A walk in the woods

 

Summer 1980. SERE Survival Instructors

The summer after my Sophomore year, I spent a couple weeks as an Air Force survival instructor. I had really enjoyed the survival training after my freshman year, so I decided to learn as much as I could by learning to teach it. 

We spent a week or so learning things like firecraft, shelter building, setting traps, and some food prep like skinning rabbits and chipmunks, and basic survival cooking. 

Then we took a group of 7-10 basic cadets out into the woods for a week, map reading, building shelters and escape and evasion techniques. Did for two groups. Lots of fun.

Head of Dean

One man alone can be pretty dumb sometimes, but for real bona fide stupidity, there ain't nothin' can beat teamwork.

~ Edward Abbey

None of us is as smart as all of us.

~Ken Blanchard

Daylight broke cool and clear, but we had been up almost an hour. Our goal is to usually be on the trail by 0630 so we can get our hiking done in the cool of the morning. By 1100 or so, the sun starts baking the mountain trails, and if you're not under the trees, the hiking quickly gets miserable. Breakfast is a pretty spartan fare: granola, gorp, beef jerky, and tang. Yesterday we had oatmeal and we boiled water to heat it up, but boiling water for 12 people takes time, and after reviewing the trek menu, we'll only do that one more time. For the rest of the mornings, its something dry and quickly consumed so we can get out on the trail. We hike down the path back to the road and find Enos waiting right where we left him, munching on hay and flicking his ears around chasing away flies. This is a big test: will the boys remember how to re-saddle the burro so that everything stays safe and secure for the hikes ahead? It turns out that it takes a couple of tries, but they get it much faster than I thought they would. Apparently it's impressive enough for Ranger Greg, because with that task complete, he wishes us good luck and takes his leave, heading back to base camp and a few days off. We're pretty impressed because the rumor we'd heard was that most rangers stick around for 3 full days. Either Greg has a hot date waiting, or he's satisfied we'll survive out on the trail on our own. The way the boys are working together leads me to believe it's the latter. Which is a good thing for us, because without "Administrative" supervision, we can relax a bit and enjoy the trek a lot more. And, we decide to put ALL of our remaining food into Enos' saddle bags... a bit more than the 25 lbs. we were limited to by the Wrangler, but probably not by too much: we've consumed three more meals since yesterday morning. Our goal for this morning is to get on the road and back to Pueblano early enough to take advantage of the activities there, and then move on to our overnight camp, Head of Dean, in time to do some activities there too. Having already been to Pueblano the night before, it's a quick march for both us and Enos, and we arrive right around 0830. As I mentioned before, Pueblano is a Lumberjack-themed camp, so the boys get to do some spar pole climbing. Spar pole climbing is how lumberjacks, (and probably some early telephone linemen) climb the tall trees and poles using the waist strap and spur-anchors hooked to the sides of their boots. The safety equipment is quite a chore to don, with a fairly complicated waist harness, safety rope, and tightly cinched ankle spurs. The ankle spurs take some getting use to, because you have spikes coming out the INSIDES of your ankles, and you have to drive them sideways into the pole, then put your weight on the spikes as you step up, moving the belt as you go to keep you in position. It takes a few tries to get the rhythm right, and it's a lot of work, but once you figure it out, you can quickly move up the pole. Our task was to climb up far enough to kiss the eye-bolt at the top that the safety rope was fed through. We had a couple of boys who were a little skittish about the height thing, but after several boys scrambled right up, everyone else figured it had to be a safe operation and gave it a try. There were some very big smiles upon reaching the top! 

From Pueblano we took Enos, left the roads we'd been hiking on the last day and a half, and headed out overland via trail. We encountered some rather steep hills, but with Enos marking the pace, it was slow and steady going and no one fell behind. I found that a periodic poke in the rear by a hiking pole kept Enos at a pretty constant pace. He turned out to be a good hiker and never really slowed us down. After a stop along the trail for lunch, we rolled into Head of Dean around 1330, with lots of daylight left, and the hope that the boys could get the camp's activity, the Challenge Course, out of the way today so we wouldn't have to wait till the morning. As it turned out we were in luck, there were still a couple opening available, so we got our name on the schedule for 1500, and then went down to our camp site to set up for the night. Set up by now had become pretty routine: identify the bear bag hanging area, the sump, and the cooking area, and then pick where we would set up our tents. Hang up the food, set the dishes and cooking gear over by the sump, set up the dining fly in case of rain so we had a place to keep the packs dry, and set up the tents. Oh yeah, figure out where we could get water, and most importantly, the location of the nearest latrine! Priorities, priorities, priorities! The Challenge course was a typical team-building course that almost everyone in some organization or other has been through. I've done them a couple of times in my Air Force career, and as a ground school instructor at US Air. They are a lot of fun, they make you think, and you really do bond a bit more as a unit as you make your way through each challenge finding that everyone has different strengths and insights and all will eventually come out if you stay open to hearing everyone's ideas. 

