Mom G. will never believe it!
Over the weekend I took the Basic Adult Leader Outdoor Orientation (BALOO) training for Cub Scouts. Per BSA guidelines, at least one adult leader must be trained to take the pack on a campout, so my Committee Chair and I attended the training. It's a full day, starting at 8:30 and winding down around 5, covering camp essentials, first aid, fire making and safety, menu planning, and other skills necessary to a successful campout.
One of the things that struck me as we went through the afternoon session was how useful the training was - and I've been camping for well over 20 years now. Sure, the model campsite was old hat (although they used far fewer blue tarps that my standard campsite), and some of the material was geared more towards the Boy Scout leaders in the group (we don't do backpack camping with Cub Scouts as a pack), but overall it was a lot of fantastic information.
The other thing that really jumped out at me is just how handy a Boy Scout Handbook is for general survival skills. First aid basics, general plant and animal information, knot tying (I am not too proud to admit that I, at nearly 40 years of age, finally learned how to tie a proper square knot), navigation and hundreds of other beneficial pieces of information that could be, quite literally, a life-saver.
There's even a section on how to make a monkey's paw!
You could do a lot worse than to keep a copy of the Boy Scout Handbook in your SHTF bag, that's for certain.
That is all.
