FAITHFUL OBSERVATIONS: Trail Life Project - Floating an impossible dream

Editor’s note: This was an article published by Trail Life about the troop at Candlelight Fellowship. I thought it was such an uplifting story others would like reading it also. When you consider that 40 percent of children in our area do not live with their biological father and often don’t have a mentor, then having a man to follow is so important. Steve Meyer and others are great examples of wonderful mentors for boys.

— Bob Shillingstad

By STEVE MEYER

Special to The Press

A year ago no one would have believed today we would be sitting in a boat our Troop built from a fir tree and a broken golf cart. But that was before the boys began dreaming last spring …

In our Trail Life Troop, as a new program year begins, the boys gather and begin to dream about new adventures. Then someone tossed out the idea of building a fishing boat. Instead of dismissing the notion outright, we wrote it on the list. Soon the outlandish idea was gaining traction, and boys and adults were getting excited as a seemingly crazy suggestion slowly became a plausible plan. None of the boys had ever built a boat, and we certainly didn’t have a budget for it. What we did have was access to a sawmill at Camp Lutherhaven and plenty of trees we could mill. Perhaps we could make a rowboat.

Before we could even consider building, we had to determine whether the wood from trees available to us could work for constructing a boat. At our next Troop meeting, the boys spent a significant amount of time doing research and determined a Douglas fir was our ideal tree. The roar of a chain saw and the smell of fresh-cut fir signaled the beginning of our boat building project. In minutes a nice straight Douglas fir had been dropped, and the process of milling it into strips for the hull and timbers for the frame had begun. The Troop then turned its attention to finalizing the boat style, shape, and method for building. Eventually, we decided on a 15-foot runabout that could handle a small motor.

That notion soon changed as well. Our first idea was to take an engine out of an old broken golf cart and modify it to create an inboard motor. It was then a boy suggested we just fix the golf cart, sell it, and use the money to buy a small outboard motor. That’s how our fundraising scheme began. We figured we could fix up old, non-working small engines to sell and use the money to pay for fiberglass and other boat parts. In the process, the boys could pick up their small-engine repair badge and learn a thing or two about entrepreneurship. The boys put in 16 hours rebuilding a 10-horsepower engine on a generator to earn the small engine repair badge — and then they went on to fix a compressor, a brush hog, and a golf cart to sell on Craigslist.

Building a Boat

The boat build started in November after the wood we milled had dried. Since the boys can’t use power saws, I framed up the majority of the shell and then hauled it to a Tuesday night Troop meeting for them to start sanding down in the parking lot. The Adventurers worked together on two additional weekends over the following months. The first weekend we sanded more on the hull and filled all the holes with wood putty to get it ready for fiberglass. The second weekend they installed all the flooring, the seats, and the oarlocks. One of the boys in the Troop is a master blacksmith, and he designed and forged the most gorgeous set of decorative oarlocks I’ve ever seen.

Once the boat was put together, we stayed up late into the night working on an old donated 5-horsepower outboard motor. The parts for the gas tank and primer bulb didn’t come in, so we rigged up a funnel and a hose as an IV-drip running gas into the engine. You wouldn’t believe all the whooping and hollering that came out of that shop when that 40-year-old outboard came back to life in the middle of the night!

We took it for a test run the next morning. It ran flawlessly as long as the guy standing in the back holding the IV gas drip bag didn’t fall overboard. Since we researched and designed the boat ourselves instead of working off plans, we weren’t sure how it would ride in the water. We were all pleasantly surprised at how high it floated. I’m pretty sure we’ll be able to fit a half dozen Trailmen and at least a few hundred pounds of fish in it.

The final step was to give the boat a name. I suggested we call it “Lots of Characters” because we have so many characters in our troop. After some discussion we decided to drop the “S” and change it to “Lots of Character” because the whole experience really was about building character. Learning how to persevere when you’ve bloodied your knuckles pulling the starter cord on that engine for the 126th time. Learning how to treat each other with kindness and patience even when someone just ran a screw right through the side of the hull. Learning that life isn’t about getting stuff, the real joy comes in giving stuff away … especially our time and talents. Most of the older boys will only get to use the boat a time or two before they wrap up their time in Trail Life. The real joy comes in getting to pass the boat down to the younger boys that will follow in their footsteps and be inspired by their example.

Going into this project we weren’t really sure how it would turn out and if we could pay for the expenses. I always like to see the boys take on adventures that they don’t know what the outcome will be. When they go into the unknown it forces them to answer the question that every boy needs to answer before he becomes a man. “Do I have what it takes?” Do I have what it takes to actually make a boat that will float? Do I have what it takes to finish a 50-mile backpacking trip? Do I have what it takes to survive in life? Once they get it in their head that the answer is, “Yes, they do have what it takes,” then there is no stopping them with Christ.

So, how did we come out with our experiment in entrepreneurship? When all the receipts came in we had $784 in expenses and $787 in income from the equipment they fixed up and sold. That left us with a total profit of $3 for 400 hours worth of labor. Was it worth it? Absolutely! They’re already making plans for their next boat … a 24-foot wooden cruiser with a big ol’ 8 cylinder engine so they can learn how to water ski!

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“that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God …” — Colossians 1:10 (Trail Life Motto)

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For more information about Trail Life USA, go to traillifeusa.com or contact Bob Grammer, who is Northwest New Troop Coordinator at bob.id0412@gmail.com.