 The activities of the course consisted of a series of senarios requiring the boys to use their problem-solving skills. They ranged from passing a hula hoop around a circle of bodies, to climbing a ten-foot wall and getting everyone over it without use of tools, props, or other people. To make it interesting, the instructor levied penalties and handicaps on the boys, including making some of the participants mute, some blind, and some forced to say exactly opposite of what they intend. From an observer's standpoint it was very entertaining. From a leader's viewpoint it was extremely impressive that no matter what the obstacle, the boys doggedly worked their way through every problem and succeeded in conquering all their challenges. Again they demonstrated what a strong, cohesive unit they've become. After dinner we had another Advisor's coffee. 

Once again the adult leaders took over the porch and enjoyed cookies, coffee and camaraderie. Unfortunately for some, the staff, which contained several girls, had decided to improve the traditional coffee recipe and actually added cinnamon to the brew! I thought it was a good move as the coffee was brewed pretty strong. Some of the really old-timers thought it was a sacrilegious desecration of some ancient outdoors tradition. Apparently camp coffee can only be made with the stalest of coffee and MUST be steeped in an old used sock. Finally, when ready to pour, it is filtered through an old pot scrubber to filter out the grounds. Any other method is new fangled, weak and contains shades of Brokeback Mountain... who knew?

Head of Dean camp sits at the very head of Dean Canyon. The staff cabin overlooks a long, open valley to the west where we watched the sun slowly set turning the sky all sorts of shades of oranges, reds and purples. It is said to be the best view at Philmont, and on the night we sat and watched the kaleidoscopic changes dance across the evening canvas, not one of us would argue the point.

Flume Canyon

“My favorite animal is the mule. He has more horse sense than a horse. He knows when to stop eating -- and he knows when to stop working.”

~Harry Truman

On day four we got an added bonus: the chance to spend three fun-filled days with a burro. Not that we wanted a burro, mind you, but we were given the opportunity none-the-less. It came with the itinerary we had picked out, and left us no choice in the matter.

We hiked back into Ponil and its' stables by 0800, determined to quickly pick up our beast of burden and get an early start on the day's hike. Unfortunately, every other trek picking up burros that day apparently got the same memo, and all converged on the corral about the same time. What we didn't realize was that there was some training involved with saddling a mule and keeping it alive for the duration of our stewardship. Who'd have thunk it?

The morning quickly slipped by as we sat through about an hour long presentation of mule care by the local wrangler, followed by an extended wait while our boys chose just the right burro to cut from the herd; the adults stood at the fence rail and shouted suggestions, such as, "get one that's small enough to push!" or "find the one who likes to walk!" and a few other completely unhelpful hints. This was followed by an even longer wait while they struggled to saddle it with the multitudes of knots and lashings that would satisfy the wrangler before he would release the beast into our care. All told, it probably took the boys three complete attempts to get the halter, saddle, and saddle bags successfully situated and secured before they got their blessing to press on.

The interesting thing about getting a pack mule as a companion on this hike was that it wasn't allowed to pack much. For some strange reason, all we could shift to this animal was 50 pounds! We thought that was kind of limiting, but at least it would cover all the food we were hauling, so we could lighten our packs. Unfortunately the blanket, saddle and satchels together weighed well over 25 lbs.! So instead of carrying all of our food, it carried a couple of our dinner meals... Another reason we were left scratching our heads about the benefit of being saddled with this beast for the next three days.

Eventually we saddled up, grabbed the reigns, positioned adequate personnel both in front pulling) and in back (pushing), and set off on the trail. As we were leaving, another trek's burro, who had stubbornly refused to budge, caught sight of Enos (yes, we named our burro!) moving out, and slowly fell into step behind him. Luckily, the other trek was heading in our direction, so they followed along for the next several miles until their path diverged from ours.

