[Philmont]: 714-C-2 Trek #18

This is a report prepared by Life Scout Wesley Perkins on Trek #18 as
completed by 2005 Expedition # 714-C-2. The crew had 8 youth and 4 adult
members.

YiS,

-- 
Calvin H. Gray
Scoutmaster, Troop 405
Associate Advisor, Venturing Crew 405
Georgetown, Texas
I used to be an Owl (WM-62-2-98 @ Philmont)
http://www.troop405.org/
______________________________
July 14, Day 1 - We arrived in Philmont New Mexico. Before we actually
arrived at the scout ranch we stopped for breakfast and met up with the
Jennings at Heck's Restaurantin Cimarron. Once we arrived at the scout
ranch we got our ranger, Brian, and our row of tents (E19- E24). After
putting our things in our tents we followed Brian to the health lodge to
conduct medical rechecks. We then had a short break to go to the trading
post and then on to lunch. During lunch we got our crew motto that would
stick with us the rest of the trek, “Remember the Alamo.” After lunch we
had another short break then we were off to get our crew supplies and
food. While we were getting these things we had a small shakedown to
check whether we had the correct stuff or not. After our shakedown we
had a free tour of the Villa Philmonte and only a few people went. At
5:00 we ate dinner and shortly after, there was an advisors meeting then
mass. There was an opening campfire at 8:30 and it was a history lesson
of New Mexico. When the crew returned from the campfire most of us took
showers then went to bed at about 10:30.
July 15, Day 2 – Woke up at 6:00 to get ready for breakfast. We had to
eat fairly fast because immediately after breakfast we had crew
pictures. At 8:30 we had to clean then check out of our tents for the
next crew coming in. We got our lockers to put items that weren’t going
on the trail in, then went to the bus pickup area to wait for our ride.
We got on the bus that takes us to Cito Turnaround at 9:57. When we
arrived at Cito Turnaround Brian refreshed us about compass skills. Then
at 10:37 we were on the trail. Our first day was easy because there was
only about 150-200 ft of elevation gain and it was just over a mile
long. We arrived at Cathedral Rock Camp at 11:20. Brian taught us how to
set up the Bear-Muda triangle, and put up the dinning fly and bear bags.
We ate lunch then set up our tents. Once everything was where it should
be we decided to go on a day hike to window rock. On the way there Brian
showed us a Philmont ranger secret. He took us to some ice caves and
most of us went in. They were really cool but incredibly small. After
the caves we continued to Cimarroncito then around the hidden valley and
up to window rock. The view from window rock was incredible. We could
see for miles. We saw Cimarron, Villa Philmonte and even our camp for
the day. We got back to camp at 5:20 and started dinner. During dinner
we heard some hilarious stories from Mr. Jennings about his life. It
started to rain during dinner but not very hard. We did thorns and roses
then went to bed at 9:00. It rained very hard that night.
July 16, Day 3 – Everybody woke up at 5:45 (for the rest of the trek we
woke up this early). We ate breakfast then were on our way to Upper
Sawmill camp. We stopped at Cimarroncito staff camp and went to the rock
climbing gym. It was a lot of fun. We had to stop to get food for the
next three days at Ute Gultch Commissary. A couple of us stayed behind
at a fork in the trail to watch the packs while the rest of the crew
went the extra mile to get food. When they came back we ate lunch on a
very large rock face that was along the trail we were on. At 12:57 we
were off again on our way to Upper Sawmill. We took a very long “pack
off” break at Lower Sawmill for no apparent reason. We just all of a
sudden stopped. We arrived at Upper Sawmill camp at 3:15. After setting
up the dinning fly and the rest of the stuff we had ranger training with
Brian about first aid. After that we set up our tents, purified water,
and started cooking dinner. After dinner Brian surprised us with a pound
cake and icing that he had packed with him the whole time. After eating
the pound cake and cleaning we did thorns and roses then hung bear bags.
We all went to bed at about 10:15.
July 17, Day 4 – We started packing our personal things, the dinning
fly, and took down the bear bags, at 6:00. We ate breakfast then Brian
had to leave today. We departed camp at 7:30. Today was going to be our
hardest. We stopped at Sawmill staff camp at 8:30 to do 30.06 ammo
reload and rifle shooting. It was a lot of fun. We finished rifle
shooting and walked back to the camp to eat lunch and get going. We
started walking again at 12:20 before we got rained on by a huge storm.
