Mr. Henderson said the cleaning detail had to clean up from breakfast, and we would have a half-hour to do whatever we wanted, then we had to meet again, and we were going to learn something about orienteering, and go on a little hike.
When we met later, he told us about finding your way when you’re lost, although I don’t know exactly what he said. We just kept talking to each other. He broke us up into four groups and gave us maps. And said good luck.
Well, we started out looking at the maps and walking along trails, and the woods were really beautiful. He said we’d get warm soon enough, as long as we kept up a good brisk pace. And he was right about that.
The sun started to get higher in the sky and it warmed us up whenever it could get to shine through the trees. And so did the walking. The boys pulled bunches of dead evergreen branches off low-growing areas and ran after some of us. To keep us warm, they said. Gee, that was really thoughtful of them. We had a team leader in each group. Ours was Mark LaPointe, and he’s all right. We wondered who got stuck with Kerry.
We walked for hours, and it was fun at first, but then it got to be a drag,and we were really tired. We sat around for a while and talked, and Larry Martin said he smelled a skunk, but we told him he was just smelling himself because he forgot to wash last night.
There were all kinds of birds in the trees, and we saw a pair of big blue jays. Then we started going again, and Mark said it seemed to him as if we were lost. Great! Just what I always wanted, to be lost in the woods with a bunch of kids as stupid as me!
“Some leader you are“, dear old Sally said.
“Want to show us how you can do better?” Mark asked her, and she shut up.
We gathered around him and tried to match the map with the way we went, and it seemed right. But then Mark said he thought we went off on the wrong fork at one point, and he thought we should go back, so we did. On the way back we heard a funny sound and kept looking around for what it was and finally located a tiny red squirrel in a tree, giving us hell.
“He’s telling us that we’re invading his territory", Mark said.
“Never mind telling us what the squirrels are saying, Mr. Woodsman”, Sally snapped. “Just get us back in time for lunch, hey?”
Well, we were tired at first on the way back, but then we fooled around a lot and felt better. Mark stopped us and showed us the new buds on some trees and explained some things about nature and stuff, to us and it was really interesting. He knows a lot about things like that.
We did get back in plenty of time for lunch and we were the second group back. Not bad at all. Another group came back just a few minutes after us, but the last group was still missing, and we couldn’t have lunch until they got back. What a drag.
When they finally did get back they told us how lost they had been. It seems like we hadn’t really learned too much about following a map, but we did have lots of fun. The last group said they had seen a jack-rabbit and a flock of red-winged blackbirds. I’d have liked to have seen the rabbit, but we’ve got blackbirds all over the place here, they’re nothing special.
We had vegetable soup for lunch and big bowls of baked beans with cheese melted on top, and lots of toast. We had milk and chocolate chip cookies for dessert, and we were stuffed because we could take as much of anything as we wanted.
Kerry kept saying how he saw a big black bear, but no one else saw it, and he’s mad, because no one believed him. He spilled a jug of milk all over the table and the floor and I’m sure he did it because he was mad at everyone. He had to clean it up and he got madder at that, and went off by himself, afterward.
Our group had to do the cleaning up this time, but it didn’t take us long. Then we went up to the courts and played some badminton for a while. All the boys ever play is baseball, but I hate it, and none of us played. Mr. Farraday played basketball with some of the girls.
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