This second day of the hike was another fairly easy day. Only about four miles, and almost all of it on the road. The road was steep, and very rocky, where even a 4-wheel drive vehicle would have a fun time getting up it, but it was still a road, wide enough for a couple of people to hike side by side.

Flume Canyon campsite was an interesting site. The camp itself is located on the top of a ridge. Reached only after we dumped the burro off in a holding pen situated down on the road, and a steep climp. There seemed to be one centralized tent area which was relatively flat and out in the open with three or four cooking areas arrayed around it located among the trees

It is a legacy camp, one of the original ranch campsites set up in the 20s and 30s by Waite Philips, the man who donated the property to the Boy Scouts. The campfire circles have rock chairs set up around them, which have been preserved over the years. One of the few places where it was more comfortable to sit on the ground (i.e. rocks) than on the camp chairs we brought with us.

It was while sitting around the campfire that the one truly uncomfortable moment of the trek occurred. Another group of scouts came into camp and started setting up tents. One of the things that really stood out was the prevalent use of the "F-bomb" by both the scouts and their leaders. That was shocking enough (I just think it very unprofessional to use profanity in front of kids you are supposed to be mentoring), but in their interactions with each other, the leaders and scouts cussed each other out! The real indication of the complete breakdown in unit dynamics came when they set up their tents. One of the leaders set his tent up, and then the scouts started setting their's up, only they did it 20 or 30 yards away!

The general rule for bear procedures is to cluster your tents closely together to present an obstacle to any large animal wandering around at night. No isolated tents, no tents all in a row: they are to be grouped together with in 4-10 feet of each other.

As we sat talking around the campfire, we noticed the tents being setting up against everything our Ranger, Greg had been preaching to us. One of us mentioned it to Greg, who rather reluctantly pointed out the need to re-arrange the tents. Instead of just listening and either acknowledging the critique, or ignoring it, the leader started yelling and screaming at Greg, accusing him of knowing they were setting their tents up wrong, and waiting till they were done before saying anything. Well for one, Greg had his back to the whole thing while we were talking. For the second, the tents were stand-alone and it would have taken all of one minute or so to pull the stakes, lift a tent up and move it some place. And for the third, Greg was right and the leader and his trek completely in the wrong. The two of them traded a couple more verbal spars, with Greg, who was maybe 22 or 23 and acting YEARS older than this adult leader. By this time our adults had wandered up behind Greg and the other leader basically backed down and in a pique of petulance ordered his kids to just tear down all the tents and pile them in a pile because they, "were late for a program." What a loser.

I made the comment that they must be from either New York or Philadelphia. We found out later they were from Long Island, and already "famous" among the staff.

We ate dinner and then decided to head back down the road about a mile to Pueblano Camp, where the camp staff staged a reknowned campfire program for whoever was in camp that night. One of the nice things about staff camps is Advisor coffee. Most of the staff camps have a building with a big porch, and in the evenings the staff host all the adults onto the porch, providing coffee and cookies. No scouts allowed. Kind of our chance to relax, get some real coffee, meet other trek adults and compare notes.

While we smoozed on the porch, the scouts played a sort-of softball game called "Loggerball" against the camp staff. It is important to know, that just like the Harlem Globetrotters, the staff has never lost. Turns out the rules change as needed to keep the staff ahead. It's pretty funny to watch: 50 scouts taking the field against nine staffers. The yelling and protestations build to a fevered frenzy as the score gets more and more lopsided, never in the scouts favor.

Around 2030, the game was called using the Mercy rule, and we all filed down the hill to the campfire. Unfortunately, just as we all sat down and the first group of guys started playing guitars, the skies opened up and started pouring down on us. Everyone quickly beat feet back to the cabin, and huddled on the porch in an attempt to stay dry.

The staffers followed that old credo: "The show must go on!" so they pulled out their guitars and stood at the back of the porch and did their show as the rain cascaded down around us, periodically highlighted by flashes of lightning and crashes of thunder. A crowd favorite was the tale of Mighty Tore Torgeson, but trust me, you really had to be there to enjoy it! ("One Sving!")















The night ended with a hike back to camp in the dark. Tomorrow will be another day with Enos, some lumberjack activities, and Head of Dean. And in the distance Baldy Mountain looms...

On the Trail: Sioux Camp

There is a destiny that makes us brothers -
None goes his way alone;
All that which we send into the lives of others,
Comes back onto our own.

