I recently wrote the story about my first campout as a Scoutmaster and a mistake I made in behalf of one of the scouts, Aaron Ford. Well today’s story is a continuation of that event and about the first summer camp with the scouts as a Scoutmaster. I had planned a trip into the High Unitahs where we would hike 50 miles from in the Yellowstone drainage to the base of King’s Peak. I had four leaders with me the first three days after which one would leave and I would complete the camp with the other two. It was going to be a rather tough hike and I wanted to have the boys ready for it and explained several times the details. They were all ready to go except Aaron. After our first experience he told me he couldn’t go on this week long camp but would stay home. I was so excited to say the least besides that Jeffery wanted to go again and so I was going to have fun an this camp with he and Ben. We made all the preparations during troop meetings and I gave everyone lists of what they were to take with them and what they were not to take with them. Aaron never took any of the lists because he wasn’t going anyway. We talked about how to put your meals in zip lock bags for each meals and label them so that you would be sure to have enough but not too much. Aaron ignored this because he wasn’t going anyway. We talked about not carrying canned food or too much candy and to have purifiers for water and adequate clothing for all kinds of weather since I knew that rain happened quite often during these types of camping. Aaron didn’t worry about any of that either.
Well the time for the camp drew closer and I asked Aaron several times if he was going on the camp and if situations had changed because even though I inwardly felt great about his decision I did not want to leave anyone home. At 11:30 the night before we were to meet at the church at 5 A.M. I got a call from Aaron’s mom asking what Aaron needed to bring because she was sending him on the camp the next morning and she needed to go to the store to get his food. I went over the same things with her as far as was possible considering the lateness of the hour and the hour of departure fast approaching us. I was still hoping that he was not going.
The next morning arrived and so did Aaron after we had waited almost a half hour for him. That didn’t start the camp off very well but at least we were finally going. We arrived at Yellowstone campground near Altamont, Utah and prepared for our hike up Swift Creek to Farmer’s Lake area below King’s Peak. The one vehicle that had brought part of the troop soon left and would return at 11 am on Saturday morning when we would be there also to meet them.
We loaded our backpacks onto our backs and began our trek up the most rocky trail that I had ever experienced in my entire life. I was told it was a good trail, a little bit difficult but not really too bad and I believed it much to my dismay later that day. Knowing now what I do I would have hiked the opposite direction that week. Jeffery got tired quickly as would any 10 year old but I had kept his pack quite light and thus made him continue to carry it. Then about 5 miles in he was done despite the frequent stops for rests that all of us quite liked except the oldest boys in the troop who wanted to keep going. Jeff had had enough though and refused to go another step. He even took off his pack and went back down the trail and I was beginning to regret my decision to take him at that age. Ben was doing great and the two years of maturity seemed to be a valuable asset. I finally couldn’t seem to get through to Jeff but left him to think about it while I took care of some other needs of the boys. When I went back to where he had been I couldn’t find him so I went back down the trail enough to know he wasn’t there and finally started back up the trail. I had the other adults looking for him and later received word from one of them that he was ahead of us on the trail. He in fact was pretty proud of the fact that he had beat me to Deer Lake a long time before I finally arrived with the last scout. We camped the first night there and then continued on to Farmer’s lake the next day. We stopped at one lake as Jeff was now willing to hike with me again and did some fishing. Jeff caught a small trout that we had for lunch. So far Aaron had been a real trooper and was apparently not going to be any trouble as I had so feared he might. I did keep seeing grunts candies along the trail though and picked them up so that I could teach a lesson to the boys that night at camp about leaving trash in the wilderness even though it was biodegradable. It was not good for the wild animals at the very least. We got to Farmer’s lake and spent our first night there. I talked to the boys and then discovered that it was Aaron’s candy that I had been picking up along the trail. I figured that I would hold on to it until a later time for campfire lessons.
