On April 30th 4 scouts and 4 adults from Troop 581 went to the George Washington National Forest for a two-night backpacking trip up to the peak of Signal Knob.
On the first night they hiked three miles and set up tents near the shore of a beautiful lake. Lights out was at 8:30pm. In order to get a good nights rest for a full day of backpacking. The backpackers woke up around 6:30am and started to boil water for breakfast. Riley and Joseph both made a hearty breakfast included: biscuits and gravy, as well as a Breakfast skillet using Jetboils. After cleaning up the backpackers filtered stream water into water bottles and headed off for the day.
The first break came after two hours of hiking and was spent drinking water, eating snacks and relaxing for a bit. Parts of the day’s hike were very difficult due to the rockiness of the trail, but most of it was downhill. The group took another break at another stream to refill water bottles. It took 45 minutes due to the difficulty of getting to the actual creek, but they persevered.
Soon it was time for lunch, which included a chicken sandwich with jerky or dehydrated fruits, pretzels, and a bag of snacks. After lunch they pushed on toward peak, and the more they hiked the harder it got. The incline grew steeper, and the trail was full of rocks, but after a lot of work and breaks they finally made it to the campground. For dinner the group had a choice: either risotto with chicken (and a lot of broccoli) or beef stroganoff and chicken and rice. And for dessert they got fancy and had a wonderful Crème Brûlée, which was a big hit. After dinner the group sat down to relax and watched the sun go down for the end of the day.
Sunday morning, the group woke up early, got everything packed up and made a final push to the peak of Signal Knob and had breakfast there. The view was beautiful, and they took lots of pictures. They then started the trek back down which took three hours and was spent talking about random tv shows and video games. All were happy to reach the cars head home and parents were happy to remind the hikers that a Scout is Clean and sent them to the showers. But all had a great sense of accomplishment replete with some awesome memories.
