[teenerted1]

after a friend died a few years ago the mother took her sons out of cubs, worst parenting thing i had ever heard. the cubs were a productive connection they had to their dad and a great way for a single mom to get a positive male influence for her sons. my dad was very active in my troop so we had a great time together.

i was in cubs and scouts from 7or 8 whatever the starting age is to18.

cub troop did the usuall stuff pinewood derby, visit the local army base for .22 shooting, xmas tree lot to raise funds, etc. and one campout a year.

but scouts was a differenty story. very camping oriented troop. we had at least one campout a month, and that is what i enjoyed the most, proably hiked 500-600+ miles in the backcountry through all the 50 milers, weekend trips, and canoe voyages we took. we were so active camping that some summers we had two 50milers and a week at summer camp. some of us did both the canoe trip and the hiking trip some years.

could start a fire and boil water in the rain in under 5minutes before i turned 12.
carried a 40lb pack on my 100lb body for 50miles at the age of 12.
been to camp muir (10000ft) before i turned 16 in the winter.
traversed the olympic mtn range in a week at 17.
my first job, was as a full time councilor at the local scout camp at 16, teaching other scouts cooking and pioneering skills. was away from home for 7 weeks that summer.
never made it to eagle, spent too much time in the woods to bother with my project, had fullfilled all the other requrements though.

so just like anything scouting is what you put into it.