The next morning Brother Richard Baird, Jeff and I went for a hike to see what the area was like in the Farmer’s Lake basin. I also wanted to know how difficult it was going to be to cross over Bluebell Pass to Milk Lake. We ended up having a great hike only carrying our water and staves. We went to the top of the pass and Richard and Jeff rolled rocks down off the cliffs. I was quite bothered by it but since we could see the entire distance that they rolled I went ahead and let them do it. We had a great time but it made me change my mind on where we would spend that night. We hiked back along a shorter trail to camp where I told the boys to break camp and we would be hiking to the base of Bluebell Pass for the night. We did our usual camp clean and then I asked them to help clean out some of the fire pits where people had left cans and bottles in the fire pits and then we would carry them the 100 yards down to the Fire Guard station where they would carry them out of the basin on horses. I asked Aaron to help me because I felt it would help cement the lesson on littering that I had used at the campfire. He was suddenly very unhappy with me. I had noticed that he didn’t really help cleaning up camp either so felt justified in asking him to carry one plastic bag of trash to the Guard Shack while I carried two others. He was sure I was unjustly picking on him and I probably was but didn’t feel at the time that I was. He did do it but was real angry at me the whole time.
We later left camp and hiked the two miles over to the meadow at the base of the pass. There was a lightening storm approaching and I could hear the thunder getting closer so I spaced the boys in groups of three down the meadow about 100 yards apart so that if lightning did hit in the valley by us we would be far enough apart that less people would be hurt. I figured if any were going to attract any lightning I didn’t want the whole group to get hit.
I spent a rather sleepless night since it was on the ground and not in the hammock that I had used the other nights. The storm passed by and several strikes did hit the cliffs along the pass but we were safe through the entire storm. I arose early the next morning and there was a large rock near where we had slept. I sat on the top of the rock for nearly an hour before I finally yelled that it was time to awake and get out of bed. I didn’t know until later that morning as we were listening to a short wave radio at the top of the pass that at the precise time that I yelled there was an earthquake near Price. I have always counted the earthquake as a result of how loud I yelled but of course everyone never believes that part.
We ate breakfast and then started up the trail. I decided to have Jeffery go first to try and teach patience to the older scouts who I made stay behind the two of us. I told Jeff to go first because he had been on the trail the day before and knew the way. Well the trail was a lot harder the second time due to his having to carry his backpack this time. We went rather slowly due to that fact and Jeff kept getting madder and madder at me and the older boys kept getting madder and madder as well. However we finally made it to the top of the pass and Jeff quickly removed his pack and went off to cool off his temper. I tried to watch where he was but without being seen and he proved to be too sly and soon disappeared. When I found him missing I looked all over the ridge in the places where we had been the day before. No one even seemed to know where he had gone either. After about 15 minutes looking for him I finally decided to try to go back down the trail since one of the boys thought that he had passed him by as he came up. I started down and was only a few feet from the top when here came Jeff and Billy Ross the other youngest member of the troop. Jeff was carrying Billy’s pack because he was too tired to carry it the rest of the way. We had a great time taking pictures of the group and then started down off the pass toward Milk Lake. Jeff didn’t have any further problems and Aaron seemed to just avoid me as he hung out with the older boys, the ones who only a couple months earlier had given him so much grief at the camp in Wardsworth canyon.
We made it to Milk Lake and set up camp by around noon leaving plenty of time for the boys to go fishing. Richard, my assistant wanted to go to the top of King’s Peak so I finally let him go off by himself to find the highest point in Utah. The boys and Brother Arbon, my other assistant, continued to play and fish. We had our supper and at 10 pm had gotten ready to go to bed since we had a 10 mile hike again the next day. Richard still hadn’t returned and several of the older boys wanted to go find him. I simply told them ”NO, since it would be easier to find one person the next day rather than three or four”. Richard came into camp around 1 AM Friday morning and told me he was back and I slept much better the remainder of the night. He had only made it to the base of the mountain before dark and then figured the fastest way back to camp would be to follow the base of the hill. His flashlight went dead and he was forced to hike a mile or so in total darkness since the moon was not shining at all. He even stepped on a scout from another troop who had laid his bed across the trail. The was enough lighter than everything else to give him a path to follow.