We got about 200 meters up a REALLY STEEP hill that was at the staff
camp and it started pouring and hailing. We had to get all our rain gear
on while it was raining. It was the worst storm on the whole trek. We
had to fill up water bottles in the rain at the top of the hill before
we could go on. At about 2:05 we took a pack off break and it wasn’t
raining as bad. We had climbed 1000 feet already and were at 10,200
feet. Started hiking again at 2:40 and the rain stopped. We took a small
break at 3:40 to get rain gear off because it was getting hot. At 5:50
we reached our highest point on the trip at 11,100 feet and it was a
killer climb from 9000 feet at Upper Sawmill. Now we had to start
downhill. The downhill part was very slow because it was so steep and
very rocky. We arrived at Red Hills camp at 7:20 and it was very cold
and damp. Most of us didn’t want to cook dinner so we ate a lunch
instead and would cook that dinner for lunch the next day because we had
a very short hike. We did thorns and roses at 9:00 then went to bed at
9:10. Everybody was tired.
July 18, Day 5 – Today was a short hike so we got to sleep in and most
people slept in until 6:45 and we let the tent dry out for while before
packing up. We ate breakfast at 7:45 and it started to warm up a little.
After packing everything up, we departed Red Hills at 9:28. The hike was
uneventful and easy on the very gradual downhill slope. We arrived at
11:45 and set up the camp then ate lunch. At 2:30 about half of us ran
to Phillips junction commissary which was 1.1 miles away to take showers
and get extra supplies. It was a lot of fun. We came back then just hung
out for a while. We ate dinner at 6:15 then four guys went to the
homesteading program at crooked creek while the rest of us stayed back
because it was pouring. While we were still at camp we hung bear bags
and cleaned everything up. So far it has rained everyday we have been
out on the trail. It rained and hailed until 7:40 but not as bad as
yesterday. The guys from Homesteading came back and we just sat around
until 8:45 when we all went to bed because there was nothing to do since
it was so wet out.
July 19, Day 6 – Woke up at the normal time and noticed everything was
wet. We decided to dry it at the next camp. Ate breakfast and packed up
then departed camp at 7:40. We arrived at Phillips Junction Commissary
at 8:02 again for food, supplies, and water. We departed Phillips
Junction at 8:45 and arrived at Beaubien staff camp at 10:00. Some weird
lady greeted us and she was VERY RUDE. We got campsite number 23 and set
up all of our things. We ate lunch then departed for our Conservation
project at 12:40. We arrived at our conservation project on Bonita Peak
at 2:45. During our conservation project we had to build part of a
trail. We all dug out and moved a HUGE rock that was approximately 550
lbs. People had tried to move it before us but nobody could. We also had
to line up a whole bunch of other huge rocks on the edge of the trail to
allow water to run over them without eroding them to much. At 5:10 Mr.
Ory, my dad, and I hiked up to the top of Bonita Peak while the rest of
the crew hiked back to the camp. It was a 20 degree slope then next 600
feet to the top of Bonita Peak. After we hiked back down we arrived back
at camp at 6:40. We ate dinner then advisors went to advisor coffee.
Scouts took showers at 8:00 and adults at 8:30 then we did thorns and
roses and hung the bear bags. We went to bed at 9:45.
July 20, Day 7 – Woke up and ate breakfast. We didn’t have to pack up
because we would be staying at Beaubien for two days. We departed at
6:40 toward Trail Peak to see the crashed B-24 site. At 8:10 we saw the
first parts of the B-24 by the side of the trail. We left the trail and
started walking strait up the hill in the main direction of the
wreckage. We found lots of parts before we spotted the wings and main
center section. We looked at the part for a while and sat in a big open
spot on the side of the hill. We started back down at 9:50 and arrived
back at camp at 11:15. We ate lunch and played cards. At 1:00 we saw
huge clouds and heard thunder. We decided not to ride horses because of
the threatening clouds. Then it starts to hail. We didn’t get any rain
other than a few drops just hail. So we moved to the chuck wagon to play
cards. At 4:45 we went to our chuck wagon dinner. The beef stew was
great but the cobbler didn’t have any flavor. After dinner we randomly
took showers at the times we were assigned then played cards. We played
cards a lot on this trip. We did thorns and roses, hung bear bags, and
then went to bed 9:07.
