On July 6 the National ArrowTour contingent arrived at Wente Scout Reservation to recognize the rich 100 year history of the order. A number of large tents were erected on the peninsula by both the ArrowTour crew and Achewon Nimat members to showcase the history of the Order. The various tents included a trading post, a NOAC museum, a branding station, an information booth and an Achewon Nimat history booth. As a gift from the ArrowTour committee for hosting the event, the lodge was given a large black cylinder to use as a time-capsule to be buried and then unearthed in 50 years (2065). At the end of July a contingent of 16 arrowmen began their 3000 mile journey across the Country via Amtrak to NOAC at Michigan State University to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Order of the Arrow. On the second day of our cross-country trip, along the rails near Harve, MT, Jeffrey Kline, Angelo Huerta and Elijah Watkins sealed their membership in the Order of the Arrow and were presented their brotherhood sashes. This was the first time in our lodge history that arrowmen from Achewon Nimat have been presented their Brotherhood honor on a train. Prior to NOAC, the Contingent spent three days in Chicago touring a number of museums before continuing the train trip over to NOAC. In total the contingent spent 15 days and traveled 6000 miles through 17 states. One of the highlights of the trip was watching 15,000 arrowmen signing the song “Let It Go” from the movie Frozen at the NOAC opening show. The September 2015 ordeal held at Camp Royaneh was the first combined ordeal between Orca lodge 194 of the Redwood Empire Council and Achewon Nimat lodge. Over 75 members and candidates helped to take down tents and prepare Camp Royaneh for the coming winter months. Orca conducted the pre-ordeal and ordeal ceremony while Achewon Nimat conducted the Brotherhood ceremony. At the 50th anniversary of the first Lodge Banquet on December 12th, longtime adviser Harry Clyde stepped down as Lodge Adviser of Achewon Nimat. Harry had been the Lodge Adviser for 5 years starting in 2010. During his tenure, the lodge got back to its roots of being a boy run organization. At the banquet, Brother Eric Parnell, former Lodge Chief Rob Wong and Website Adviser Steve Kline accepted the role of sharing the duties of the Lodge Adviser. During the evening festivities, eight members of the lodge received the Order of the Arrow Century Award, a special one-time award honoring lodge members both past and present that have made a significant impact to the Order of the Arrow. A special round patch resembling the first Lodge flap was issued at the dinner to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Lodge Banquet. The contents of the ArrowTour time-capsule was also displayed for the attendees. The capsule is to be buried at Camp Royaneh at some point and dug up in the year 2065. The Golden anniversary of Achewon Nimat and the Centennial anniversary of the Order of the Arrow ended with a bang as the members of Achewon Nimat along with their guests circled the banquet tables, crossed arms and sang the song of the Order.

As 2016 begins, so too does the next 50 years of Achewon Nimat Lodge. The Klondike Derby Outdoor Snow Camping trip was held at Camp Hi- Sierra near Pinecrest with an attendance of over 300 scouts. The 2016 Klondike also marked the first time the Lodge had the ability to cook for the campers as we took advantage of the facilities at Hi-Sierra. The weekend was mild but cold. The age of video across the Internet also was used for the first time during the Lodge elections held at Camp Royaneh. FaceTime was used by Mark Stephenson to run for the office of Vice Chief of service as he was unable to attend the elections in person. Mark was elected to the position by the way and Kyle Berg was voted into the office of Lodge Chief for the second year in a row. The 2016 W3S Conclave was held at Camp Royaneh and hosted by our lodge. Over 400 arrowmen from the section attended the three day event. Members of Achie took home the Grizzly Award which is the top award at the Conclave. The Lodge also took first place in the Indian Hand ball competition which was a very spirited event due to over the top emotions on the part of some of the players. At the Ordeal in June, the San Francisco Bay Area Council celebrated its 100th anniversary. 100 years ago on June 4, 1916, the Oakland Area Council (#21) of the Boy Scouts of America was formed. Five months later in November 1916 the San Francisco Council (#51) was formed. Along with the celebration of the 100th anniversary, the SFBAC also released a set of six new Council Shoulder Patches and an Order of the Arrow Lodge Flap. The Lodge flap was made available on June 4, 2016 at the Royaneh ordeal exactly 100 years to the day after our original councils were founded. At the lodge banquet in December, the dinner was catered by a Mexican restaurant that served fresh burritos from a grill that was setup in the Council Office office. The 2017 Winter Camp awareness was attended by over 350 Scouts and Scouters aboard the USS Hornet in Alameda. The Klondike derby in February was scheduled to be held at Camp Hi-Sierra near Pinecrest but due to the abnormally heavy snowfall, camp road conditions and the condition of the camping areas, the Klondike was canceled due to safety concerns. At the Achiefest in April during the vigil call out ceremony, it was decided that Achewon Nimat needed a permanent pendant to honor the Vigils when the individual was called out. Achewon Nimat contracted with a local Scout Craftsman (Steve xxxx) to create a pewter pendant with ribbon that could be worn around the neck. Eighty pendants were created with forty designated for all future vigil members and the other forty for existing vigil members as a fund-raiser. Only one pendant per current dues paying vigil member and the member must have received vigil in either Achie, Royaneh or Machek N’Gult. The first ordeal during the new school year was held at Los Mochos in October where we had 34 candidates go through their ordeal along with three new brotherhood members. The candidate service project involved rehabilitating the camp water supply by replacing the old spring boxes with new boxes and pipe. Sweetwater Springs, located along the hillside toward the Manzanita Flats campsite, is a natural spring that has provided mineral enriched water to Rancho Los Mochos since 1947.   