[pct-l] Snipes

[Diane at Santa Barbara Hikes dot com]

Oh, ok. I get it now. I never went to summer camp. My best friend  
when I was a teen spent some time as a camp counselor. Now I know why  
she had that look in her eye when she was talking about snipe hunts.  
Never having any summer camp experience, I didn't know what she was  
talking about or why it seemed so interesting and funny to her. Like  
some kind of inside secret. I never went along with any of it. I was  
too suspicious. But I still felt left out not know what it was.

Diane

On Feb 26, 2010, at 6:43 PM, CHUCK CHELIN wrote:

> Good morning, Diane,
>
> A “snipe hunt” is a prototypical fool’s errand. Gullible people –  
> usually kids on camping trips or at summer camp – are influenced to  
> engage in a “hunt” with promises that if they do a certain list of  
> semi-plausible things, at night, alone, in the woods or the field,  
> many snipe will come flying into their sack.  The stories and  
> rituals vary greatly, but the typical result is the “hunter” sits  
> in the cold and damp, being eaten by mosquitoes sufficient time for  
> them to ponder the improbability of their silly position, at which  
> time they return to camp having learned a valuable lesson.   
> Participation is often a rite-of-passage.
>
> Some participants who smell a rat, or have advance knowledge of the  
> process, have been known to use the resulting cover of darkness to  
> covertly scare dickens out of other participants and/or instigators  
> in some devious way or another, but I’ll deny having done so.
>
> Enjoy your planning,
>
> Steel-Eye
> Hiking the Pct since before it was the PCT – 1965
> http://www.trailjournals.com/steel-eye
> http://www.trailjournals.com/SteelEye09
>