Took the Troop camping this past weekend - great campout. Most stayed in a cabin (wood burning stove) and some chose to sleep outside. A little below 0F Friday night, and warmed up to about 20F Saturday during the day. Lots of good stuff.

After lunch on Saturday another leader and I took four 13 year old scouts on a hike to a remote area of camp (the others were working on various scout skills for advancement). These 4 were all 1st Class Scouts, meaning to me that they should all have the basics down pat. Two were from one patrol and two were from another. I told the four of them that we were going to take a little walk; nothing more. As they were going out the door, I handed each buddy team a 2 qt pot and lid from their respective patrol cooksets and told them to bring it along. I was pleased to see that they were all dressed in loose layers and had their Ready Packs on. They stowed the pots and we took off. There was about 8 inches of snow on the ground, most of it fresh.

After about 20 minutes walking, we came by design to a small lake. We discussed crossing it and then I had them safely cross the lake to a brush - sheltered peninsula. Up the bank and into a small clearing, where I halted them. It was now snowing pretty heavily, and I told them to give me their water. They each coughed up a 1 litre bottle. I then poured 4 ounces into each of the two pots and told them that the situation was that they had been hiking all day, were down to thier last bit of "seed" water, and the weather would not permit them to continue on safely. I told them the "track soup" story I first heard 25 years ago from a traditional Eskimo, and said that they each had to bring 1/2 a pot of water to a full boil and make a cup of instant soup for each person in the team (I had the soup packages in my pack). The patrol team that was first would not have to clean up dishes and kitchen after supper, because the losing patrol would do it for them.

Any questions? "Mr. Ayers, can we use my stove?" "You can use whatever you have with you." Stunned look on the other team's faces, then an orderly flurry of activity from 4 boys. One team set up a cannister stove, sat on their packs, and started slowly feeding clean snow into the water in the pot. The other team cleared snow to bare ground, then had one member gathering twigs and small sticks while the other pulled out two tins from his pack - one with vasoline impregnated cotton balls and the other with bits of fatwood in it. He actually had his fire lit before the other team had the stove going!

The fire boys knelt on thier packs and worked fervishly to feed twigs, balance the pot (never took a hand off it), feed snow, and blow on the twigs - sounded like a steam locomotive "puff-puff-puff-puff" steadily. Minutes pass. The other team's stove is slowing down, but it is nearing a boil - bubbles starting to form - and I saw it like it was slow motion - the stove slowly leaned to one side - just a bit - and "splash!" the pot of nearly-boiling water spills.

The stove team hastily sets things back up and starts over. But now the propane has all burned off and the iso-butane fraction is almost gone. Too cold for the butane that make up the bulk of the fuel to vaporize very fast from the "heat" reflected from the burner, so the flame is now looking pretty pitiful. They get up to the amount of required water, but it's 50% slush when I see steam billowing past the lid of the fire team's pot - the less-equipped scout team has a full rolling boil. Winners!

Cups and spoons come out from that team and I hand over two packages of soup. They look over at the losers and say "Hey, we have enough boiling water for you - come have some soup with us." (I think that tickled me more than anything.) So the stove boys carefully set the pot off the stove and came over to get water and soup. There was NO bragging or razing - I was amazed.

While they were sipping hot soup, I set up my stove and before they finished their soup had a full pot of water boiling. I set the pot into the ensolite cozy it travels in, put the stove away, and asked if they wanted hot water for boullion or tea or instant cider (of course they did). They built up the fire and talked a LOT. Both teams stated over and over that they had "learned a lot" - not only from their own performance, but from the others. There was no "winner" "loser" talk at all - all I heard was one time "We'll personally wash up your supper mess tonight - it wouldn't be right to make the rest of our patrol do it." (and later, they did exactly that)

They discussed all sorts of related things. The stove owner wants to learn how to get better performance out of his stove in cold weather now - he said that NOW he understands what I told him about his stove and cold weather use and why I don't use that model of stove. It would take me hours to type all the neat stuff they/we discussed. As the conversation continued, they dug into their packs and brought out various trail foods to share around. The boys just impressed the heck out of me.

I didn't contrive anything; it all just happened that way. We got back to the cabin just after dark, and they spent supper discussing the whole event with the other boys - cooperatively, from one table to the other. Being prepared is more than just having the latest equipment, and I believe that 4 boys truly understand that now.

Of course, those 4 all want a stove like mine for Christmas... <sigh>

Tom