Happy Clean Living: Boy Scout High Adventure

Brady attended his Boy Scout High Adventure Camp out July 5 - 9th.

Update from his leader Brian Mecham:
We arrived in Burgdorf shortly after 1:00 PM and found a nice campsite for all 25 of us who went. We set up camp and then split up into two groups. The adventuresome group of Michael Lloyd, Todd Hartley, Ron Taylor, Lance Lewis, Brady Mathews, Jeremy Lloyd, Edwardo Hurtado, Donny Hoag, Jake Bowles, Nathan Henrie, Jake Lewis, Andrew Sealey, Blake Hartley, Seth Williamson tackled the Lune Lake trail and biked about 19 miles up and down the mountain to get to the lake. They all came home with stories to tell. Lance Lewis did a somersault and scrapped up his knees after going off an jump and landing wrong. Jake Bowles landed on Lance's bike but all was fine. Jake was trying to keep up with Lance and broke off his crank on his bike. Luckily we had a few extra bikes. The rest of the bike ride went without major incidents.

A second group of Jim Eldredge, Bryan and Michele Mecham, Alan and Ben Eldredge, James Brown, Cameron White, Jared Williamson went on a leisurely bike ride up the road from the campsite. I introduced them to a new game of cave man. It was fun. Each participant marks a circle in the dirt in front of them and they form a circle. One person stands in the middle of the circle. They all have sticks (we found some good walking sticks in the forest) The object is for the person in the middle to put a large rock in the circle of one of the other players. They can only use their sticks to defend and the person can only use a stick to push the rock into the circle. It is a fun game. Cameron was the winner. We also had spear contests to see who could stick their spear in the dirt. The dirt was too hard so no one could do it.

When we got back to camp we found Brandon and Jesse, they did their own bike ride and exploring.

We all arrived back to camp and we fixed teriyaki chicken and rice for dinner in the dutch oven. It was delicious. We enjoyed the meal accompanied with a nice green salad and Michele fixed up a special dish of rice pudding with the left over rice. Needless to say, there was no rice pudding left at the end of the meal.

After dinner we headed to the Burdorf hot springs. We negotiated a good price for the group and had a nice soak at the hot pool for over two hours. We returned to camp and had a campfire program. Jesse conducted a great skit and so did Seth and Cameron. They were a lot of fun and I had not heard any of the three so that was a pleasant surprise since I have heard most scout skits. James and Donny gave some good devotionals. James gave one on honoring the Priesthood and Donny gave one on keeping the commandments is how we show our love to our Heavenly Father. Todd and I each took some time to give them a message and the real treat was Michele and Nancy Hartley also shared their feelings about scouting with the boys. They did a great job.

Everyone was very tired and all went to bed without much encouragement.

We woke to a wonderful breakfast of bacon, eggs, pancakes cooked by the young men. They did a wonderful job. We tuned up all the bikes and the group of young men and their leaders headed off for the high adventure base. Lance Lewis took off early and drove his car down to the high adventure base and then rode his bike back up the mountain to meet the boys.

If you look closely at these mountain shots, you will see the trail they rode their bikes on. Brady said it seemed like 5 miles up the mountain and 20 going down. He completely wore out his break pads on his NEW bike.

The bike ride to the high adventure base was enjoyed by all except Seth and Donny as Seth crashed and Donny couldn't stop and ran into Seth so they were both banged up a little but Cameron go out his first aid kit (gloves and all) and cleaned and bandaged the wounds. They were both okay when I saw them at base camp after we arrived.

Parents, if you could see the mountain they came down, you would probably shoot us first but would be very proud of your boys for making the trek without any other incidents. Jim Eldredge followed the boys in his pick up all the way down the mountain. It was a beautiful country and the ride was breathtaking.

Nancy, Michele and I drove the other vehicles back to McCall and on to Riggins and up the Salmon River to the high adventure base. When we arrived we found the boys playing on the beach next to the river taking a dip every once and a while to cool off. The night before it got very cold in the mountains but down on the river it was plenty warm. I am sure their nights on the river will not be cold like the first night.

On our way out to the high adventure base we realized that the road we were on was going to close before we could get back through due to road construction. So Todd, Nancy, Michele and I had to take the truck with the bike trailer and all the bikes back up the trail the boys came down. I gained an appreciation for the challenge of the ride and became a very proud leader to know that all the boys made it and can say they have accomplished a challenging but rewarding bike ride. It took us about 2 1/2 hours in the truck to make it up the hill and back to Burgdorf. We ended up taking about 5 hours to get home. It was a lot of fun and we were very disappointed we couldn't stay and enjoy the river trip. I am sure they will have plenty of stories to tell about the last three days.

Brady had a tough couple of days at the beginning of the high adventure, but it got better and better as the bike ride was behind them.

We have great leaders who really have fun with the boys.

They were also able to white water raft down the river. Hopefully I'll get more pictures of the whole experience. The water was fairly high and they had a great river run. A lot of the rocks that usually are visible at this time are still under water so the floating was great!