Tonight was our annual Urban Hike and this year's theme was "Caledonia's Past" (aka "The Heritage Hike"). We met at the church as usual and as the girls arrived they were asked to share their ideas for working on different badges - Science, Outdoor Cooking, Heritage, Plants & Animals, Performing Arts, and Career Awareness.The Guides split themselves up into groups and each group was given a clipboard, a pen and a scavenger hunt sheet. Before heading outside, each group had to create a Be Prepared Plan explaining what they should take with them on a hike, how they make sure no one got lost, what to do if someone did get lost and what to do if someone needed first aid.
Before leaving, we quickly reviewed appropriate behavior on public and private property and explained how the scavenger hunt would work. As we walked, we would be stopping at different places in town to learn something about their history. In some places there would be a question for the girls to answer based on what they could see. Midway through our outing, we planned to stop in the park where the girls could answer some nature questions and find traditional scavenger hunt items - as well as play on the play structures, before heading back to the Church.
Time was against us and we had to cut out certain parts of the walk, and only had about 15 minutes in the park instead of the planned half-hour.
So, where did we go?
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
  |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
The girls had to find answers specific to different locations (such as the original address of Jones Baker (26 Old Plank Road), the year the Toll House was built (1875), the temperature on the sign outside the Credit Union). A number of the questions in the scavenger hunt could be used anywhere:
- Where is the nearest mailbox to the Church?
- What do you see that is made of wood? List as many items as you can.
- Do you see any living creatures? Note any birds, insects, reptiles or mammals that you see.
- What are people doing? How many different things do you see people doing outdoors? Are these jobs or fun activities?
- Where would be a good place to sell cookies? Find 3 places that would be good cookie selling locations and explain why you chose them.
- Explore the Park and find out what lives here (remember: living things include plants, animals, birds, insects, etc.)
- As a group, choose 5 things in nature that you find interesting and explain why you chose each thing.
- Find 3 different flowers. What do they look like? Where are they found?
- Find each of the following in nature:
- Something soft
- Something smooth
- Something rough
- Something circular
- Something square
- Something triangular
- Something red
- Something brown
- Something yellow
