Now that I had the monies required to go to CJ, there were new challenges that I had to go through in getting there. All CJ participants in the London District had to attend the London District Camporee on the weekend of May 25-27, 2001. This camporee took place at Camp Sylvan, located just off Highway 7 near Parkhill, Ontario. My troop easily had the best campsite there. We had a beautiful entrance built out of spars and rope, with our troop banner hanging from the top. A thunderstorm moved in Saturday evening and dumped a deluge of rain, but that didn't ruin our great weekend. Many thanks go out to the 31st London Group for running the campfire Saturday night, and Scouts Own on Sunday morning.
On Saturday June 9, 2001, my troop met at Scouter Brian Durnin's house. There we erected and inspected all the tents to make sure there were no holes in them, then Scouter Brian sprayed a waterproofing chemical on them. We also took all the bent tent pegs and straightened them out in the garage. Mrs. Durnin cooked up a delicious lunch of hamburgers and hot dogs for us. While we were there, we discussed our trip plans.
On Monday July 2, 2001, the troop held a farewell barbecue for all the Scouts in the troop going to CJ. The barbecue was held in the backyard at one of the Scouts' houses. We had a smorgasbord of food, including hamburgers, hot dogs, Mexican layered dip, salads, and desert. After eating and getting wet in the swimming pool, Scouter Brian took us through our final trip plans.
On Tuesday and Wednesday that week, I spent a lot of time packing, not to mention engraving my name, troop, subcamp and site number on a lot of my equipment. Before I knew it, Thursday July 5th was here. Click 'Next' to begin reading about my great adventure. |
