CRUSO, North Carolina (CNN) -- Eight missing Boy Scouts and their three adult leaders, who were the subjects of an intense search, acted as expected and were found safe Monday in the North Carolina mountains, a Scout official said.

The Scouts had failed to return home from a camping trip Sunday in the Pisgah National Forest southwest of Asheville.

"Our Scouts did get a little off course, " said Rodney Jones, a Boy Scout official with Crossroads Fellowship. The group veered off a hiking trail, said Jones. They decided to camp an extra night instead of trying to find a way out of the forest in darkness.

"A meter maid found them off of Crawford Creek Road," Jones said. "They did just as we expected, they hunkered down," he said.

"They woke up, saw power lines and said, 'Hey, we're home.' "

Jones said everyone in the group is in good shape and unharmed.

"As the Scout motto says, they were prepared, and they did just as they were supposed to," said Jones.

The Scouts have been brought to the Cruso, North Carolina, fire department.

An overnight search team failed to find the eleven members of Troop 217 from Raleigh, said Charity Sharp of the Cruso Volunteer Fire Department.

Family members of some of the missing campers had arrived in the early morning and had been providing information to aid in the search, said Sharp.Watch more on the overnight search »

The troop was on a weekend camping trip in the Black Balsam Gap area near the Blue Ridge Parkway in southern Haywood County, according to Haywood County sheriff's dispatcher Michael Huffman.

"We're in the Great Smoky Mountains," said Sharp. "It's very mountainous with a lot of creeks, waterfalls and trails that are not clearly marked. It's very easy to get lost."

Cell phone service is spotty in the area, she said.

Five search teams had combed the area overnight and found no sign of the Scouts, said Haywood County Emergency Services Director Greg Shuping.

The campers' vehicles remained parked in a lot at the campground entrance Sunday evening, leading authorities to suspect the scouts simply extended their excursion for an extra night, Huffman said.

Search teams were organized late Sunday night after their families in Raleigh did not hear from them after they were supposed to have begun the five-hour drive home, Huffman said.

The area is located in North Carolina's Pisgah National Forest and has popular hiking trails running through it.