I had this idea for an award (patch, certificate) that the scouts could earn for hiking some part of the Appalachian Trail in each of the 5 New England states (CT, MA, VT, NH, ME). The patch would look identical to the above (the classic trail marker symbol for the organization), with the state [...]

Making a competitive car is very simple and you don’t need to be a physics teacher or engineer. All you need to do is get on the internet and search “pinewood derby”. It’s all there. This does take time and you do find that most sites are ones where you have to pay for a book [...]

The Ukulele is a great instrument to pick up and learn. With four strings, it’s not at all complicated like a guitar and ANYONE can play it.  You can pick it up and start playing in 15 minutes (the strumming takes a little getting used to). Give yourself a few days to really get better then [...]

A friend at work introduced this to me and I introduced it to my daughter. I’m bringing it up because they have a great Junior Program for kids starting at the age of 14. I think this is a great opportunity to do something challenging and really build confidence.  If your son has any thoughts [...]

      Leave No Trace is not simply a program for visiting the backcountry, it is an attitude and a way of life. I plan to expand this area considerably, I have lots of material to share on this topic. Here’s one that is pretty good - an extensive powerpoint done on the entire program: Leave No [...]

This is it, the best mountain bike for the money – the Trek 3700. I was for a long time a Specialized bike guy, but they became too clunky and expensive. Then I purchased a used (practically new) one of these off Craigslist for my son. It has everything you need, it looks cool and it has [...]

There are quite a number of good extended bike trips in the area -Miles Standish State Forest, Cape Cod Canal, Nickerson State Park (Brewster, Cape Cod, right on the CC rail trail), Lexington/Concord RtT, Northampton RtT. I’ll post more on these later. Here is a list of MA trails: http://www.massbike.org/bikeways/ Here is a map of [...]

One of the best scouting activities in our area is Orienteering. One of the best local spots for anything scout related is Nobscot Scout Reservation (in Sudbury, MA). Below is a note to our kids on what to expect. I thought it might be useful if you need anything like this. We have also taken the scouts here and introduced them to [...]

  Last year we did this whitewater rafting trip out in western MA. They actually organize a full Whitewater MB class, but we wanted the kids to have an introductory run first before getting into the whole MB requirement process. It was on class III rapids which I thought were pretty mild (albeit, it was [...]

  If you are looking for a nice powerpoint to introduce caving to the scouts, maybe the attached will help. I do not know the author, but this one is very good:   introduction_to_basic_caving.ppt    Here is a guide to caving LNT:  lntcaving.pdf   There are quite a number of caving opportunities in the northeast. [...]

  Here’s something that looks pretty interesting – earning the geology merit badge (and mammal study) while exploring a cave. They seem to have a nice program designed. Could do all year, not just a summer activity. Lincoln Caverns is somewhat in the area of Gettysburg (center, bottom of PA), so if you are traveling there [...]