For 2005, the troop stayed in-council and spent the week at our own Ockanickon Scout Reservation. As we have come to expect, the programs were awesome, the staff excellent, and the food was good. We stayed in the Ottawa campsite, which we are quite familiar with. We shared the site with Troop 140 out of New Jersey, and thank them for being great neighbors.

During the week there, our boys earned a combined total of 42 merit badges. This year's badges earned included: Basketry, Canoeing, Communications, Environmental Science, Life Saving, Rifle, Archery, Swimming, Indian Lore and Fingerprinting.

Our first year scout spent the week in the Dan Beard Program. Our hats are off to the Counselor, Chewey, who completely revamped the program and made it much more interesting for the first-year guys. They even had the change to earn merit adges in Mammal Studies, Swimming and Textiles.

We also enjoyed the second annual In-Site Campfire. The boys taking the Communications merit badge, once again, had to emcee a campfire. On Tuessday night, Ms Wydro made the trip to camp, bringing pizza and jello. A campfire show was put on. Jim Devita was on-hand to help make the actual campfire. Mr, Kingsmill and Sam Griga visited and stayed for the show.

At the Friday night, Closing Campfire, the troop treated the camp to their own "It's A ummer To Be You" skit. This year, Mr. Peden joined in the skit, as Mr. bacon's silent partner and was responsible for getting the whole audience to participate in the skit.

The scouts worked on cleaning up the Ockanickon sign (pictured above), as their service project. They earned the Honor Patrol award for both patrols,a nd the Honor Troop award. They would have earned the Clean Camper award, if the SPL had turned in the paperwork. Monkey was voted the Honor Camper by his fellow scouts.