<I>Photo by Tim Jones</I><BR>The Scouts attended a patriotic service at Arlington Cementary.

Recently, two scouts from our community went to a national event in Fort A.P. Hill, Va., called the “National Scout Jamboree.” There were three Boy Scouts from Eastern Oregon in their group. Tim Jones, Bill Sevey, and Colin Peterson, who moved from here to Ontario not too long ago, traveled with scouts from southeast Washington. For that trip, they first had to travel up to the Tri Cities area then they stayed the night with local Scout leaders. They headed over to an airport in Pasco and flew to Salt Lake City, Utah; from there, they exited the plane and got on another airplane headed to JFK International Airport (big airport!). When they arrived, they claimed their luggage and headed outside to the tour bus that was waiting for them.

For the rest of that day, they toured Manhattan and the Empire State Building (great view), where they took pictures and bought souvenirs. At the end of that day, they retired to their hotel. The next day they headed to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island to take pictures and hang out there for a little while. Then they made their way back to Manhattan to see other things in the financial district.

That night they headed to Philadelphia, where they stayed the night. The next morning, they went to see things like Independence Hall, The Liberty Bell (crack and all) and other stuff like that. Then they had to depart to Valley Forge, where they saw the whole camp and learned what was like to live during the Revoluntionary War. Once they completed their tour at Valley Forge, they headed over to Washington, D.C. to stay the night.

The next day, they headed out to tour things like the Vietnam Memorial and the Lincoln Memorial (that was very interesting) and other significant sites. They also stopped to see the Air and Space Museum, Museum of Natural History, and the Museum of American History.

The next day, they went to the patriotic service in Arlington Cemetery in which the Navy Drum and Bugle Corps played. Then they headed over to the Annapolis Naval Academy (pretty cool to see the grave of John Paul Jones, a great naval captain).

On their last day of touring, they got to see things like Capitol Hill, The White House and the Library of Congress.

Once they completed touring those areas, they headed to Fort A.P. Hill to participate in the National Scout Jamboree. At the National Scout Jamboree, the boys were able to enjoy activities like trap shooting, disabilities awareness, and water activities like scuba (the coolest thing was scuba diving), snorkeling, and row boating. The boys also got to see the arena shows in which President Bush tried to attend three times and finally was able to come on the third try.

They stayed there for a week working on merit badges and experiencing new thrills. When it came time to leave, they were half-excited and half-sad: Excited because it was way too hot and muggy there and they did not like the ticks, but sad because they had a great time there, and were going to miss it.

On the way out, they stopped at a theme park called Kings Dominion for the rest of the day. The next day they drove over to Dulles International Airport and got on a plane headed to Salt Lake City, Utah, which was pretty much the end of their trip.

Online: (http://www.bsajamboree.org/)

Tim Jones will be a freshman this year at Grant Union High School. He plans to play soccer and be in the band.