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Makahiki

Ben spent the weekend camping with his Boy Scout Troop at the oldest scouting show in the U.S. - The Makahiki.


All the scout troops from around the island meet for this weekend. Each troop brings one activity or event and the family members come on Saturday to try out all the activities. Some of the troops do demonstrations. Ben's troop was demonstrating all the different ways of making a fire depending on the materials at hand.


One troop had set up a tee pee.

One troop brought a real working trebuchet and let people try it out. Instead of flinging rocks, we flung Ziploc baggies of water which the boy scouts would try to hit with a bat.


There were MP's there with their attack dogs. We watched an incredible demonstration of how the dogs will attack a suspect when ordered to. I would not have wanted to be the guy who had to let the dogs take him down over and over for our entertainment. Yes, he is yelling in this picture, but it was just to make the dogs think that they were doing a good job. Don't want them feeling inferior.


Katie got to climb into a Coast Guard boat and play with a gun. If they only knew her desire for world domination, they might not have let her on there.

One of the girls favorite demos was the lava tube. Each person got to mix oil, water, food coloring and glitter in a large test tube with a screw top. The food coloring mixes with the water but not the oil and makes a colorful "wave" in the tube.

We didn't get to see Ben for very long. We stopped by his camp site and watched him make some grilled cheese sandwiches. This is far beneath his cooking ability and usually annoys the heck out of him. He likes to cook in a dutch oven over a fire using about fifteen ingredients.

I think I'll let him make dinner when he gets home tomorrow.

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