Here at Troop 226, we've long believed that having worthy goals for the end of the journey helps to keep our Scouts active into their high school years. One of our programs which has been most important to our older Scouts is our annual National High Adventure trip. Our minimum requirements for attendance at a national trip is 70 nights of camping experience and the completion of 9th grade.  We usually find that all of our National trip participants are at least Star rank.

Where Do We Go?

Since 1979, we have sent at least one crew to the following high adventure locations. An *** means we have attended this location multiple summers.

• Adirondack High Adventure Area, New York - ***
• Boundary Waters Wilderness Canoe Area, Minnesota - ***
• Florida Sea Base, Florida - ***
• High Knoll Scout Reservation, Virginia - ***
• Maine National High Adventure Area, Maine - ***
• National Scout Jamboree, Virginia - ***
• Northumbria International Camp, England - ***
• Kandersteg International Camp, Switzerland
• Philmont Scout Ranch, New Mexico - ***
• Tinnerman Canoe Base - Ontario - ***

Why Do We Go?

We decided long ago that a large Troop such as ours must have really older boys in charge. 8^th graders simply aren't ready to look into 55 pairs of eyes each Tuesday evening and keep things moving properly. Our desire to retain Scouts into the 10^th and 11^th grades and utilize their relative maturity as troop leaders required us to meet their programming needs. Thus, High Adventure was born. It's a privilege to attend, it's fun, it's rugged, it's far away from mom and dad for two full weeks. Wow, what a concept!

How Do We Go?

These trips take a great deal of planning, and are more costly than a week at summer camp. The sales pitch for both Scouts and their parents begins early each year. We have sufficient adult leaders to undertake the journeys (we often must have multiple trips in a summer to accommodate our older Scouts) and we use college students who used to be Troop members as Assistant Crew Advisors.

Scouts of high school age are encouraged to work to pay for a portion of their trip, and we have a large fund raiser in the fall from which a boy who hustles can earn nearly half his trip expense.