Troop 48 Berlin, NJ

June 16 to 18, 2017, Troop 48 ventured down to Belleplain for the weekend.

Saturday, we headed down to Cape May, where we took kayaks on a 3 1/2 mile journey up and down the tidal Cape Island Creek. We scooted under railroad and car bridges, watched baby crabs scurry through the mud, and spotted ospreys on the nest. Afterwards, we went down to Sunset Beach where we checked out the concrete ship, waded in a bit, and looked for Cape May diamonds.

Back at camp, it was time to go swimming in Lake Nummy, followed by a dinner of (depending which patrol you were in) hot dogs and ramen, hamburgers, or tacos.

Despite mosquitos and sunburn, it was a great weekend!

Pictures are up from the weekend!

Congrats to John and James for surviving their ordeal and being inducted into the Order of the Arrow this month!

Last week, Bryan “Skippy” Gillespie earned the rank of Eagle Scout, passing his Board of Review in Haddonfield.  Skippy become Eagle Scout #121 in troop history.

Skippy’s had a great career with the troop, spending a year as Senior Patrol Leader, backpacking over 400 miles with the troop (including Washington State and a two day 50 on the Batona), and planning and building some impressive monkey bridges.

Congrats Skippy, we’re all proud of you!

Our flag retirement at the Berlin VFW on Memorial Day Weekend went very well.  We managed to retire scores of flags, and the Scouts who took part in the ceremony did an excellent job.  Thank you to everyone who came out to help the VFW and the Troop with this.

Extra thank you to Assistant Scoutmaster Steve Teti for organizing and running the ceremony, it went great Steve!

Thank you to everyone who came out to help place flags at Berlin Cemetery for Memorial Day!  We had a big crew this year, and lots of help from the Girl Scouts and other folks from around town, so the hundreds and hundreds of flags were placed in record time.

So we had a freezing great time whitewater rafting for our May campout!  Despite it being 48 degrees when we got there at 11 AM, some wetsuits and some paddling (okay, a lot of paddling) kept us toasty as we rocketed down the rapids of the mighty Lehigh River.

Don’t ask about the buckets.  I certainly didn’t ask about the buckets.

A few weeks back, Troop 48 spent the night practicing canoeing strokes on Penbryn Lake in Sicklerville.  The beautiful sunset was just a bonus.

Well done to Chase for finishing up his Eagle Project!  He spent four days pulling up fences and repainting the front of the Berlin VFW.  The building looks great!

Now just to wrap up those last few badges…

Congrats to John and James for being elected to Order of the Arrow this year!  Enjoy your ordeal.

For those of you who read Scouting Magazine, a familiar face was featured this month!  Mr. Pannu talked to Scouting Magazine about the creation of the Sikh Religious Award.

A few days before I opened this up, a similarly familiar face popped up on Instagram from the national BSA account.

Great job Mr. Pannu!