The Polar Bear Award.
Those hardy Scouts that go camping during the winter months find a wilderness very different than the one found during the lush green months of summer. They are also eligible for the Polar Bear Award. This award is given to Scouts, who spend 24 hours outside on an outing during any of the months from November through March. Other temperature requirements have changed from time to time, but generally it must be below freezing. Sometimes the whole troop camped out, other times just a few. One thing is for sure every Polar Bear Campout has been memorable, such as the Polar Bear Campout at Maywood Environmental Park in February of 1987, which had high winds that knocked down almost every one of the dozen or so tents set up or the campout after the Klondike Derby at the Sheboygan County Marsh that included a fantastic game of Capture the Flag during the moonlit night, followed by the "Coffin" story by Scoutmaster Mark Safranski. Like that outing many of our Polar Bear Campouts came on the heels of the one day Klondike Derby. For most of the Scouts that have earned the Polar Bear Award, the patch is a testiment to taking on a challenge and overcoming it, and having fun at the same time.
