Memories

Hello everyone. I just figured I would start a thread about your fondest memory from CAP. This may be hit or miss but here it goes.

My fondest memory from CAP was probably my first colorguard competition. It was a truely amazing experience and showed me how all of our hard work had payed off. I will never forget that experience of a lifetime!

My best memory was looking at what we did to our escort's hotel room, at color guard competition.

From then would probably be either doing an O-course with my Ultimate Cadet Challenge team or the O-course at encampment.

My fondest memory? I have two.

The first one, an accident, which could have went horrible, but luckily I didn't get hurt. It was late night, and my squadron just finished up providing crowd control at an event for a local town. After being on our feet for basically the whole day, and having to tell people no, along with some thinking CAP was some military cover up for something they didn't know, we were all tired. Now, we had John Deer Gator's, borrowed from a Local ANG unit that a member was a part of. I was sitting in the back, after we crammed the back with has many cadets has "safely" possible. We are driving back to our little command post, and a buddy of mine said "Wow, if you drag your feet, you leave tracks!" I got the brilliant idea of trying it. Our driver, another ANG member, sped up after we got in a open field. Me feet got enough traction, and there I was sliding out of the back of a Gator. I hit the ground, rolled over to my side, and got up all within two seconds, because there was a truck driving behind us a good distance away. I start dying laughing, and when everyone sees I am okay, they all laugh.

Another fond memory is much more recent, but I have had a good time getting selected for positions. It is like a CAP "high". I was recently appointed to primary wing CAC and recently appointed to Flight Sgt. It is a CAP dream come true for me.

It is hard to choose which memory is my fondest one from CAP.  I've been doing this for a while.  When I first returned to regular uniform wearing senior member status, I was wearing every piece of flair allowable on my service dress uniform at a wing level activity.  A cadet looked at my uniform and asked me why I was wearing a Curry ribbon as my highest ribbon if I had the Mitchell Award and several PD awards.  This confused cadet then asked why the white stripes were on the edges of the ribbon and didn't look like his Curry ribbon. 

I was impressed a Cadet NCO took him aside informed him that it was not a Curry ribbon.    It took about 30 seconds for the cadet to realize the mistake he had made as the other cadet was correcting him and went into a short class on the order of prescidence for ribbons. The offending cadet turned bright red and could have been confused for a stop light at the time.

It's been about 18 months since the event occurred.  I ran into the cadet at the Wing/CC's Call last month.  That cadet NCO (now a cadet officer) who corrected him had been mentoring him through E-Mail and at events they were at together ever since about uniforms, even though they are from opposite ends of NC.  Now he is probably one of the most knowledgeable (and tactful) people I've seen on uniform wear and appearance.  Seeing a person turn an embarrassing moment into a learning experience and then into motivation to improve their knowledge to the point of being a subject matter expert is rewarding enough.  Hearing that the cadet who corrected him continued to mentor him and help him develop his knowledge in that area after the event is one of the reasons I am still working with the Cadet Program.

Wow! These are some great stories!

Too many stories from encampment staff training weekends...

I have three! They are funny, and some to people can be touching

My first is CPC. It was my first time. I LOVED playing Khajabi, I flipped in midair, so fun Met a lot of new people and made a lot of new friends!

Wing Comp. for CG 2012. We went bowling the last night of it. We messed around with our CG commander and then he wouldn't talk to any of us, haha But that was short lived. We watched Karate Kid, everyone loved that movie!

My encampment at camp Pendleton. My favorite part was Friday...such good times.

I don't know what I would do without CAP!

I miss the last night of Encampment... Grogging everyone....  Watching the skits... and watching the CC, the DCC and the DCD singing love songs to one of the flight sergeants...  I miss everything about encmapment... 

"Senior Staff Meetings" at Jim & Kathy's(J&Ks) in Camp Douglas, WI about 1/2 mi. from the gate at Volk ANGB after a day of wrangling cadets at the ILWG Summer Encampments. Unfortunately, we don't go to Volk anymore and Jim sold the bar the year before our last year there.

My favorite memory would be from encampment. There was this cadet in my flight, I will call him cadet A, every time that our flight sergeant told our flight to fall in, Cadet A would scream out Cadet B's name looking for him so cadet a would know where to fall in. The Funny part is that he would be looking around and jumping, so nervous it would be like gunshots were going off at the same time looking for cadet B. Along with this every time that the flight sergeant told our flight to go to Parade Rest. He would scream out NO windows. It was really funny.

"Senior Staff Meetings" at Jim & Kathy's(J&Ks) in Camp Douglas, WI about 1/2 mi. from the gate at Volk ANGB after a day of wrangling cadets at the ILWG Summer Encampments. Unfortunately, we don't go to Volk anymore and Jim sold the bar the year before our last year there.

Good News!! Heard at encampment this year(in Springfield, IL) that Jim & Kathy's is back! Apparently, the new guy fell too far behind in the rent and Jim took it back over. Have to get back up to Camp Douglas again.

"Senior Staff Meetings" at Jim & Kathy's(J&Ks) in Camp Douglas, WI about 1/2 mi. from the gate at Volk ANGB after a day of wrangling cadets at the ILWG Summer Encampments. Unfortunately, we don't go to Volk anymore and Jim sold the bar the year before our last year there.

Good News!! Heard at encampment this year(in Springfield, IL) that Jim & Kathy's is back! Apparently, the new guy fell too far behind in the rent and Jim took it back over. Have to get back up to Camp Douglas again.

