Confidence Camp- Day 4

We managed a phenomenal amount of activities today!

First up, we went foraging for edibles. A cattail stand is a veritable supermarket.

Checking plants in a field. We went to a number of locations near my house and brought back various roots and greens to cook, and a whole gallon bag of salad greens.

Then we went to the creek to get water. No "easy outs" this morning, except I let them use real shovels for the digging.

We split into 3 groups and each built a small fire. Each one roasted one set of roots and boiled some greens. The cattail roots also got boiled.

Made sure everything was boiled adequately to kill any organisms in the creek water.

Our beautiful buffet! Except I didn't manage to get the bag of salad in the picture because we were keeping it in the shade under the table.

And the sampling! There was nothing that everyone disliked. A few people preferred one kind of green or root over another, but the experiment was a huge success!

We checked the solar stills, but they didn't have much water because we had to take them apart too early, because we needed the pans to cook. Shuffling the sessions due to weather messed up the schedule for the pans. But some water was collected. We did see that they work if given more time.

After a lunch that was more hearty than a few bites of greens and roots we settled in for an afternoon of more serious compass work. Working with a map to take bearings and estimate distances.

Then I took one person from each team to a location out of sight, came back and gave the remaining team members bearings and distances. They had to go find their partner. Then they switched and I took the other person to a different location. All teams came back without any huge problems. It's always good to end the week with the same number of people you start with.

Finally, the weather made an outdoor activity enjoyable. We are having so much fun and learning. Yes, I'm learning things too. For example, I hadn't tried the cattail roots in spring. At other seasons I would call them edible, but not tasty. The springtime ones were actually yummy. I've learned that the letter T after an elevation number on a topo map means that the elevation was determined from aerial photos, not from a ground survey, and is thus less accurate. People ask questions, and if I don't know the answers I try to find them.

We are all approaching tired, but what a week! I'm learning which lessons fit into the time slots, and which need more time. And I have a great, enthusiastic group of campers.

See Confidence Camp- Day 3