Emerald Bay

7 days. No civilization. Just the ocean breeze, a couple bags of packed belongings, and a district full of young studs with the lives of hundreds of impressionable scouts in their unwashed hands. Welcome to Camp Emerald Bay, where I was warped from my comforting manor of summer idleness into the harsh reality of the world outside our comfortable borders.

Day 1:

The day starts on a compact boat with wooden ramparts reeking of salty seawater and its confines as bijou as a 2 person tent. I had joked to my friend earlier that the boat was meant to fit all 500 of us, which he laughed off with as we knew that was impossible. 5 minutes later, and our faces went aghast as the ship's captain sent troop after troop to join us as we were all compacted into the upper deck. And off we were, with the apparent entitlement of the boat, The Barf Barge, soon coming to fruition as puke was launched out of every garnished digestive system and dodging pellets of blow chunks revealed itself to me as a far higher priority than not falling victim to this excruciating sea sickness. But alas, 2 hours later, the anguish ended as we all reached shore, and the fun was about to begin. Immediately, we were all hit with a swim test, a novice endeavor, to just swim a mere four lengths. Astonishingly, some people failed. They now have no water activities whatsoever to be able to participate in during the stay. Then, lunch was served, followed by the only real downtime we would get for the week to follow, a prompt dinner, lackluster campfire program, and sleep, if we can only call it that.

Day 2:

We are all roused to an awakening at 5:00 a.m sharp, and I am immediately regretting this decision through my bleary eyes and lack of senses to guide me. I jump into the ocean and swim a ¼ mile out of boredom at 6:00 a.m, fiddle with some eggs at 7:45 a.m during breakfast, and am off for my first real session of the day: Canoeing. As the heat sizzled down on the lot of us from up high, and my skin began to melt, all the dozen of us present for that class were eagerly awaiting a saturated entry into the water, but alas, some unstimulating safety conduct was all we could get. Then the second session: Kayaking. Once more, the soulless safety conduct dulled my mind, but at least we were able to work on some strokes with the paddle in the water. Session 3: Archery. A gust of wind blew past my frankly nonexistent hair, as my heartbeat pumped blood at a nimble pace as anxiety set in. This was the most difficult session in all the lands, with a qualification requirement being to shoot at least 60 points by the end of the week, with hardly any time to shoot at all in class. As I was working through all the memory based parts of the merit badge, I tried to formulate a plan in my head of how I was going to tackle this hurdle, as my sessions 4 and 5 were both taken up by activities already, and there was no way a beginner like me would be able to score 60 points in the time we had in class.A problem for future me, I decided, and moved on with my dad. A quick lunch at 12:45, and we were off to Session 4: Lifesaving. This was by far the most entertaining merit badge for me, as swimming was my forte compared to hiking and shooting, so I could implicate my skills while also doing fun exercises and learning how to save lives in the water. A win-win-win! Finally, Session 5: Snorkeling came. I quickly learned that in order to qualify for the snorkeling patch all that would be needed was 3 sessions of snorkeling, for 5 minutes each, and we would be done. With this information, I could squeeze in archery and possibly qualify with enough skill. Hope rejuvenated, I enjoyed my minor snorkeling session and consumed a hefty dinner, falling asleep with a renewed sense of dopamine for the upcoming days.

Day 3: Dopamine crushed

On this day, we woke up at 5:00, ran to an island(Parson’s) and back, hopped in an elephantine canoe with about 8 of us per, and canoed for an hour to that same island where we snorkelled for a bit, slept on rocks, cooked out own food, neglected to shower, and woke up at 4:30 a.m the next day for the canoe back. Slightly painful, but all part of the experience.

Day 4: Literally the same thing as Day 2

After the canoe ride back, we had all our sessions as per usual, where we practiced capsizing in canoeing(which is insanely difficult), we had a chill session at a beach which we kayaked to, rapped a string around another string 1,000 times to create a bow string in archery, chucked a buoy at a bunch of children simulating drowning, and snorkelled for a bit with the troop. Then, it was finally time to start accruing the necessary points for archery. The goal: 20-30 points to land me a soft cushioning spot to alleviate the rest of my point in the following two days. The result? 7 points, and the counselor was being nice. It was beginning to look like I really wasn’t going to be getting this merit badge after all. But little did I know, that the next 3 days were about to harpoon some of the most incredible achievements I have ever done.

Day 5: Woo-Hoo! Time to wake up at 5:00 a.m again and jump into frigid water!

