Preparing for Bowron Lakes {High Adventure BSA}

Peter sharpens his pocket knife with a sharpening stone from Grandpa Pete, which had belonged to his Grandpa Peter from Scotland.

As our departure day draws near, preparations for our BSA high adventure canoe camping trip in Canada have switched into high gear.   Grandpa Pete drove up for a visit and left us his truck for our journey, as our gear-hauling needs surpassed our gear-hauling capacity by a long shot!  Grandpa Pete drove Tim's car home after his stay with us; we certainly got the better end of that bargain to say the least.

Zachary, as the elected crew leader, will be the Scout in charge on this high adventure BSA trip.  Of course the adults (Tim, me and Kimberly) will ultimately be 'in charge,' but the Scouts will be running the show, so to speak.  With great mentoring from Dr. M, Zachary planned out the 7-day meal plan, complete with snacks and desserts, measured to meet an anticipated 2,800+ calorie/day/person need.

Ezra's back home after working at Fire Mountain Scout Camp all summer, and jumped right in to help baggie up all the week's snacks for our Bowron trip.

Seven days' meals and snacks for 9 people measures up to quite a boatload of supplies, for which we will need water-tight, lidded, handled buckets, to be tied to our canoes when we're paddling to prevent a lost load if/when we flip.  Tomorrow Zachary and another Scout will make an appeal at our locally owned hardware store for donated or discounted buckets for our trip.  We have budgeted carefully for the various expenses of the trip, but with the price of fuel in Canada, we could probably use the cost savings of 15 buckets to offset the cost of a half tank of gas.

Zachary and Joseph measure out quantities of calories.

Zachary's before photo, having grown his hair out for a few months

One optional Bowron tradition, at least in our troop, involves donning a Mohawk at some point in the Bowron experience.   On our last Bowron Canoe Adventure in 2007, Isaac's dad, Ron, gave him a Mohawk; having had his own Mohawk as a youth on the Bowron Circuit over 30 years earlier.  Ron's fond memories of his childhood trip to Bowron Lakes inspired our 2007 trip; our entire family was fortunate to be on the crew (though Joseph and Peter were too young to paddle, and rode as canoe passengers).

Peter's hair already cut and styled, Tim gives Zac the zany buzz while Tony looks on.

Zachary and Peter, head to head, ready for Bowron

Matching Mohawks, Zachary and Peter faced off in style just days before our 500 mile drive to our 70-90 mile canoe camping expedition.  The weather forecast looks drippy, but we'll be prepared with our rain gear and high spirits.  We had a few days of rain on our last visit to Bowron Lakes, and although the sunny days shine brighter in our memories, the rainy days had their highlights, too.

Peter practices carrying his dry bag; fastened to a stripped external frame backpack. 

During our 2011 Bowron Lakes adventure in a few days, our blog will feature daily flashbacks from our 2007 expedition.  We hope you'll stop by and check out the scenes and stories from our first visit to Bowron as we tackle the circuit of lakes for a second time around.


Warning: once you've seen the rugged beauty of Bowron Lakes, you'll want to go experience it for yourself!