Holiday Lock-in 2011 (2)

Sounds of laughter and the scent of freshly cooked pizza filled the NEPA Boy Scout office until the late hours of the morning. On December 17th-18^th the local ventureres of the NEPA council were holding one of their annual lock-ins at the service center. This particular Lock in was created with the purpose of giving everyone who participated a weekend to remember. Competitions, games, Guitar Hero, Cake, Lego’s, pizza, Good Friends, and even a Surprise Birthday party  were all major players in the venturing lock in, which in the end proved to be a blast for everyone.

The first major event that was held was a massive LEGO competition. The ventureres divided into three teams and they set to work on creating the most elaborate structure. Teams had just one hour to try and outdo each other with their Lego building skills. In the end, teams build three different structures of very different capabilities and strengths. The structures ranged from very large, to smaller more detailed structures, to even mobile transformable structures that could change from one thing into another. In the end, it was a tie between all three teams, simply because all of the creations were very elaborate and unique in their own ways.

After a slight break from the Lego contest, the ventures divided themselves into two teams, boys against girls, and held what was perhaps the most competitive event of the night, the Movie Trivia Game.  The ventureres gathered around the projector and screen playing a DVD movie trivia game and listened intensively as the host on the screen explained the rules. The teams then competed against each other in a shouting match for eight rounds of yelling out movie titles, actors, scenes and more.  In the end the Boys team won with an amazing score of 40 to 0. However, because the game was so fun the Venturers decided to continue on with the TV version of the game, this time with the girls wining, 40 to 0.

By around four or five in the morning, ventureres of all different shapes and sizes could be found stretched out or curled up in a ball in different places throughout the room at the service center. Some brought out sleeping bags and found dark corners to fall asleep in, others just chose to throw on a jacket and fall asleep stretched out face down on the floor. Some fell asleep on a mattress of blankets, others on top of a mattress of backpacks and various objects.  Some small faint murmurs of the few remaining awake ventureres could still be heard, softly giggling and laughing about the fun night that had just started to come to a close.

At around ten the next morning, every venturer was awake, cleaned up and ready to go. Breakfast had been served, the VOA meeting had been healed, and all that was wished to be accomplished was complete. Rides started to come and ventureres slowly said goodbye one by one, giving hugs and saying goodbye to old friends and new ones that they had just met. As everyone was leaving it was apparent that no one left without a smile on their face, and plans to make the next venturing lock in even bigger and better than the last.