At the end of 2017 it was announced that due to financial challenges with the SFBAC that the Order of the Arrow would no longer have a Staff Adviser provided by the council to handle lodge logistics. In addition, the LEC meetings would need to be moved from our normal 1st Wednesday night of the month to either a new location or a different night. The 2018 Winter Camp Awareness aboard the USS Hornet was attended by 300 scouts and leaders and the 2018 Klondike held over the Presidents holiday weekend in February was located at the Cisco Grove RV campground at an elevation of 5600 feet. Although the snow was sparse on Saturday, a storm came through on Sunday that dumped 3 inches of fresh powder. Just perfect for the various Klondike events. At the council dinner on February 3, former lodge officer and Founders award recipient Ben Sebastian was presented with the National BSA Honor Medal for life saving. In June of 2017 Ben witnessed a car crash into San Leandro Bay and without hesitation jumped into the Bay fully clothed to rescue the individual that was trapped in the car. As the door was locked due to the water pressure, Ben found a rock and broke a window to get the individual out of the submerged car. In the process Ben cut his hand that ultimately required a number of stitches. Ben pulled the man out through the back window and got him safely to shore. Once the individual got on dry land and caught his breath, he ran away to a waiting car. As it turns out, the car was stolen and Ben saved the thief from drowning. Due to the financial challenges faced by the council it was decided at the March 2018 LEC meeting to move all future LEC Meetings to the 1st Monday of the month. The Achiefest which was normally held at Camp Royaneh in March was instead held at Boomers in Livermore as a one- day event. As Murphy’s Law would have it, it rained the entire day preventing the arrowman from using the outdoor activities at Boomers. However they were able to have fun with some of the indoor activities. Lodge Elections later that day and a fantastic dinner was provided by the Shepodd’s at their residence in Livermore where Chris Santos was nominated as the 2018-2019 Lodge Chief. A special Vigil ceremony was held at Los Mochos on April 14 for Mark Stephenson. Normally the ceremony would be held at Achiefest but the one day event at Boomers required the Lodge to hold the ceremony at a different place and time. On May 24th it was announced by the National Order of the Arrow Committee that Rob Wong (Lodge Co-Adviser) was one of the recipients of the 2018 Distinguished Service Award (DSA). The DSA is the highest honor that the National Order of the Arrow can bestow upon it members. Rob has served on National staffs and events, regional staffs, section staffs and has been a coordinator of the Vigil Classic golf tournament for many years. In addition, Rob also volunteers his time for the Susan G. Kolmen Breat Cancer awareness organization. Nine members of the Lodge attended the 2018 National Order of the Arrow conference in Bloomington, Indiana. The contingent traveled via Amtrak from Jack London Square to Chicago via the Northern route where they toured various museums and embarked on a river cruise before heading to Bloomington. Along the way, track work in Oregon required us to transfer to a bus, Amtrak ran out of food, we were delayed due to multiple freight trains and missed a train connection where we were forced to sleep overnight in a train station. At NOAC, Rob Wong was presented with the DSA; the youth traded many patches; we were rained on multiple times; and had a blast the entire time. One of the highlights of the week was having a contingent pizza party hosted by Rob Wong at the location where he was staffing. This NOAC had the most mobile technology of any NOAC to date. An online App provided all the individual scheduling and data capturing information. At the Lodge Elections in May, an almost full contingent of officers was elected to run the Lodge for the 2019-2020 year. In June of 2019, the first three youth female members in Achewon Nimat history completed their ordeal at Camp Royaneh over the weekend of June 2. Melody Fewx, Felicia Lim and Sofia Petrova from Ohlone Village became members of Achewon Nimat. As a new arrowman, Melody took on the role of Vice Chief of Service. The 2020 WCA was one of our largest ever with over 450 scouts, adults and staff attending the training seminar. The follow up outdoor session Klondike derby was held at the Tahoe Area Campground in South lake Tahoe. Over 200 persons attended the winter camping event. However Mother Nature was not playing fair as the amount of snow on the ground was minimal. Still everyone had fun in the cold and we were able to still complete the Snow Sled race to everyones approval. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the Achiefest and the Ordeals in June and October were canceled as was summer camp. LEC and village meetings were held virtually via Zoom and the Conclave was carried out virtually using the social media site “Discord”. Fires in August came really close to Rancho Los Mochos and Camp Royaneh and then a fire in September near Willits also caused some concerns. Unfortunately for Cutter Scout Reservation and Camp Oljato, the fires destroyed those camps. Ironically, we had just camped at Cutter in April 2019 for the W3S conclave.