Day Four

Saturday, 7/4 - And welcome to the Fourth of July! Up at 3:30, once again following Rick into the bathroom. 43 degrees (seems cooler than that), with very clear skies - looks like it's gonna be another good one! Started packing immediately - I've got more crap than everyone else, so I have to get started earlier. Roused the Scouts at 3:50 with lights on; everyone sleepwalking their way through packup. Finished my personal and administrative packing in short order, and jumped in the van to drop the keys off at the firehouse - absolutely no-one alive there. Back within 10 minutes, at which point the hall was already nearly clear. Tried the vacuum cleaners - once again, the floor sweeper was dead, while the shop vac worked but had a bad filter. Used the shop vac despite, but I'm sure I didn't do my allergies any favors. You'd think the Scouts who use this place as their meeting hall would do themselves the favor of having adequate cleaning materials on hand so that all their visitors would do a decent job of it before leaving. Oh well; we did the best we could (and as always, it was a lot better than we found it!) Loaded up and left at 4:38 sharp, with the loom of dawn to the east. Most of the Scouts in my van asleep again within 10 minutes, right after we hit I-25 and turned south. Wound our way through the town, then hit the 75 mph speed limit just south of Cheyenne Mountain (home of NORAD) and cranked it up. Listened to KILO, and watched the sunrise - another beautiful day coming on strong. Did the slowdown to 50 in Pueblo (they really do need a bypass there), and back up to 75 south of town. Spotted a few more antelope as we passed "Twin Peaks," plus plenty of grazing cattle. Approaching Walsenburg (our planned breakfast stop), Rick and I miscommunicated on our hand signalling; I said stop, and he thought I meant keep going (so we did.) Oh well, no-one's going to starve to death. We ended up stopping (once again) at Trinidad for McDonalds and the Texaco station - bought premium again, for the Raton Pass climb. Tim's cargo van turned out to be missing its gas cap - one of the few things I didn't check when I picked it up. Did the Crew Rosters while eating breakfast - one less hassle at BaseCamp - and we were on our way. Up Raton Pass and into New Mexico, using our premium gas to good advantage. Just north of Raton, we ran into another hot air balloon race, with at least 25 balloons in various stages of lifting off. Third time in the last 4 years for this - must be the balloon racing capital of the United States. Got some decent pictures "on the fly," and kept on cruisin'. Through Raton, and west on U.S. 64 to Cimarron. Spotted a few more antelope, and lots of cattle. After the NRA Whittington Center, there was a large herd of buffalo to the left hand side of the road. I used the CB to point out various Philmont mountains as we approached Cimarron. In town, we took our time passing about half the residents, apparently setting up a Fourth of July parade; lots of traffic. South on NM Rt. 21 to the Ranch; I continued pointing out rock formations and peaks (Tooth of Time, the Arrowhead formation, Black and Bear Mountains) as we drove along. One last buffalo on the right as we hit Philmont's border. Passed Villa Philmonte and the Training Center on the left, then into the main entrance on the right, passing under the worn-out boots on the entrance gate. 9 a.m., and I'm very pleased to see that no-one's in the parking lot! - second year in a row we had the welcome center to ourselves with respect to incoming crews. Hot, sunny, breezy and dusty - yup, it's Philmont all right. Hit the Welcome Center with Rusty and Chris, and got quickly registered. As usual, hurry up and wait for the Rangers. Everyone relaxed and checked out the scene, with the veterans explaining the layout to the rookies. Our first Ranger (for Crew A) showed up in 15 minutes - John Carman from Kelso, Missouri, big dude with a ready smile; looks plenty capable. Introduced him all around, and explained that we were basically co-trekking with Crew B, and therefore wanted to wait on the second Ranger (he said "no problem.") The 10 am departure crews began arriving and stacking their packs all in and around the welcome center shelter - guys watched with some interest as the crews began weighing their (as usual) killer packs (always an eye-opening experience.) Finally got aggravated with the wait - why kill yourself driving 250 miles getting here if the Ranger spends an hour crossing the 200 yards from the Ranger tent-city? - so we left Chris W. to wait him/her out and moved the vans into the parking lot. Unloaded at a garbage truck access point - the only break in a quarter-mile's worth of parked cars. Naturally, our second Ranger showed up 2 minutes after we left, and Chris hustled him over - Bob Gallagher, a midshipman from the Naval Academy (my second USNA Ranger.) Another