GALLERY: St. Michael-Albertville Scouts Tackle Many Points Camp

Where can a tween or teenage boy spend a week grubby in the woods, shooting guns, climbing walls, jumping on a ginormous aquatramp and eating three -- delivered to your plate and all you can eat -- hot meals a day?

Where can an adult parent or leader spend a week watching their son learn valuable leadership skills, attempt to use those skills at difficult tasks and see their sons experience new and challenging physical feats?

The answer to both of these questions is at Many Point Scout Camp. Situated near the headwaters of the Mississippi on 2400 lake acres, 30 minutes from Itasca State Park and the Tamarac Wildlife Refuge, Many Point is a wilderness masterpiece. Founded in 1946, thousands of boys have spent a portion of their childhood experience at this camp. In fact, some boys this last week, were third generation campers at Many Point – with Scout, Dad and Grandpa there as leaders all at once.

Recently – Boy Scout Troop 547 of St. Michael - Albertville returned from a week at Many Point Camp. The 25 Scouts ranged in age from 11 to 18, from rank of Tenderfoot through Eagle Scout. Six adult leaders were there all week, some rotating half weeks; one woman (this writer) even joined the fray. 1000 males at camp for the week – twenty women split between camp staff and parent leaders. 

Troop 547 stayed in two person tents provided by the camp, in a campsite close to the water. Days started at 7:00AM and lights out was at 10:30PM. 

First up – flag raising at your individual campsite led by a patrol (group of 5-6 boys within the troop). Another patrol will take off early to fill the role of dining hall “servers” for the troop. The rest of the troop joins the entire campsite for morning gathering. Camp flags are raised, loud songs sung and camp trivia thrown out to earn each troop an early spot to eat by answering correctly.

Meals were actually quite delicious – made by a real “Granny” and her camp staff. In fact, “Granny” bakes hundreds of loaves of homemade bread – affectionately called, “Granny Bread” every day for three meals a day!

“I get up at 3:45 a.m. every day to start the bread from scratch, but it’s worth it. I love feeding these boys and I’ve done it for 24 years with no plans of stopping anytime soon!” Granny tells us. If a Scout didn’t care for the meal, there was unlimited Granny bread and peanut butter and jelly. Servers were required to jump up and refill anything empty so one only needs to nod to the empty bowl of chili and the server was up in a flash to refill.

Afterwards servers bussed and wiped off tables, swept floors and waited for permission to be excused. Each boy had multiple turns at server and they all learned quickly that they either wipe down that dirty messy table, or they will stand there all through their own free time. After day one – no one dawdled anymore as the line at the trading post for candy just kept getting longer and you wanted to get there first!

During the morning hours – boy attended merit badge sessions on everything from fish and wildlife management to emergency preparedness to whittling. After lunch, was time for troop activities voted on in advance. Options included greased watermelon (one must see this one to believe it), water polo, rifle shooting, sailing, kayaking, canoeing, snorkeling, beach volleyball, aquatramp as well as a myriad of additional choices.

“I liked the sailing best” a First Class Scout tell us, ‘we tipped over two times but the second time we actually tried to tip over because it was really fun!”

“We got so far away from the buoys – the lifeguard had to come get us in a speedboat. It was super windy but the wind wasn’t going the way we wanted it to!” another Scout shares.

The older boys were given more challenging options – as they typically had already earned all their lower level merit badges. Some boys went offsite for the week and did a full amazing race within the 2400 acre confines of camp. Others earned BSA and Red Cross Lifeguarding certificates which required a 500 yard swim and diving to the bottom of the lake to save a weighted adult male dummy. Emergency Preparedness offered a week of simulated air, land and water rescues including local search and rescue teams, a backwoods mounted horse posse and actual emergency vehicles and wreckage.

A fan of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn – head over to Flintlock Adventure base and spend the night on Huck’s Raft on the water – or the night in a tree house. Older Scouts can even certify in Scuba diving in one week.

International target sports, jet skiing and tree top rope courses were just some of the challenges open to the boys. There was even an all camp mini Iron Man – this writer entered with her son. We felt official as they wrote numbers on our arms with sharpies. I am proud to say – I wasn’t fast but I wasn’t last! I was the only pony tail lopping over the finish line.

After supper the boys have two hours of free time where they can do anything and everything the camp offers. Scouts can finish merit badges, climb the 60 foot towers and free rappel, mountain bike or the camp wide favorite – go buy Skittles and Mountain Dew at the Trading Post.

“I liked the climbing tower best – free rappelling was the most fun – it’s all up to you so you better tie your knots right,” shares Life Scout Zack Peterson.

Adult leaders slept in tents and supervised all activities. Restrooms and showers were top notch rivaling those of high school locker rooms and women had completely private accommodations.

This was this writer’s first year attending camp. I can categorically say I enjoyed every single minute of this week. From watching the boys have a blast tipping over on our windy day of sailing (“pull your dagger board out FIRST!”) to watching the older boys step up and lead by example, to watching the middle of pack boys bust out with pride when they started the fire – in front of the Eagle Scouts – using just dry twigs and flint stone. 

We fell asleep to the sound of loons, slept through rain storms dry in our well-designed tents. In fact the first night it rained – I awoke to someone physically moving my tent in the rain. Before I could speak, I heard through the downpour, “It’s just me Mom,” said my 15 year old son Zack, “I figured you probably did your rain flaps wrong (I did) and I was going to save you a night of soaking wet”.

I found many examples over my four days where the Boy Scout slogan was lived out (Do A Good Turn Daily). Imagine being one of 20 women out of 1,000 men - all of whom are encouraged to hold doors for ladies and other basic tenets of chivalry. Although I was perfectly capable – I had many boys jump up and offer to carry my bags to my van on the day of my departure.

There are several Boy Scout troops in the STMA/Hanover area – for more information on Scouting – contact the Northern Star Council.