~ Edwin Markham

It's finally the big day: the day we head out on the trail and start knocking down our 69+ miles. We woke early, excited about the big day ahead of us.

My first order of business is getting a shower. Seems kind of strange to mention that, but the next opportunity to get one is going to be FIVE days into the future. I've grown up spoiled and much too civilized; I'm not sure how I'm going to feel a day or two from now after miles and miles of hiking and not showering. Better get one in while I can.

After breakfast we have a couple things we need to do. One is a "shakedown," a Ranger-led activity where we pull our beds from out tents, empty our packs of all our gear, and watch as Greg goes through all the things we'll need for the trek, and offers suggestions on what we probably don't. There's the obvious (such as sleeping bags, water bottles, tents, first aid kits, etc.), and the not so obvious: matches, sun screen, bug spray, stoves, fuel, water purifiers... Some things he had issues with - everyone having a pocket knife, carrying a camp stool so that you don't have to always sit on the ground. All the adults had one, and I'm set on bringing mine - I'm sure it is well worth the extra weight. We end up ditching about half the cooking pots, the dining fly poles (we'll use hiking poles) and a couple of the issued tents as almost everyone brought their own.

After the shakedown and repack, we made our way across the camp to a picture station where we had our group photo taken with the Tooth of Time in the background. This was a gaggle because three boys wandered off without saying anything, so we had to send someone back to find them, and they were all too cool to hurry. Pretty much this was the one time when they acted like little kids on the whole trip. However, when it was all said and done, it was a beautiful day with a crystal clear sky, so I'm sure the photo turned out spectacular.

So it's 1000 and we're ready to go. We've moved out of our tents, our packs are loaded, our extraneous gear is stored... unfortunately we have to wait for our scheduled bus time of 1300, as we're being dropped off about 10 miles from the Base Camp and there are only a couple of buses which are busy making drop off and pick up runs throughout the reservation.

There was one last cafeteria lunch, which killed about an hour, and we made a last tour of the trading post, but mostly we just had to hang out and sweat in the shade as the day got warmer and warmer.

Finally, our Trek was called and on to the bus we scrambled. The trip took about 30 minutes, passing through the nearby town of Cimarron, and then up a dirt road for several miles. One of the highlights of the ride was passing a herd of about 100 elk grazing next to the road. They didn't even lift their heads as we passed by. Guess they're used to people who don't threaten them in any way.

Our bus dropped us off at a place named "Ponil Turnaround" which pretty much matched it's name: a cul-de-sac at the end of the line. We tumbled out, grabbed our packs, and watched as the bus drove away in a trail of dust. Civilization was two weeks away.

The first order of business was some instruction from Ranger Greg: the proper way to cross a stream, the importance of sticking together, not getting too close or too spread out on the trail, and the proper use of the Red Roof Inns. Philmont has outhouses spread throughout the property, and though they are mainly clustered near the camping sites, they are located sporadically (though never strategically) along the trails. They can be identified by their red roofs, hence the nickname. In providing his instruction on how to use the latrine (no urine, toilette paper and fecal matter only...) he showed how to use a stick to chase away any bugs or creatures that might be lurking in the privy seat before use. As he went to discard the stick with a mighty throw, he put his entire weight into the toss, but forgot to let go, and followed the stick right THROUGH the wall and out onto the ground outside!!! It was pretty spectacular! Luckily he wasn't hurt, just temporarily humbled as we all recovered from our initial shock and started laughing. Nice ice breaker!

After repairing the Red Roof Inn, we saddled up and started our hike. Today was a relatively easy walk... about 3 miles to get broken in. We followed a small stream for about a mile, then passed through Ponil Staff camp. We looked longingly at the cantina as we passed, but headed up a rocky road for about 500 yards till we found a side trail that took off steeply up the side of a ridge, until we eventually found our camp site for the night: Sioux.

Since it was still early, we had plenty of time to go through the lessons of setting up camp at Philmont: setting up the "Bear-muda" food triangle: cooking gear by a sump; food preparation area/cooking circle; and hanging the bear bags to put all our smellables out of reach of any curious animals (i.e. bears). Finally, locating the tents in a cluster outside the food triangle to preclude bears from stumbling into us in the middle of the night.

