Okay, so this post isn't really about something recent. It's about something that happened a couple months ago. It's about the weekend I went to Point Reyes with my dad, Ben, and my Boy Scout Troop. I'd been on backpacking trips there with my family several times when I was younger, so I knew what to expect.
I'd actually gone to Point Reyes with my Scout Troop the previous year around the same time of year. Last year, I went on the trip right after I'd spent the whole week working on a big report for school, so I was eager to take a break from it all on this campout. I'd been working hard for school prior to a campout this year, too. But this year I'd spent a couple weeks working on Yearbook stuff. Now that my pages were uploaded and ready to go, I had a campout to look forward to.
We had invited the Teachers and Priests, but they had their own thing going on, so it was just the Deacons. The gang was all here: Adam, Josh, Ben, Solomon, Michael, Kyle, and me. Ben technically wasn't a Deacon at the time, but since he's the only eleven-year-old Scout in our troop, we figured we might as well take him along. Plus, Ben's been really into Boy Scout work lately, so we knew he'd enjoy it. The adults were my dad, Brother Crow, Brother Hopkins, and Brother VonSavoye (I'm pretty sure I spelled that right).
Since we drove in after school on Friday, we didn't arrive until after dark. It's technically a better idea to arrive at your campsite so there's plenty of daylight to set up your tent and stuff easier, but this was an exception. Once we'd assembled all our gear onto our packs, we strapped on our packs and hiked to our site. The hike was about 2 miles, and I think it took us about an hour. The first half or so was mostly uphill, so we didn't exactly start out strong, but once we started going downhill about halfway toward the campground, it was a breeze.
Despite the dark, we managed to find our campsite and set up our stuff okay. After a bit we went down to the beach to have a campfire. Once we lit the fire and got it going, we ate dinner. Adam was in charge of bringing hot dogs to roast over the fire. I'm not sure who exactly brought the roasting sticks, but the roast was a success(I think I ate 3 or 4 hot dogs. That's the best thing about Boy Scout campouts-Mom isn't there to stop you from gorging yourself.). And Michael was in charge of bringing graham crackers, chocolate, and marshmallows. I'll bet you can guess what they were for.
After that we had a little campfire ceremony. I know Mom posted how on our family's previous Point Reyes campout, we'd seen some people who were doing some kind of Buddhist meditations on the beach when we went down there. Mom was impressed that the people stayed entirely focused on their meditation, despite the loud noises of Eliza's and Ben's bickering. Well, a good part of our campfire was religious, but there was no one to disturb us. If there was, I'm not totally sure we would've stayed focused the way those Buddhists or Muslims or whatever they were did.
After a good night's rest, we woke up to a cold morning. The weird thing about camping is that if you arrive when it's dark, you get a whole new view of the area in the morning. Soon after everyone got out of their tents, Ben and I made breakfast for everyone. I was in charge of breakfast, and I got a bunch of Pop Tarts, because I knew Adam loves those. The flavors I decided on were S'mores and Blueberry. You should've seen Adam's reaction when he got wind of the fact we'd be having that for breakfast. Other than that, I'd also brought Mountian House eggs and bacon. You know, the dehydrated food where you just add water to make it edible.
The next little while was a drag. After we took down all our tents, the younger scouts did some of their Trailhead stuff. Since I'm done with all that, I was just sitting around with nothing to do. But after a while, everyone finished up. Then we went down to play on the beach. I just rolled around on the sand dunes for the first half hour or so, but what's kind of amazing is that I got zero sand in my underwear. Then I joined the others to play around on the wet sand. Adam, Kyle, and I all ran around, chasing and throwing sand at each other. Solomon even built a sand castle. Towards the end of our stay on the beach, Adam, Kyle, and I worked together to dig a really deep hole-so deep I could stand up to my knees in it.
Once we got back up to our campsite, we did the final packing and ate a few snacks Brother Hopkins had packed. Then we made like a baby and headed on out. I first heard that joke over the summer, around the time when Mom would still cross her legs whenever she heard the joke, and I think I know why. When babies are born, the usual case is that their head comes out first. That's what the "head on out" joke is referring to. The reason Mom would cross her legs when she heard the joke is because hearing it would kind of make her think, "Oh no! A baby's coming!" But after a while of me telling the joke she became immune.
Anyway, once we'd packed up all our stuff, we went back toward the cars. On the way home we stopped for pizza. And man, talk about a wonderful afternoon. I guess it would be a bit unformal for a bunch of dirty, sweaty boys to walk into a store for pizza, but that's just what we did. A nd something happened in the store. You know how a lot of pizza places have tvs all around so you can watch football or something while you're waiting for your order? Well, after I'd just finished eating my fourth or fifth slice of pizza, a commercial came on for The Hobbit:The Desolation of Smaug. Boy, did the preview get me fired up! I heard Solomon mutter, "No way I'm gonna see that," but I was thinking the opposite.
So about a month later, I went to see it with my friend Dominic. His mom and sister took him to the theater where we'd meet. While Dominic and I saw the Hobbit, his mom and sister saw Frozen(or at least, that's what I kind of got wind of). I do feel a little bad for them, since the Hobbit was about an hour longer than Frozen. So they just had to wait a while before we came out. In fact, his sister Hannah came into our theater to see if the movie was over yet. And, coincidentaly, it was when the credits started! Anyway, both me and Dominic liked the movie. But I'm not sure if poor Solomon would've.
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