So what do you do with your Cubs on a campout?

[ScoutNut]

We usually do the big breakfast on Saturday morning. Sunday is a simple, minimal clean up morning.

[5yearscouter]

We usually do the big breakfast on Saturday morning. Sunday is a simple' date=' minimal clean up morning.[/quote']

 

Sunday morning after they played ALL.DAY.LONG on saturday they usually wake up hungry enough to eat a whole cow, a pig and a chicken. so we moved the big breakfast to Sunday morning. If they want to eat pop tarts and leave early, they can, add we usually pass them where they've stopped somewhere for a bigger breakfast on the way home. most stick around and talk and eat and help each other pack up and it makes for more comraderie.

[ScoutNut]

After playing all day on Saturday (and Friday evening for some), our boys, and their families, were hungry enough Saturday evening to eat anything that did not move out of their way fast enough!

 

We did a substantial breakfast on Saturday so that everyone had the energy for the long day. This was often bacon/sausages, dutch oven egg scramble mess, fruit, and bagels. Lunch was usually light. Just fruit and a sandwich that could be done on the fly. Saturday dinner was when all stops were pulled out. Meat main course, fruit/salad/veggies, starchy/potato thing, and of course, dessert.

 

Sunday morning was a quick clean-up meal. We never did any poptarts. However we were big on fruit, cold/dry cereal w/milk, hard boiled eggs, and ready cooked, heat/eat sausages..

 

We did not want to spend a lot of time cooking, and cleaning for that one meal when we had the entire campsite to clean up, and pack up.

 

After Scouts Own service, breakfast, and clean up, we were ready to do our Sunday activities (leave early for home, or stick around the camp area for a while doing planned, or impromptu activities) without worrying about hitting our check-out time.

 

As for what activities to do on the campout, a lot depends on what is available to you at your camp area. Utilize all of your resources. Big field - do wide games, sports, kite fly, or rocket shoot. River - fishing derby. Trails - hiking. Nature Center - guided tours. Bike Trails - biking. We even did an excursion to visit a Scout museum that was near to one camp spot!

 

Check out the materials you got when you took your BALOO training. There are lots of ideas in there.

 

On whether to do campouts strictly for fun, or strictly for achievements, BSA's view (as taught in BALOO) is that you should NOT focus on advancement, and achievements. Focus on the outdoors, and having fun. If you do fun things in the outdoors, you will end up naturally completing some requirements at the same time.

[berliner]

Cub camp is fun & games. And food. Cubs need lots of food. Books at camp?

 

Now there is 2 types:

- first Cup Camp, 1-2 nights in a small group

hikes and outdoor games, we did "river crossings" (big streams) because the lil ones enjoy getting their feet wet for some reason.

Never go hiking without duct tape!

Learn how to set up a tent (for the advanced with blindfold), make a fire, knots, basic toten chit, basic cooking by cubs (or they need to help lots),

camped next to a farm once so they got a tour, lots of nature and more bush walks and games and ... food ;-)

In the evening its enough to toss a glow stick or one for each patrol to them and the cubs figure out their own game (touch football, capture the flag..)

Watching stars (at BSA camp once we put the scouts on bleachers and waited for the International Space Station ISS to zoom past), night hikes, ...

fire circles with songs and stories and each scout had to say something as well (hard for the shy ones), I saw little skits in NZS - maybe more a BSA thing.

Scouts own on Sundays

 

-Group Camp (summer camp) 2 nights with all-group (cubs/scouts/venturers)

of course the benefit is that the older scouts can bear more responsibilites

with more people, more adults its also easier to make a big program

we always have a theme and on the 2nd night for campfire everybody,

including adults, have to dress up (pirates, knights, movies, superheroes ...)

we have a nice obstacle course patrol competition

(council camp has a big parcours, flying fox, full scale rappeling tower, pool, mess)

archery/softair/bb guns or even 22s/22 magnum depending on site (non council :-P ), availability of adults etc.,

fishing for eels (and then cooking them in foil in the fire)

tubing in mountain streams, swimming,

we carted out a generator, pump, bouncy castle and slide and pumped water over the slide into the stream (all ages love that)

 

If you can imagine it you can probably do it :-D

 

 

 

 

 

 

[King Ding Dong]

Cub camp is fun & games. And food. Cubs need lots of food. Books at camp?

 

Now there is 2 types:

- first Cup Camp, 1-2 nights in a small group

hikes and outdoor games, we did "river crossings" (big streams) because the lil ones enjoy getting their feet wet for some reason.

Never go hiking without duct tape!

Learn how to set up a tent (for the advanced with blindfold), make a fire, knots, basic toten chit, basic cooking by cubs (or they need to help lots),

camped next to a farm once so they got a tour, lots of nature and more bush walks and games and ... food ;-)

In the evening its enough to toss a glow stick or one for each patrol to them and the cubs figure out their own game (touch football, capture the flag..)