Is that the place right across the highway from the front gate?

No. That is the Target Bluff Hauser Haus. It is a German resteraunt, bar, and gift shop. To get to J & Ks you have to go into Camp Douglas itself. There is also the Runway's Edge which is on Volk itself down near where the old theater used to be. It is at the end of the 400 series of buildings north of the hotel/guest house they built several years ago.

Let's see here...1992 Joint Indiana & Kentucky Wing Encampment at Ft. Knox, KY.  I was 16.

-A female cadet I liked said yes to being my girlfriend.

-I had the awesome opportunity to watch an A-10 live fire demonstration (REAL AMMO!) from the top of a cliff.

-My little brother was trampled during PT and sent to the post hospital.

-The Army ROTC came through our encampment area in full cammo and gear doing low crawls while we sat on the steps and watched.

-Tank simulators.

-The Patton Museum.

Way too much more to mention on here but it was probably the best experience I had in CAP thus far!

Let's see here...1992 Joint Indiana & Kentucky Wing Encampment at Ft. Knox, KY.  I was 16.

-A female cadet I liked said yes to being my girlfriend.

-I had the awesome opportunity to watch an A-10 live fire demonstration (REAL AMMO!) from the top of a cliff.

-My little brother was trampled during PT and sent to the post hospital.

-The Army ROTC came through our encampment area in full cammo and gear doing low crawls while we sat on the steps and watched.

-Tank simulators.

-The Patton Museum.

Way too much more to mention on here but it was probably the best experience I had in CAP thus far!

Whoa! Tank sims?? Where did you do that?

Let's see here...1992 Joint Indiana & Kentucky Wing Encampment at Ft. Knox, KY.  I was 16.

Whoa! Tank sims?? Where did you do that?

RIF - Reading is Fundamental.

Let's see here...1992 Joint Indiana & Kentucky Wing Encampment at Ft. Knox, KY.  I was 16.

-A female cadet I liked said yes to being my girlfriend.

-I had the awesome opportunity to watch an A-10 live fire demonstration (REAL AMMO!) from the top of a cliff.

-My little brother was trampled during PT and sent to the post hospital.

-The Army ROTC came through our encampment area in full cammo and gear doing low crawls while we sat on the steps and watched.

-Tank simulators.

-The Patton Museum.

Way too much more to mention on here but it was probably the best experience I had in CAP thus far!

Whoa! Tank sims?? Where did you do that?

Let's see here...1992 Joint Indiana & Kentucky Wing Encampment at Ft. Knox, KY.  I was 16.
...
...
...
-Tank simulators.

Mine are somewhat disjointed and spread over many activities over the last 30 years or so. In no particular order:

1. Firing an M-16 for the first time (Fort Gordon, April 1981)
2. Buddy-seat parachute drop (Fort Benning, July 1981)
3. Huey ride (again Fort Benning)
4. Visiting the 24th Mech and playing with their tracks (Travis ANGB 1983)
5. Watching a C-130 do a live equipment drop, then doing a short landing and short power takeoff (FT Benning, 1982)
6. Watching Airborne graduation drop (FT Benning, 81 or 82)
7. Finding Ranger droppings (a belt of unused M-60 blanks, an M-16 magazine, and a map case) on various FTXs in the North Georgia mountains
8. Rappelling
9. Ascending out of a sinkhole
10. C-130 rides, especially the one to Wright-Patterson to visit the Air Force museum
11. Watching an F-16 do a live-fire pass at Hardwood Range, WI (1994 encampment, Volk ANGB) followed by a B-52 pass (no bombs, sadly)
12. The Leadership Reaction Course at FT Benning, 81 and 82
13. Winter FTXs at Armpit, AL (The stories from there alone make DI look tame)
14. Visiting Fort Rucker and the Army Aviation facility
15. My first o-flight where a cadet jerked the yoke around and nearly crashed us
16. Airshows airshows airshows!
17. Being finally promoted to Sergeant (now Senior Airman)
18. Getting stuck on the Armpit Highway (too many times to mention)
19. Never having an FTX called due to weather or equipment failure
20. AE Weekend at Oshkosh, WI
21. EAA Precautionary
22. The time at RCLS when some cadets broke into the tank park and accidentally started an M-60.
23. Flying the Delta simulators at Hartsfield Airport.
24. Getting a tour of Fifi, the only flying B-29

Let's see here...1992 Joint Indiana & Kentucky Wing Encampment at Ft. Knox, KY.  I was 16.

-A female cadet I liked said yes to being my girlfriend.

-I had the awesome opportunity to watch an A-10 live fire demonstration (REAL AMMO!) from the top of a cliff.

-My little brother was trampled during PT and sent to the post hospital.

-The Army ROTC came through our encampment area in full cammo and gear doing low crawls while we sat on the steps and watched.

-Tank simulators.

-The Patton Museum.

Way too much more to mention on here but it was probably the best experience I had in CAP thus far!

I was there as well and still have the Tshirt! I have a ton of photos from that encampment!

There are so many that I could easily throw one out there, but I don't know if it would truly be my fondest memory.  Honestly, EVERY TIME I put on my uniform as a cadet, whether it was for a trek to the group CAC meeting 2 hours away, or headed to the Air Traffic Control center in Hilliard, FL, I simply loved it!