big guy, but a bit more reserved than John Carman (or maybe he was just embarrassed that we had been waiting on him so long.) Did the intro thing again, and also spent a minute chatting the two of them up on our ambitious upgrades for the first 2 days of Trek 21; both seemed excited and positive, and promised their support. The Rangers do get sick and tired of the same old diaper hikes, and that's a fact, Jack. Snagged all our gear and headed for the tents, and quickly got ourselves settled in. Canteens and ponchos all around, plus all our "critical forms" paperwork, and off to the zoo (hopefully, a bit less of a zoo this year.) Rick and I hit Admin, while the Rangers started in on basic instruction in front of Logistics; Admin was fairly easy - confirmed Daniel H.'s and Neal K.'s fees transferred to 2000, completed our final payment, and got the basic paperwork packages for both crews. Off to trip planning, with the Crew Chiefs and Adults from both crews tagging along. Schmoozed with our planning guide ("Charles"), who seemed impressed with our knowledge base and had no problems with our proposed changes. Of course, having copies of the previous two years worth of itineraries (listing similar changes) didn't hurt a bit. There was a bit of an issue with the departure bus (they like you to have 24 hours in BaseCamp, and so wanted us to take the 10 am bus), but relented when the schedule showed no other crews going to Six Mile Gate at 8 am the following morning, plus we had all our own gear and would therefore save hours at the Commissary check-out. Only other problem was the horseback ride at Ponil on Day 3 - apparently, the Philmont Training Center already had the 8 am horseback ride locked up. Well, we'll show up anyway and see if it happens (can't hurt.) Reserved the 1 pm ride, and didn't make a big deal of it. In a surprise, they allowed us to do a 1 for 1 exchange of the Chuck Wagon Breakfast at Ponil for the Dinner at Clark's Fork (we had offered to trade both breakfast and dinner at Ponil for just the dinner at Clark's Fork); so two Chuck Wagon Dinners - good deal there! Best of all, we got it all done fairly quickly, making up some for the long wait at the Welcome Center. Checked the trail/water boards on the way out - no particular problems, plus I was glad to see that the Maxwell to Baldy Skyline trail was finally open and ready for business (we're there, babe, we are there!) The ridgeline trail from Old Camp to Dan Beard was also open, despite the forest fire the previous month. The water situation was also better than I had expected, especially considering they were in a Class III Drought again (3 of the last 4 years now!) By this point it was 11:30, and we headed off to lunch, enjoying the Philmont Ranger song ("I - Want to go back to Philmont!") and Philmont Grace (which, of course, we already knew very well.) As usual, lunch was eminently forgettable after all the great food we've been eating the last 3 and a half days. Off to First Aid for Medical Checks, and another interminable wait, growl! Chatted with the Rangers on the porch, and Chris and Rusty took the time to present our crew T-Shirts to both, which earned them quite a few envious looks from the other Rangers standing nearby. The first of the day's thunderstorms moved through, with plenty of thunder and lightning; both crews waited it out under one of the tarps. We joined them once they finally opened up (around 1:20!!!) and had our place in line established. But we continued to wait, and wait, and wait.... Took the time to review our gear with John and Bob; they were again impressed to find we had every single item on their list but the food. It do makes things a bit easier, and that's a fact, Jack. Mike, John and Nathan decided to play an impromptu game of basketball on the local court, using a canteen (until, of course, it got stepped on and broken.) Then Mike started "bopping" people in the head with it, and being generally annoying, until I took him aside and calmed him down. Not a big deal - just too much sitting and waiting - not good after all the non-stop, high intensity activities we've been doing in Colorado the past three days. John and Bob eventually went off and snagged another medical technician, and we finally got started on our medical re-certs around 2:10, finishing at 2:45 (beyond ridiculous!) Back to the tents to pick up our bear-bags, fuel bottles and money, and down to the Commissary for food and fuel. Tim headed off to Cimarron to buy some breakfast type stuff to augment our first couple of meals. I checked the mail - none - and waited in yet another long line for fuel while the guys collected and field-stripped our initial meal packets. In a mistake, I forgot I was buying for both crews, and only picked up 4 pints. We all headed back to the tents for a rather cursory equipment shakedown (by now, both John and Bob had no qualms about our equipment