Wake up, paddleboard, breakfast. This routine was slowly dissolving any sense of solace I had within me, and at Session 1, I was starting to feel mild bits of homesickness. Was all this affliction really necessary for just a patch? Was it really the right call to sacrifice every ounce of energy I had in me just for a few measly patches? Absolutely, and I went through all of the sessions with a renewed sense of self-confidence fueled purely by my will. Pain is a mindset, they said. This is real life, they said. Doing this was not a challenge, but an expectation, and I must meet the standards. And so I went forth, grinding through everything with the utmost passion, until the moment finally came. Session 5: Hitting the archery range. With only 7 points down, it was up to me now to bring that number up to at least 40. Yet with about 90 minutes of the 2.5 hours I had at that range, I could only bring it up to a measly 18. Was it all about to be over? Was I truly about to fail one of the hardest non-eagle-required merit badges just because of a tremble in my fingers? Unacceptable. And thus I kept shooting, and shooting, and shooting, until my moment finally came, like the climax of any Disney Princess Movie. I shot one in the blue, kept my hands in the same spot, shot another one in the blue, and another, and one in the white. I had just gotten 19 points in one, bringing my total at that point up to 41 points. And then I shot a bullseye, my very first and only, and it was all over then after. From 7 points to over 100 by the end of the camp, I had done what had once seemed impossible, with a little bit of luck, and a grand slam of perseverance. It was finally over. The day ceased with an unordinary dinner, and for the first time all camp, I fell asleep with a smile on my face.

Day 6: Almost over

I woke up at 5:00 a.m and swam a mile for fun, as well as a nifty patch that joined the ride and accessory list for achievement garnered over the trip. Sessions resumed as usual, yet with this being the last day for them, it was also the most knackering for all the activities. For canoeing, we had to single-handedly canoe for a mile to an island, the same island to which I swam the mile to earlier that day. For kayaking, we finally actually did something, and it was capsizing, which is a far easier maneuver to pull off than with canoeing. For archery, I could finally take it easy, or at least I thought I could until our counselor hit us with a test, which was about 1 question for each of us, and mine was relatively easy. With life saving, we did a strip’n’swim for about 20 meters, as we picked up a 10 pound weight from the bottom of the ocean. Finally, we had a festival of games during Session 5, during which we swam and rowed and belly-flopped to have an absolute blast and divert the end of the trip. At least we thought it was the end. Oh no. The pain, misery, and desolation they had been soothingly letting in for the past we were about to implode into chaos, as Day 7 nearly killed me.

Day 7: The finally barrier(and it’s gigantic)

We were awoken to a massive thunderstorm at 2:30 a.m, the notion of our prior arousal being “early” completely wiped out from our noggins. Okay, now back to the thunderstorm. Never mind, it was just the Scoutmaster trying to have some fun as he gave half the camp a near heart attack whilst shaking all of our tents and arousing us from our semi-groggy state. Then, at 3:00 a.m, we hiked 7.4 miles up a mountain. Does that sound a bit harsh? I haven’t even revealed half the details yet. First of all, we were told it was only 2 miles, and a bit steep. A BIT STEEP!? The grounds we were traveling on were nearly perpendicular to the ground. Any futile attempt I made to even scoot up 5 feet, I was instantaneously shifted by the weight of gravity and the cackling of rocks sliding me down like a crusty water slide. I had to shift 300 feet of mountainous terrain on my butt, taking over 20 minutes to do so! Not only that, but due to the amount of time I had taken, the rest of my group had come to the conclusion that I had given up and returned, completely abandoning me and leaving me to fend for my own. In addition, the under exaggeration of the distance caused an underpreprement of resources, and I was done with my entire water bottle halfway up the mountain.Tragically, the ranger guiding us up the mountain was lost to two buffalos resting atop the first hill, so my measly companion and I had to make our own with just a small flashlight and a will to live. Did I mention it was 3:00 a.m, because from that, you can unearth two pivotal pieces of information. 1. It was pitch dark. 2. If we were to die, nobody would be able to find us, and because the group had already abandoned us and shrugged us off as quitters, by the time they found us, it would already be too late. Why am I talking about death so much, you may ask? Well, because the intense waves of dehydration and heat that we seething in nearly caused us to faint, and there was nothing we could do but put one foot in front of the other and pray. Finally, with a faint flicker of a flashlight in the distance, and the vague presence of voices of yonder, we were able to locate more hikers, and finally reunite with our group, making it to the top of the mountain. Although still excruciating, the hike downwards was far better, and after a week of the most mind-boggling experiences I’ve ever faced, topped off viciously by summiting Silver Peak, it was time to head home. And so we did, finally and inevitably, concluding the trip.

And thus, was Emerald Bay. Am I glad I went? Definitely. Am I ever going back? Not in a million years.

Trip Rating: 8/10