Greg went over all these items and then coached the first set of chefs through the process of one-pot cooking. This is the concept of cooking all your menu items together in one pot. That means if you have soup and mashed potatoes and corn bread, you dump them all in the same pot, add water and cook them as one entree'. While this sounds easy (and it is), in practice this seldom worked out as a palate pleaser in a manner that Julia Child would approve! At Sioux we actually cooked a Mexican meal, where mixing it all together was actually pretty tasty. Rice, refried beans, sloppy joes were all mixed together and layered on tortillas. Probably the best meal of the trip, though we didn't know that at the time!

After dinner, our resident expert, Lynn, who had been at Philmont 4 or 5 times, suggested that we take the boys back down to Ponil where the staff put on a cantina show, and serve rootbeer for $1 a mug. The boys were all up for that, so Greg and I escorted them back down the trail about a mile to the cantina. Unfortunately, the place was packed and they had quit serving the rootbeer about 15 minutes before we arrived. The evening weather was cool and clear, and the music from inside the cantina filled the valley, so the boys all sat down and started playing cards and swapping stories, relaxing after two long days of preparation and anticipation.

I think this demonstrated the one thing that impressed me the most about this group of boys. They came from three different troops from diverse parts of the Pittsburgh area, and had never met before we started our practice hikes. Yet they came together, accepted each other at face value, and worked extremely well together as a group. I doubt any life-long friendships developed, but the fact that they all came together and worked well as unit so quickly, was a truly nice surprise.

The cantina show wrapped up around 2100, so we gathered the group up and herded them back through the dark to camp. Definitely a bit harder to follow the trail when you have nothing but a pen light to light the way.

Tomorrow we pick up the burro. THAT should be fun!

McConnell's Mill Hike

Me thinks that the moment my legs begin to move, my thoughts begin to flow.

~Henry David Thoreau

Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time.

~Steven Wright

Kurt is turning me into the outdoors guy I always wanted to be. I don't think he's doing it intentionally, because I have to shove him out the door most time we go on an outing, but he's giving me the reason to do all the hiking and backpacking and camping I liked doing and thought I'd keep doing.

While I was over in the desert this last trip, Laura sent me an e-mail about going to Philmont. Philmont Scout Ranch in New Mexico, is pretty much the Mecca for scouts. I'm sure there are other important places you can go and claim to have visited, but if you mention doing Philmont to anyone who has ever been a Boy Scout, you've pretty much said you've done THE scout thing.

Kurt wants to go, and the local council has a bunch of openings, so Laura suggested that I go along too; we can train and get ready for the adventure together. I couldn't think of one good excuse not too, and when I asked my boss at work for the time off, he quickly said "YES!" (Turns out HE was an Eagle Scout...)

So we need to get out on the trail. We visited REI outfitters and found a couple of nice packs on sale (the first real packs we've ever had), but needed an opportunity to try them out. My month has been jam-packed since I got back, and so has Kurt's; but we found a Sunday morning to go out together.

We drove up to McConnell's Mill State Park which is a gorge along Slippery Rock Creek just about 20 minutes north of the house. Easy to get to, and filled with trails, I figured it would be a great starter hike for us. I got on-line and found a 3.5 mile hike down one side of the creek and back up the other with lots of rocky ground and a couple of steep hills, just what the doctor ordered to see how the equipment felt first time out.

The weather was gorgeous and we got on the trail about 9 a.m. It was a fairly cool morning, so sweatshirts worked for proably the first 3/4 of mile, then got to be a bit much. The trail is part of the North Country Trail system, so on the way down it was marked with blue blazes and easy to see. The Creek was gorgeous in the early morning light, and we stopped for a rest at McConnell's Mill about the 3/4 mile point. The rest of the hike to the turn around bridge was right along the creek, just above the rapids and huge rocks that were depostited from the every edge of the last glacier to push this far south.

At the bridge we stopped and watched the local EMT teams practice river rescue techiques and had some chow. Then it was back up on the trail headed back. The trip back seemed to go a bit faster, though we were used to the hiking by this point, and since we had a time crunch with Kurt's musical practice later in the day, we hurried a bit faster than on the way down.

One of the unusual things we notices was several mill stones cast along the hillsides above the creek. Some were quite high up, and quite far down the creek for the Mill, so I wonder if there might not have been more than one mill on the creek.

All in all it was a fun day, and a great chance for Kurt and I to share some quality "guy" time in the great outdoors. We should experience lots of that in the next 7 months or so!