Life as a scout master

This is doughnut falls, a favorite to hike. Nice safe and close, except the time one of the scouts tried to throw a rock at a bull moose. He was stopped in time.


These are the diamond fork hot springs. Another favorite hike. Each pool is a different temperature and can be drained or add cold water to it. We go during the day because at night they are full of naked BYU students. Its a good 3 miles in and 3 miles out but worth it.


This is scout camp in Idaho. Since I have been scout master I have had one aspergers, 3 autistic, one bi-polar and one down syndrome scout. So I get to do most of the activities with the boys to make sure they don't drown. We just earned the canoeing merit badge in this picture. I went out and flip, drained and got back in the canoe 4 times. I also signed up for the mile swim but you had to swim a half mile to qualify. I swam the half mile and felt accomplished enough and didn't swim the full mile.


Oh the adventures of the wilderness survival merit badge. I went out and stayed with the boys to keep an on a few of them who have handy caps. The boys made the shelters out of wood but I just tied a rope between trees and hung my poncho over it. But when I went to crawl into my bag the biggest wolf spider I have ever seen was there to greet me. I had some fun dreams that night.


Candy and Twelve year old boys. Ya


This young man didn't want to bring his scout shirt to camp. So he got the loner and had to wear it to all the meetings. He now brings his scout shirt.



He walked head first into the rock. So I told him to move it. I didn't think he would take me seriously.

I don't know how to move the picture the right direction. But this is little wild horse canyon. It was a great slot canyon hike. It flash flooded a few days before so we had some water and debris to deal with. Great hike, 11 miles but I recommend it. There were a few parts we had to shimmy up the canyon to be able to keep going.


Little wild horse canyon.


Just before the hike. You can't see them but the bugs were horrible.


This is goblin valley. Each of the mushrooms is about 6 to 14 feet tall. We played capture the flag here for hours. I deam it the worlds best capture the flag arena anywhere. We used about 200 feet of rope as our boundary line and you could run on top of the mushrooms or between them. It made me want to go home and watch labyrinth.


We eat good, breakfast burritos. oh-ya. I just happen to be cooking, it is usually the boys. But if I am going to eat it. I help.

For the Metal Working Merit Badge we made knifes. We went to Lyndsey's step dads work where he is a sells rep for ESAB welding. The boys had to Mig, Tig, Plasma cut and Torch Cut. We the made the knives out of 18-8 stainless flat stock, a ax handle and epoxy. It was a blast.

We also made home made snow shoes. We used emt conduit, construction fencing, zip ties, string and rope. We then snow shoed into a cabin. One of the boys complained because he was sinking about 3 inches in the snow. So he took them off and then sank to his waist in the snow. So we found out these actually worked. I was surprised because I just made them up from extra junk I had laying around at work.