July 21, Day 8 – We woke up at 6:00 today and took everything down then
packed it up. We ate breakfast then departed Beaubien at 7:40. We
arrived at Phillips Junction again and got food for the remaining four
days. Departed Phillips junction at 9:15 and arrive at Fish Camp at
10:20. We toured Waite Phillips lodge then ate lunch. There had been a
bear reported near here the past couple of days so we had to be careful
where we ate. We did fly tying at 12:00 then went fishing. It was
incredibly boring so most of us stopped early but we had to wait for
about another two hours for the people who enjoyed it. We left Fish Camp
at 2:20 and arrived at Agua Fria camp at 3:20 and set everything up. At
5:10 we ate dinner then Mr. Adams taught us about Karate and read Ghost
stories about Philmont. Then we played cards and heard more great Ghost
stories about Urraca Mesa at 8:00. We hung the bear bags then went to
bed at 8:50. I noticed at this point that everyday we were on the trail
we must have gotten even more tired because we seemed to be going to bed
earlier each night.
July 22, Day 9 – We woke packed our things ate breakfast then departed
Agua Fria at 7:25. We stopped at Fish Camp to get water then started on
the trail up Webster Pass 8:10. With about an eighth of the way left on
our trip up Webster Pass we had a run challenge. All but three of us ran
up a really steep part of the trail that was about 100 meters long. It
was a lot of fun! We arrived at the summit of Webster Pass at 9:16 and
took a pack off break. We started back down Webster Pass at 9:35. We
arrived at Crater Lake staff camp at 11:20. We ate lunch then half of us
went spar polling. Mr. Jennings had to leave at 2:30 because he didn’t
have enough pain killers for his leg. We also had to move our tents and
dinning fly because they told us the wrong dominions of our camp site
and we had our tents a different camp site. We ate dinner then played
cards. At 8:00 we went to the camp fire program and it was really good.
They had really funny stories and played lots of music. We got back to
camp and went to bed at 11:00. Because of the campfire we didn’t go to
bed even earlier.
July 23, Day 10 – This day would be our longest hike but it was easy
because it was all downhill. We packed up our personal and crew things,
ate breakfast, and departed at 7:30. At 8:58 we took a “pack off” break
at camp Aguila. We arrived at Abreau staff camp at 10:50 and had root
beer and bought food at the trading post. We ate lunch then departed
Abreau at 12:20. We arrived at Zastrow staff camp at 12:55 and set up
our camp. We took fire to the lodge so Richard and Nick Benbow could
make cobbler. We ate dinner at 5:00 then at 6:30 we went to the lodge
for cobbler. Brian and I did the flag retirement then we stayed at the
lodge for games. At 8:30 we walked up to a big circle for a rededication
ceremony. After we walked back from the ceremony we put the bear bags up
then went to bed at 9:30.
July 24, Day 11 – The hike was very short this day but very steep up
hill. We woke up at 6:40 packed our things ate breakfast then started
hiking to Backache Springs at 9:07. After a grueling uphill hike we
arrived at Backache Springs at 10:38. When we got to our camp the view
was incredible. You could see so far in almost all direction because we
were in a very large field on top of a drop off. At 12:00 we ate lunch
and watched the clear sky turn into thunderstorms in the distance. They
were growing very fast and from everywhere. After lunch we set up camp.
It was VERY HOT in our campsite. At 12:55 the storms had grown so fast
it started to sprinkle where we were. We sat outside to watch the rain.
You could see it pouring just above us and everywhere else but it never
reached the ground where we were. At 4:40 we climbed a hill to a well to
get water for dinner and our trip tomorrow. We ate dinner did thorns and
roses then Mr. Adams told Philmont ghost stories. Mostly about Urraca
Mesa. It was really cool because our campsite was on a drop off on the
side of Urraca Mesa. Ate 8:45 we all went to bed.
July 25, Day 12 – This as our last day so we got up at 5:30. We ate
breakfast packed everything then left camp at 6:57. We arrived at Rayado
turn around at 8:30. From Backache we could see the turn around. We
toured the Kit Carson Home and waited for the bus. At 10:14 the bus
picked us up and we arrived back at base camp at 10:25. We got our tent
assignments then went to lunch in the mess hall. Most of us agreed that
the trail food was a lot better than the food at base camp. After lunch
we took showers, did laundry, and went to the trading post. A lot of
people took naps. After all that we went to dinner at 5:30. We had to
fill out a Philmont critique form after dinner. At 8:30 we had to go to
the closing campfire. It wasn’t nearly as good as I thought it would be.
At 11:45 we all went to bed. We woke up at 6:00 and took showers. We had
to clear out our tent after we ate breakfast for the next crew. We
waited at the bus pickup for two hours before our bus came at 10:00.
That was it we were leaving Philmont. On the way out a lot of people
looked at the Arrow Head (on the back of the Tooth of Time). We stopped
in Cimarron to get lunch and tour the town then we left at 11:45. We
arrived back at the church at 1:10 on July 27. We all had fun and that
was one of my favorite camping trips.
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