Girls & Boys & Fire...

[SMT224]

Just back from winter camping trip with my daughters Girl Scout Troop. As an SM & GS Leader, I try to work on Scout skills when even I'm out with the girls. This time it was fire building.

 

I taught them how to make a nice little nest out of Sisile rope, add some burnt cloth, and then fire sparks in. They learned quickly to carefully blow on the burnt cloth until the Sisile caught and they were holding a burning nest. We went through basic fire building, and all the girls were able to collect tinder and kindling, layout a fire, and then light it with a burning nest. We were at a Boy Scout camp, so there were plenty camping sites and fire pits, so lots of places to practice.

 

Eventually we wandered over to the camp lake that had been drained for the winter. The girls sat on the dock and continued to make nests and discovered they could drop the flaming nests down on to the mud & ice below and they'd keep burning for a while. Like boys, the girls really liked doing this, and became quite skilled.

 

There was a Boy Scout Troop at the camping as well, and eventually a group of boys wandered down to the lake... attracted by the fire or girls, I'm not sure! After wandering around the empty lake bottom, throwing ice at each other, and generally acting like idiots, they ended up on the dock watching the girls make fire. One of the boys finally stepped forward and admitted they'd never made fire like that and they had now idea how the girls were doing it.

 

So the girls were more than happy to teach the Boys Scouts how to make the nest, add the burnt cloth, and set it aflame with sparks. It wasn't long before the boys & girls were down in the lake bottom making little fires. Then one of the Boy Scouts found some cat tails and they all discovered how very flammable these can be with merely a spark. It was boys and girls having fun with fire.

 

The other GS Leader & I sat on the dock and watched all this, and I had no worries about the fire spreading with all the snow, ice, and mud. But I was a bit floored to look up and see two Boy Scout leaders standing on the other side of the lake, arms folded, watching. They didn't say a thing, just stared. I suddenly became keenly aware of how many BS/GS rules we were breaking with no designated fire pit, etc...

 

About that time we were completely out of fire starting materials, so the other Leader and I decided it was time to go, so the girls left the boys at the lake and headed back to our side of camp. The girls had a great time and thought it was so funny that they were teaching Boy Scouts how to build fires! I have no idea what the BS Leaders were thinking but the boys had a great time, and learned a new Scout skill!

[Nike]

The SMs were probably thinking, "Great. We bring them out here to get away from distractions. What do we find? Girls. Who's doing tent check tonight?"

 

 

[OldGreyEagle]

See, I would have been thinking about starting a Venturing Crew and the girls would be one step up because they were already teaching skills

 

Youth learning from each other, what a concept!

[SctDad]

Sounds like there are some serious scout skills lacking in some troops.

 

As for the boys managing to find the girls. Have you ever noticed that where ever there is a Boy Scout Camp, there is usually a Girl Scout Camp near by or a CO-ED private camp.

[shortridge]

SctDad,

 

Not in my area. Boy Scouts have two (soon to be three) camps, Girl Scouts have three, and they're all many miles apart. The two co-ed camps in my region are also a good distance away from everyone else.

[qwazse]

I bet the SMs' conversation went something like this ...

SM1: "So, I guess those girls were practicing some wilderness survival skills this weekend."

SM2: "Yep. At least our boys spent the morning on EDGE. One of these days, they'll be able to teach them a thing or two."

 

SMT224 - thanks for keeping the girls sharp!