Great Gifts Edition

Vol. 3, No. 12 GREAT GIFTS EDITION In this Issue: The Gift of Adventure Gifts from The Summit 37° 53Ń - 81° 06´W Using Latitude and Longitude Geocaching Geocaching Merit Badge THE GIFT OF ADVENTURE Year's end is a great time to look back at remarkable events and forward to wonderful possibilities. At the top of Scouting's list is The Bechtel Summit Reserve - the latest in a history of generous gifts forming the foundations of the BSA's High Adventure programs. Waite Phillips (second from left) with BSA leaders Hiking near Philmont's Tooth of Time In 1938 businessman Waite Phillips gave the Boy Scouts of America 100,000 acres of mountain and prairie in northern New Mexico - the heart of what would become Philmont Scout Ranch. Twenty-five years later, BSA's national vice-president Norton Clapp financed the addition of the Baldy Mountain region, opening the rugged north country to Philmont trekkers. Philmont trekkers heading for Baldy Mountain Facilities for outfitting and launching watercraft expeditions at the Northern Tier High Adventure Base and the Florida Sea Base were provided by gifts of time and financial support from many volunteers and philanthropists. The Sea Base expanded in 1984 with the hundred-acre gift of Big Munson Island. High adventure canoeing at Northern Tier The latest BSA High Adventure base will be The Summit Bechtel Reserve, 10,000 acres of forested mountains in West Virginia with access to an additional 70,000 acres in the neighboring New River Gorge National River Area. It's ideal for Scouting's best challenges, from rock climbing, mountain biking, zip-lining, and watercraft adventures to hiking, camping, and appreciating nature. Made possible by a gift from the foundation headed by Eagle Scout Stephen Bechtel, Jr., The Summit opens in the summer of 2013 to host the National Jamboree. Between Jamborees it will provide terrific adventures for Scouts from across the nation. GIFTS FROM THE SUMMIT Celebrate The Summit with reminders of the excitement about to break loose in West Virginia. Check out the following Summit commemorative items, just right for Scouts and Scouters on your gift giving lists. You'll find these and more Summit collectibles at www.scoutstuff.org. 37° 53Ń - 81° 06´W Did you notice the number and letter code on each Summit item? Those are coordinates of latitude and longitude pinpointing the location of the BSA's newest high adventure base. Latitude and longitude form a grid overlaying the planet. Lines of latitude encircling the globe are numbered from the equator (at zero degrees) north or south to the poles (each at 90 degrees). Vertical lines beginning at one pole and continuing to the other form meridians of longitude. They are numbered east or west from the prime meridian (zero degrees) at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, England. The 360 degrees of longitude and the 360 degrees of latitude are each divided into 60 smaller measurements called minutes, and each minute is further divided into 60 seconds. Here's how the Scout Fieldbook shows the grid: Latitude is always written first. The Summit Bechtel Reserve coordinates of 37°53Ń - 81°06´W mean the new high adventure base is almost 38 degrees north of the equator and about 81 degrees west of Greenwich, England. Many topography maps feature latitude and longitude coordinates in the margins. This corner of a Philmont Scout Ranch map indicates that Wild Horse Creek is about 36 degrees, 27 minutes north of the equator and 105 degrees west of Greenwich. USING LATITUDE AND LONGITUDE Navigating with a GPS (global positioning system) receiver is a challenge you're likely to find at The Summit, but you don't have to wait. The BSA already has plenty of opportunities for you to sharpen your GPS skills and perhaps earn the Geocaching merit badge, one of Scouting's newest and most exciting awards. GPS systems compute data from satellite signals to give accurate readings of the receivers' locations. Upload the latitude and longitude of a destination and your GPS receiver will plot a course that can lead wherever you want to go. The latitude and longitude shown on the screen of this GPS receiver mark a spot near Dallas, Texas. The arrow on the compass indicates the current direction of travel. GEOCACHING The sport of geocaching is a scavenger hunt using GPS coordinates to locate small containers (the caches) that others have hidden. With your parents' permission, you and your fellow Scouts can go online to find the location of a cache near your home. Program the coordinates into a GPS receiver, then follow the course it sets to locate the cache. Geocaching Waterproof Boxes Inside the container you might find a journal to sign, and sometimes a few trinkets. Leave a trinket of your own, then take one from the box and deposit it in the next geocache site that you find. The Geomate Jr™ Geocaching GPS is a special GPS receiver preloaded with hundreds of geocache locations. Learn the basics of GPS navigation as you search for geocaches in your neighborhood. Available along with other geocache items from www.scoutstuff.org. GEOCACHING MERIT BADGE As you become skilled with the use of a GPS, consider earning the Geocaching merit badge. That will help you refine your navigational abilities and explore ways that GPS receivers can enrich your Scout adventures. And don't forget the coordinates for finding The Summit: Latitude - 37°53Ń Longitude - 81°06´W Punch those numbers into a GPS receiver and you can lock in your route The Summit. It might be just down the road from your home, or more than a thousand miles away, but start dreaming now about the newest jewel in the crown of BSA High Adventure bases. Soon you can join Scouts from across the nation making their way to the Bechtel Summit Reserve for the gift of as much fun and challenge as you can imagine. (This edition of the Be Prepared Newsletter was developed and written by Robert Birkby, author of the current editions of the Boy Scout Handbook and Fieldbook and of Scout Stuff, the new book about the National Scouting Museum.) .

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