Boy Scouts apply knowledge, skills at winter event

During the late 1890s gold rush in the Alaska-Canadian Klondike region, many people camped, built fires, cut fire wood and worked together in search of the precious metal. Over the weekend, Boy Scouts from across central Illinois had the chance to do the same.

More than 10 area Boy Scout troops met Saturday morning at the Peoria Park District’s Camp Wakonda to take part in the 2012 Xtreme North Klondike, an annual scouting wintertime event. This year’s event was hosted by Washington Troop 163 and Morton Troop 178.

Event co-chairman Ken Rose said Klondike, a national scouting event, is one that is very important in the scouting world.

“A lot of the camping that we do as scouts occurs in the spring, fall and summer months,” he said. “As a principle of scouting, we like to try and get the kids on an outing of some type at least once a month. There’s not as much opportunity to get out in the winter months, so having a wintertime outdoor activities day gets the guys out of the house.”

After the event’s formal start at 9:30 a.m. Saturday, troops began pushing homemade sleds to various skill stations, which focus on teamwork, decision making and problem solving skills. At each station, scouts have the opportunity to earn “gold nuggets.” They competed for awards given at the event’s closing ceremonies later that evening.

“We have a first aid station where they’re presented with a victim,” Rose said. “Through their boy scout training, they’re expected to know some first aid. They will apply those techniques in a simulated environment and in addition to going through that exercise and earning points for technique. Then there’s the opportunity at the end for scout leaders to provide feedback on how they did.”

Other stations at Klondike included a code breaking station, where scouts receive a message in Greek and work together to translate the message into English; a fire building station, where scouts build a camp fire with minimal materials and a trapping station, where scouts learned the ins and outs of animal trapping from Farmington trapper and scout leader Brian Efnor. This year, a new station was added to the event to show off the talents of a local troop.

“One of the things we’re featuring this year is Morton Troop 85’s living history group,” Rose said. “These are guys who do various reenactment events. For this event, they’ll have a U.S. soldier, a Canadian mountie, miners, prospectors, trappers, a snake oil salesman and other people you’d expect to see during the gold rush.”

Scout leader Tom Majewski from Morton Troop 178 said his scouts were very excited to get outdoors for Klondike.

“Youth nowadays, it seems all they do is stay inside and watch TV and play video games,” he said. “These guys really look forward to these monthly events outdoors.”

Seth Gudemen, 13, a Troop 178 Boy Scout, agreed.

“I have always been a big outdoors person,” he said. “So I like to camp and to hang out with my friends outside.”

Another plus of Klondike, he added, is meeting new scouts each year.

“It’s neat to get away from the public world and all the electronics,” added fellow-Boy Scout Ian Gymer, 12.

To keep scouts interested in the weeks leading up to the event, letters from their “Uncle Joe,” a fictional trapper keeping in touch with his soon-to-be-visiting nephews, were posted on the event’s website.

“We wanted to keep people coming back to the site and to keep the interest of the scouts,” Rose said.

Rose said Klondike is a great example of what it means to be a Boy Scout.

“What Boy Scouts is really all about is taking young men and helping them to become mature, responsible adults and leaders,” Rose said. “We teach citizenship, we teach decision making and we teach real life. What scouting is really about is helping young boys grow up into good young men. Camping and events that we do are really just the backdrops, or the classrooms, we use to foster important skills.”

For more information on this year’s event, visit klondiketroop163.net.