Watching stars (at BSA camp once we put the scouts on bleachers and waited for the International Space Station ISS to zoom past), night hikes, ...

fire circles with songs and stories and each scout had to say something as well (hard for the shy ones), I saw little skits in NZS - maybe more a BSA thing.

Scouts own on Sundays

 

-Group Camp (summer camp) 2 nights with all-group (cubs/scouts/venturers)

of course the benefit is that the older scouts can bear more responsibilites

with more people, more adults its also easier to make a big program

we always have a theme and on the 2nd night for campfire everybody,

including adults, have to dress up (pirates, knights, movies, superheroes ...)

we have a nice obstacle course patrol competition

(council camp has a big parcours, flying fox, full scale rappeling tower, pool, mess)

archery/softair/bb guns or even 22s/22 magnum depending on site (non council :-P ), availability of adults etc.,

fishing for eels (and then cooking them in foil in the fire)

tubing in mountain streams, swimming,

we carted out a generator, pump, bouncy castle and slide and pumped water over the slide into the stream (all ages love that)

 

If you can imagine it you can probably do it :-D

 

 

 

 

 

No generator rule at my council camps. Except they use one for the bottle rocket launcher.

 

Fishing for eels ? Lol.

[berliner]

Cub camp is fun & games. And food. Cubs need lots of food. Books at camp?

 

Now there is 2 types:

- first Cup Camp, 1-2 nights in a small group

hikes and outdoor games, we did "river crossings" (big streams) because the lil ones enjoy getting their feet wet for some reason.

Never go hiking without duct tape!

Learn how to set up a tent (for the advanced with blindfold), make a fire, knots, basic toten chit, basic cooking by cubs (or they need to help lots),

camped next to a farm once so they got a tour, lots of nature and more bush walks and games and ... food ;-)

In the evening its enough to toss a glow stick or one for each patrol to them and the cubs figure out their own game (touch football, capture the flag..)

Watching stars (at BSA camp once we put the scouts on bleachers and waited for the International Space Station ISS to zoom past), night hikes, ...

fire circles with songs and stories and each scout had to say something as well (hard for the shy ones), I saw little skits in NZS - maybe more a BSA thing.

Scouts own on Sundays

 

-Group Camp (summer camp) 2 nights with all-group (cubs/scouts/venturers)

of course the benefit is that the older scouts can bear more responsibilites

with more people, more adults its also easier to make a big program

we always have a theme and on the 2nd night for campfire everybody,

including adults, have to dress up (pirates, knights, movies, superheroes ...)

we have a nice obstacle course patrol competition

(council camp has a big parcours, flying fox, full scale rappeling tower, pool, mess)

archery/softair/bb guns or even 22s/22 magnum depending on site (non council :-P ), availability of adults etc.,

fishing for eels (and then cooking them in foil in the fire)

tubing in mountain streams, swimming,

we carted out a generator, pump, bouncy castle and slide and pumped water over the slide into the stream (all ages love that)

 

If you can imagine it you can probably do it :-D

 

 

 

 

 

well then you have to take the group to an off-coucil camp ground for that kind of fun ;-)

And you ever seen the eyes of a 6 year old cub or a 10 year scout who just caught an eel? makes 'em 10 feet taller :-)

[Stosh]

Astronomy belt loop or just stargazing is a good one for calming things down at night. Especially if they are from the city and you camp far enough away. $10 10X binoculars are better than "my turn! " with a telescope.

The binocular idea is great. With a telescope only one boy can use it at a time, but with binoculars, they can use the buddy system.

 

Stosh

[DuctTape]

No direction will yield chaos. Instead, provide direction but no organization or meddling. Get them started on something, but don't interfere unless it is matter of safety. Example, bring the cubs to a creek show them how to look for crayfish and let them have fun. A campout isn't a time to "do requirements". Instead, do fun stuff and later, (car ride home) or next den meeting when discussing the fun bring up the fact requirements were met and have the cubs look at other badges and think of fun things they can do which will meet those requirements for the next campout. Scouting should be fun, and requirements are met by having fun. Once we sit them down and have them open a book, they aren't scouting, they are in school again.

[qwazse]

Cub camp is fun & games. And food. Cubs need lots of food. Books at camp?

 

Now there is 2 types:

- first Cup Camp, 1-2 nights in a small group

hikes and outdoor games, we did "river crossings" (big streams) because the lil ones enjoy getting their feet wet for some reason.

Never go hiking without duct tape!

Learn how to set up a tent (for the advanced with blindfold), make a fire, knots, basic toten chit, basic cooking by cubs (or they need to help lots),

camped next to a farm once so they got a tour, lots of nature and more bush walks and games and ... food ;-)

In the evening its enough to toss a glow stick or one for each patrol to them and the cubs figure out their own game (touch football, capture the flag..)