or level of preparation), and started packing up our crew gear and food. No sign of Tim, which is a bit odd. Discovered my mistake with the fuel, and returned to buy another 2 pints (for 3 per crew); fortunately, there was no line the second time through. Back at the tents, Rusty and Chris were working hard to equalize weights; distressingly, Crew A is significantly heavier than last year, due to several Scouts not listening to me on clothing (notably Dan and Ryan) and the simple fact that we had fewer people to divide common gear between - only 8 versus our usual 12. Including 2 liters of water, the Scouts all ended up between 34 and 38 pounds, with Tim at 40, and 45 for me - about 4 pounds average more per person than last year. Crew B was about the same, with a tradeoff between bigger Scouts (meaning bigger and heavier clothes) but 2 more people. Considering the amount of effort we put in to "minimize to the max," this was a bit disappointing, even if we're still near or better than 20 pounds less than the average pack weight across the Ranch. [I'll have to think on this before 2000.] By this point, it was 4:45 or so, and Al and Chris W. headed off for the Advisor's and Crew Chief's meetings, even though we all knew that they'd be the usual "compleat" waste of time (and we were right!) I paid a quick visit to the Trading Post to buy the 1998 and 60th Anniversary patches; didn't want to get burned again like in `96. Excellent patches, really colorful designs. Tim finally got back; turned out he had misinterpreted what we needed, and therefore headed all the way to Raton for a better selection of food to "replace" our breakfasts (instead of just supplementing them.) He had a ton of stuff, which we field-stripped down to about 5 extra pounds per crew. Awfully long drive for a few granola bars et al., and (unfortunately) he had taken the cargo van - the one vehicle we had which was under a mileage rate. Well, can't be helped now - and we now have quite a bit of extra "munchable" food for the trek. Tim also somehow lost his St. Christopher medal under the tent platform, which I managed to recover with a group effort to lift the platform up (fortunately, no rattlesnakes or skunks in residence!) Off to dinner, with a rabbit escorting us for about 20 yards; after another chorus of "I want to go back to Philmont," we headed in for the usual spaghetti slime they prefer to serve for the pre-trek crews (a little carbo-loading is a good thing.) More rain fell during dinner, canceling the normal campfire program in favor of the "Under the Welcome Center" version. We headed back to the tents for some final prep and sorting, dumping a fair amount of gear into the vans. Rick also started gathering valuables for the security locker, but most of us opted to just keep our few items in with our other junk in the vans (which, after all, were locked, alarmed and watched.) Finished most of all that, and headed off for the campfire, linking up once again with John and Bob - now wearing our crew T-Shirts, cool! Things were wet and crowded under the pavilion, but we got there early enough to grab some decent vantage points, and watched the show. They did a pretty good job of it this year, probably because they had plenty of warning that it was going to be under the pavilion (or maybe they've had lots of practice just lately?) The campfire consists of a series of vignettes featuring an Anasazi Indian woman, a Conquistador, a mountain-man, a Texas Ranger, a gold miner, a cowboy, etc., plus Waite Phillips, all discussing their various roles in the history of the Ranch. Even though I've already seen it (or a close variant) eight times, I still enjoy it. Once again, they ended the night with the Philmont Hymn, holding up a huge plywood "poster" with all the words so that the Scouts could join in. When it was over, most of the Scouts headed back to the tents or over to the snack-bar; Tim, Al and I talked with John and Bob for awhile, while Brendan and Rusty hovered hopefully about a group of Girl Scouts or female Explorers who were sitting at the picnic tables, basically hanging out. We were nearly positive this was the same group we had seen at Buena Vista the previous day, but they were a very aloof bunch, very pointedly ignoring every Scout who came up to try to talk to them. "May you have a truly miserable trek, in keeping with your friendly attitudes and gentle spirits." What a difference between these useless twits and the female Explorer group from Minnesota that we co-trekked with back in `95! - and doubtless bolstering the bad attitude some Leaders have regarding female trekkers at Philmont. Returned to the tents to do some more diary writing and organizing, and grabbed a quick shower around 10:45 or so, with the whole place to myself - always better to start off clean. Bed by 11:15, mostly clear and 58 degrees, with a gentle breeze. Tomorrow, we hit the trail....