Twenty-eight scouts, four sisters, and a contingent of parents headed to Cape Henlopen State Park in Delaware for an absolutely gorgeous weekend.
Most of the group opted for the early Saturday morning drive. And that was one of the smoothest trips to the ocean I've ever done. Google maps estimated the travel time as two hours and thirty minutes. Even with some stops along the way, all drivers were at the campsite in under 3 hours.
There were two other troops camping nearby us--but very kindly, they left us the largest area for camping. The scouts had plenty of room to spread out around a field, locate hammock hanging trees, and still have space for throwing frisbees.
After an early lunch (the scouts were 'starving' by 10am due to the early wake-up), we established buddies for the beach and rehearsed several rounds of buddy checks.
For safety and simplicity reasons, we decided that buddies would be 'permanent' for the whole time at the ocean (no switches). So we asked the scouts to carefully consider their groupings into twos and threes.
Once we arrived at the beach, we had frequent buddy checks. The scouts did very well with these. The beach was busy, so we opted to clear the water for every buddy check. And some of the scouts suggested the buddy groups count off (just like we do for other outings)--and that worked great.
Water temps were chilly (a bit below 70). So lots of the scouts spent time on towels chatting, playing cards, etc. I also brought two paddle boards along for the trip--which seemed like big hits.
At about 4PM, the older scouts (actually) decided we needed to get going for dinner prep. Several variations of walking tacos were on display, along with hearty spaghetti with meatballs and iron-fired pizzas. Then came the dutch oven cobblers. The dinners were all quite good.
The scouts were some-kind-of-tired by Saturday evening. And the mosquitoes were getting more feisty as the evening wore on. We had fewer than 5 scouts still moving at 9PM. Lights out at 10pm was an afterthought.
Virtually everyone headed for home on Sunday morning once we packed up and had breakfast (and after the Hydra patrol experimented with boiled dumplings).
A few interesting bits of history on Cape Henlopen--it is arguably the nation's first 'public lands' because in 1682, William Penn granted it to the common usage of those living in the nearby counties. It was also an active Army base during World War II (and Mr. Mallus pointed out to me a likely bunker near our campsite and a gun emplacement on the beach). More history is here: http://www.destateparks.com/park/cape-henlopen/history.asp
Check out the pictures over here.
-Mike Forrer