Watching stars (at BSA camp once we put the scouts on bleachers and waited for the International Space Station ISS to zoom past), night hikes, ...

fire circles with songs and stories and each scout had to say something as well (hard for the shy ones), I saw little skits in NZS - maybe more a BSA thing.

Scouts own on Sundays

 

-Group Camp (summer camp) 2 nights with all-group (cubs/scouts/venturers)

of course the benefit is that the older scouts can bear more responsibilites

with more people, more adults its also easier to make a big program

we always have a theme and on the 2nd night for campfire everybody,

including adults, have to dress up (pirates, knights, movies, superheroes ...)

we have a nice obstacle course patrol competition

(council camp has a big parcours, flying fox, full scale rappeling tower, pool, mess)

archery/softair/bb guns or even 22s/22 magnum depending on site (non council :-P ), availability of adults etc.,

fishing for eels (and then cooking them in foil in the fire)

tubing in mountain streams, swimming,

we carted out a generator, pump, bouncy castle and slide and pumped water over the slide into the stream (all ages love that)

 

If you can imagine it you can probably do it :-D

 

 

 

 

 

We don't get eel on the line in these parts. One time when son #1 and I were visiting FL, we pulled in a ribbon fish from Jensen Beach pier. Now that's the stuff nightmares are made of! But, never an eel.

[packsaddle]

When I was CM, our camping was family oriented so every cub had a responsible adult partner close by, if not involved directly in the activity. We went canoeing, swimming, splashing in streams, quests to catch frogs and turtles and snakes, hikes to the top of the mountain. We had campfire contests for the most perfect toasted marshmallow, we did games like man-in-the-moon or crossed-sticks. We had crab soccer races, flew kites (wind needed), went fishing (and sometimes caught dinner). We had family dinner competitions to see who could cook the best over a campfire (we actually had campfires). In the evenings if it was clear we watched for meteors or tried to name constellations and made up stories to tell each other. And then slept really well. Like I've written like a broken record in the past, I loved the cubs. They are far better than boy scouts IMHO.

[blw2]

.... I loved the cubs. They are far better than boy scouts IMHO.

 

Interesting. Seems like the majority of folks seem to think just the opposite. I must admit to thinking that it seems like Scouts will be more fun as a Scouter. I sure did as a youth.... seemed like all we did in cubs was arts and crafts.

 

 

[perdidochas]

I did a campout with my Webelos last spring' date=' and they had a wonderful time. Unfortunately, they had too much of a wonderful time playing and enjoying the camping and I was unable to really get them focused to just sit down for a little bit to go over some requirements. I'd really like to knock out a few requirements with the boys during our next campout, but I don't want a repeat of our last campout where it was like pulling teeth to get them to even pay attention. Is it too much to expect them to sit still while camping? Should I just focus on a few fun outdoor requirements and save the book work for a den meeting?[/quote']

 

Why in the world would you waste camp time with bookwork? It is too much to expect them to sit still while camping, except for safety briefings. Have fun on campouts. That's the time to teach woodcraft skills, and let the boys run around the woods with sticks.

[perdidochas]

Build a shelter out of a tarp. Show them why its important to know their two-half hitches and taut-lines. Making a competition out of things with a reward helps to keep them focus.

Maybe the winners get to lead the Webelos-Only hike.

 

Tree Identification is another thing to work on.

 

For second year Webs, look at the outdoor requirements for Tenderfoot and Second Class that are age appropriate, find fun games that can support that knowledge.

I'm with BD. Teach them foil cooking or even buddy burner cooking of a burger for lunch. Go on a hike. Make hiking staffs. They will be doing the Boy Scout requirements soon enough.

[King Ding Dong]

.... I loved the cubs. They are far better than boy scouts IMHO.

 

Interesting. Seems like the majority of folks seem to think just the opposite. I must admit to thinking that it seems like Scouts will be more fun as a Scouter. I sure did as a youth.... seemed like all we did in cubs was arts and crafts.

 

There are days I really feel like chucking that book in the circular filing cabinet. Bear and Webelos are not so bad, Wolf sucks.

[packsaddle]

.... I loved the cubs. They are far better than boy scouts IMHO.

 

Interesting. Seems like the majority of folks seem to think just the opposite. I must admit to thinking that it seems like Scouts will be more fun as a Scouter. I sure did as a youth.... seemed like all we did in cubs was arts and crafts.

 

Yeah, I'm often in the minority opinion. And if arts and crafts is all you did as a cub, I agree. I was also DL for much of that time and what I liked about the little guys was the completely open sense of wonder and adventure that they expressed with almost everything we did. We did a lake shore cleanup and I cut my hand on some broken glass. So they all got to help with first aid. Later, when the stitches were ready to be pulled, we had contests to see who would get to pull some of them. Those little guys were 100% into everything they did. It was all good all new. At those ages they still WANT to learn and then experience joy when they do.