The Phil-list Jan_2005: RE: [Philmont]: stripping meals

From: Troop 6 Scoutmaster <troop6scoutmaster@comcast.net>
Date: Mon Jan 17 2005 - 22:38:24 CST

I've watched with interest over the last week or so the thread on meal
stripping. As Tom says, you should find what works for you; ultimately
thats all that matters. To that end I'd suggest that you actually order
PhilFood from the Philmont commissary to use during your shake downs so that
you can experience, first hand, the reality of what you will be dealing
with. I was a first time advisor in '04 and had done enough research (or so
I thought) that meal stripping, or more accurately consolidation of like
sized packages (cracker boxes, ham cans ... etc) and trash elimination
(outer wrappers) seemed like a good idea. Our crew discussed it during a
shakedown weekend where we had PhilFood and thought it was a good idea.
When we picked up our first set of meals at basecamp, four days worth, it
became instantly obvious to us that tearing down 72 meal packets would not
be an easy task. Add to this the look of disbelief from our Ranger. We
decided to try it his way. To help put things in perspective I'll explain
.. Philfood is unique, it is a mix of off the shelf consumer products and
commercial backpacking food packed in two person packets. There are two of
each of the items that each person gets and one of each item they are to
share. There isn't a complete description of each meal packet's contents
although there is a basic description in the guidebook to adventure. The
outer package proves useful as a trash container and as a clean place to
arrange all the individual dinner packets. Also, every time you stop for
program or at a campsite, the food, all of it, goes up in a bear bag,
leaving it in the outer packaging simplified this task. We also adopted the
protocol whereby meal buddies would each take the breakfast and lunch for
that day when we packed up in the morning (we made a habit of eating
breakfast 1hr or more out of the campsite) and that the cooks for each day
carried all of the suppers (no trouble rounding up dinner); the rest was
distributed until we each had our fair share, based on package count. We
also ate just about everything (except the green beans) we got and used
drop/take boxes accordingly. My long winded point being that in retrospect
I can't see how meal stripping would have worked for *US*, breaking the
packages up would have most certainly resulted in chaos. But to Tom's
point, each crew must find their own way, what works for them, there is no
right answer.

Jim Thompson
74, 04 and 06

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-philmont@troop47.com [mailto:owner-philmont@troop47.com]On
Behalf Of Tom Lindtveit
Sent: Monday, January 17, 2005 6:06 PM
To: Multiple recipients of list philmont
Subject: RE: [Philmont]: stripping meals

> Our crew came up with the following method for stripping meal
> weight:

I just think it's only fair to make the following point periodically for
those who are leading Treks to Philmont for the first time in 2005 (or
'06): It's important to find what works for YOUR Crew and keep an open
mind. A lot of the things you read here are very Crew specific, such as
meal stripping. For instance, my crew last summer never even considered
stripping food items, we ate EVERYTHING, even what we didn't like. The
same goes for the shoe discussion, read everything, present the options,
but use what works best for you. I didn't take a second pair of footwear
last year and never missed them. You will hear a lot of neat and varied
information here and on the other lists, but you need to filter it.
There are no absolutes. For any of the important stuff (i.e. things that
might ruin your trip, like medical stuff, or paperwork) please feel free
to call Philmont and ask. They are extremely good people.
By and large you will get great information here, and you should make
use of it. But I have also read things that make me shake my head. This
doesn't mean it's wrong info, just stuff that would not work for us.
Some of the people on this list have a lot of experience and have been
doing this for many years. Over that time they have found what works for
them and have developed strong opinions about what is "right". This
includes me, with 30+ years on the trail both in and out of Scouting,
you bet I have some strong opinions.
So this is just a friendly reminder to take it all in, but think about
it. You will have a great Trek either way, so don't sweat the small
stuff.
Happy Hiking,
Tom

P.S. For Steve Mac: John Wayne Toilet paper (standard Philmont issue) is
toilet paper that "is rough and tough, and don't take cr*p off of
nobody".

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Received on Tue Jan 18 00:21:20 2005

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