The next morning I was anxious to get the boys hiking as we had 14 miles of 17 miles to go that day to a place 3 miles from the trail head where we would meet Arbon’s on Saturday. I went over the map with all of the troop and showed them where I figured that we could stop near the river where a bridge crossed over and where it looked like there was a flat spot to set camp. As we cleaned up camp we found a fiberglass tent pole that no one claimed and would need to be carried out to the trash. It ended up that it stayed in the mountains and is spread across a mile or more as little pieces laying somewhere in the trees. I should have just left it there but I asked Aaron if I could simply tie it to the outside of his pack since he was near me and had his pack on his back as the others were not at that point yet. He would have rather I had asked him to carry a rattle snake as it seemed to me that having that pole on his pack would cause him great grief and pain. (It was a quarter inch in diameter and maybe 18 inches long.) Well he finally let me put it on and we all got our packs loaded onto our backs and started down the trail. Brother Baird was in front and I and Brother Arbon at the end of the group. As we were hiking that first couple of miles I didn’t see Aaron hitting the pole against the tree trunks and breaking it into short slivery pieces but Brother Arbon did and silently picked each of them up. At about 2 miles into the hike we stopped for a rest and Brother Arbon showed me the handful of pieces. I then put them into a bag and we put them into Aaron’s pack. On the next part of the hike I noticed him flinging things out into the trees but was unable to find any of them. He successfully threw all of them into the woods. So at about three miles into the hike we talked about the ramifications to this beautiful area of such actions but I knew we would never be able to find them so after a short rest we started down the trail again or at least prepared to go but Aaron just sat on a log and refused to go. I sent the rest of the troop ahead minus Jeff and Brother Arbon. I tried to talk Aaron into going and he just said he was staying there. I reminded him we still had 10 or 11 miles that day and three the next and that I was responsible for him and wouldn’t leave him behind. After 5 to 8 minutes passed I finally grabbed him by the backpack, as he did have it on, and stood him up and told him to start walking, so he did back and forth across the trail not down it. Needless to say I was getting pretty hot myself and told him to get going down the trail or I just might loose my temper, so he did taking baby steps by placing his boot right in front of the other boot and so on. I almost did loose it but had no time to react before he broke into a full run down the trail. I turned to Brother Arbon and said “if you will watch Jeff and bring him along with you I’ll hike faster and catch up with Aaron”. I didn’t know if he would pull another “step off the side of the trail until I passed by” trick like he had a month earlier in Wardsworth Canyon. Well I then started into a very fast walk as I couldn’t run with my large backpack. Jeff decided there would be no leaving him behind and he would often break into a run to stay up with me. We passed every boy and Brother Baird. my other leader. except 5 of them by the time we reached the area I had pointed out that morning that we would be staying. One of my older scouts, Anthony Perry was waiting there for me and I asked where the other four had gone. He said that they didn’t think that this was the right spot and were going to go to the trail head. It was still fairly early in the day and they could easily make those last 3 miles. I told him that we should go up around the bend and see where a good place would be to camp and then I would go on out for the other four. I started up a small incline on the trail and heard Jeff trip and fall behind me. He had really given all he had just to keep up and was now laying on the trial with a bloody nose. So we went around the bend, and I helped him by taking his pack, to a nice level area with lots of shade and grass then set down our packs and went to the bank of the river where I used the water to clean him up. During that time Richard Baird had gotten there and suggested that he go after the other four. I told him that he could but to keep them there until I got there. We found a tree to put a hammock in and settled Jeff down for a little relaxation. I then headed up the trail without my pack and only carrying some water. I would run 100 yards and then walk 50 so that I could make faster time. Then just before the trail went through some big trees and into the parking area I stopped and caught my breath and then ran full speed out to the area where the boys and Richard were waiting, Aaron included. I yelled to them as I went through te trees to get their backpacks on and head back up the trail. They started pulling stuff out of their packs and throwing them into the truck but I told them it had been their decision to go all the way and thus they would have to take it all back up to the camp for the night. Two of them got really mad at me and started back, Aaron and Nate Taylor. The other two, Shane and Troy along with Richard and I rested up really well and then hiked back to camp. When we got back to camp Ben and Jeff both told me how Nate had told them not to say anything and shut up. He was still pretty mad. Well to this day I remind Nate of the experience every time I get to see him and we both laugh but he still remembers how mad he was and still says “But we didn’t know where to stop!” I remind him that Anthony stopped and he had told me that all of you knew that was the place or I wouldn’t have been mad because they made the decision to keep on hiking. Well it was a great day four of the boys hiked 20 miles when they could have stopped at 14, and two scout masters hiked the same distance only without backpacks for the last 6. I slept well that night.
The next morning not much was said by Nate or Aaron and we all hiked out to the trail head. We met the Arbon’s and loaded up at which time I found out the four had been successful in ditching some of their belongings the day before. By then I didn’t care and we made our trip into Heber where we stopped at Grannies Malt Shop and had some really good hamburgers and milk shakes. There is nothing like 5 days in the mountains to make simple food taste really good.
