Thinking like a Junior/Brownie

No picture for this since I am Bret's troop leader. Maybe someone will send me a pic. But here is the letter we read from our Canadian Scout Family...

Sea Scouts
This year, C-- and I are in Sea Scouts (here, we call them Marine Scouts because we do not live near the sea)! Our Sea Scouts are for boys and girls that are between 9 and 14 years old. Sea Scouts are different from regular scouts because 75% of the program has to be related to water activities (swimming, boating, scuba diving, fishing...). In our scout association, there are only -- other Sea Scouts troops! There are two age groups for our Sea Scouts. The first one is for 9-10 year-old kids. We call that group "Louveteaux"* and their team name is Sea Lion, but in French it translates to Sea Wolf. The second group is for 11-14 year-olds. They are "Éclaireurs"* and their team name is Shipmates. C---'s in the "Louveteaux" and I'm in the "Éclaireurs" but both groups are together during the meetings. Because we're Sea Scouts, we play games like "Babord-Tribord"* that help us to practice marine vocabulary like "babord": port*, "tribord": starboard*, "poupe": aft* and "proue": fore*... Our troop has also bought a small sailboat which we will learn to sail. In a year, we have four camps: an autumn camp, a camp during which we say our oath, a winter camp and a summer camp. Sunday, the 31st January, we came back from our third camp (it was our winter camp). I slept out in a Quinzee, and C--- slept in a cottage. It was very FUN even if our mom wasn't with us (because she's in Sea Scout with us, but she couldn't come). For our first camp of the year, we slept in a cottage and went canoeing. This summer we may camp on an island. In our group, we're -- "Louveteaux", -- "Éclaireurs" and -- Scouts Leaders. That means that we're -- altogether. I know we're not that many kids but it's a new scout group... Our group is in ----, in ----, in ----, in Canada, in the world, on the Earth and in the universe! ;-)

Have a nice day, M-- and C--

* Louveteaux : Wolf Cubs
*Éclaireur : Scout (We're not sure how to translate Ééclaireur...)
*Babord-Tribord : Port-Starboard
*Babord, port: Left
*Tribord, starboard : Right
*Poupe, aft : Back
*Proue, fore : Front

(names and places have been bleeped out)

This is our Canadian scout family's troop at their parade, and in their quinzee (where they slept!!!)