[Philmont] what I would do next time about hauling water

On Tue, 17 Jul 2007 23:14:14 -0400, "Ched Hudson" <chedhudson@verizon.net> jammed all night, and by sunrise was heard saying:

> I did not allow water bladders on either our training hikes or at Philmont.
> As an advisor, I wanted to see for myself how much my scouts were drinking,
> and the Camelbacks make that all but impossible. I have had several scouts
> on day hikes dehydrate even with the tube in their mouth all day.

It's a good point, to an extent... it requires some self-discipline to
drink from a Camelback regularly. I carried a 3 liter Camelback and up
to 3 liters in Nalgenes (my full pack weight was close to 70lbs, part of
that based on some , depending on whether we'd need crew water at the
destination camp, and the likelihood of problems... we hit a problem at
Toothache Springs, early on -- the Spring wasn't active, so we were
short on water, which is a big problem.

But I digress... on rest stops, one of the advisors would advise the
scouts to take a good drink, which seemed to work well, Nalgenes or
Camelbacks. I believe that observing proper hydration takes some
practice, and perhaps even advisors don't always understand the issues,
particularly if you're from the humid East Coast, as our crew (South
Jersey). So reminders help everyone, and building up the "stop and drink"
habit helps too.

> The other issue for me was hygiene. Each crew member decorated one Nalgene
> to make it readily identifiable as his drinking bottle. The other bottles
> they carried were considered crew food, to be shared and used for cooking,
> washing, and of course refilling the drinking bottles as they neared empty.

The problem with that is that one Nalgene isn't nearly enough water for
most day's treks (I typically drank 4-5 liters on long hike, but I'm a
big thirsty guy... and even at that, our ranger recommended 2 gallons or
so a day, though I can't quite imagine some of our smaller scouts, at
1/2 my weight, drinking that much).

We tried to ensure that everyone carried ample drinking water of their
own, plus crew water. And the crew water was distributed more on the
ability to carry and the need, based on destination and difficulty of
hikes. I usually carried an extra liter just for safety, but not
everyone needs that extra 2lbs.

> For dry camps and the long haul from Clark's Fork over the Tooth we had
> several collapsible Platypus bottles, lots of spare capacity for almost no
> weight.

We did the same hike, and at least didn't have to worry about water at
the end of the hike. Even at that, some did run out, including advisors.
This was the one time I didn't carry my "backup" liter, though I did
plan enough water (5 liters) for my personal needs. One of our guys got
a bit dehydrated on that hike (also taking in side hikes up both peaks
along the way), the only time on our trek this happened.

-- 
Dave Haynie                                Philmont 2007 Crew 712K1 Trek 8
Troop Advancement Coordinator <advancement@daretowntroop60.com>
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