Scout’s 2023 Beargrease in Cloquet

Cloquet, Minn. — More than 125 Scouts from Northern Minnesota and Northern Wisconsin took part in their 2023 Beargrease.
It’s known as a Beargrease because the Scouts need to pull a sled around a two and a half mile loop.
The dog-team for these sleds is actually the scouts who are taking part, while the team leader acts as the musher

Along the loop are eight stops where the teams need to showcase some of the skills they have learned as a Scout. Each team has between four and eight members and the idea is to complete each stop in the shortest amount of time. One of the Scouts taking part is Ethan Christensen and he explained some of the skills Scouts needed to complete. “There’s one that’s kind of first aid and what you do if you find someone out in the woods. There’s an orienteering one which it’s just like compasses and finding your direction and stuff and there’s a tomahawk throwing one later on.”

The recent snow made the two and a half feet of snow that was already present on the course just a bit more difficult for the Scouts.

With their homemade sleds the scouts would be outside for most of the day, and would even fix their own lunches with food they had brought along. Clark Garwathait, the District Director of the Voyageur Area Council of scouts said, “So they eat out on the trail where they make their own lunch and its stuff they’ve planned. Some are doing grilled cheese, some are doing hot dogs, some, are doing ramen noodles. Whatever they decide to make and then at the end of the day when they come in we’re going to have soup and bread and donuts for them.”

The scouts we talked with all agreed that they enjoyed the event and are hopeful that it will continue next year. The scouts who took part in the event are between the ages of 11 and 18.