants a copy of the publicity/info. handout we distributed at the previous month's Pack meeting (I spent weeks on it, and it worked very well!), e-mail me at AaMonHarr@aol.com. Piedmont