[Philmont]: RE: Trek 25

Russell Ballard writes...

My crews were awarded our 3rd choice which was Trek #25. Can anyone tell me
about this trek and the camps it goes through. While evaluating treks, we
couldn't figure out why it was classified as Strenuous.

Comment...

Trek 25 was a new route in 2000, listed at 65 miles, did Baldy, and spent a
significant amount of time in the Valle. Truly a Strenuous trek. In 2002,
it got even longer at 73 miles. That was the year of the Ponil fire, and
probably no one actually did it.

In 2003 after the fire, it became a South / Central route, listed at 50
miles. The toughest days are 5-6-7 (Sawmill - Comanche Peak - Comanche
Camp), with both elevation and water management issues going over Mount
Phillips. But realistically, it is closer to Challenging than Strenuous.

For whatever reason, when Philmont makes changes to routes such as this,
they appear to make little or no attempt to match the difficulty of the
prior trek - they simply use the number and keep the rating of it with no
consideration of whether it is accurate. There are several examples of
this, 25 might be the most glaring.

The other source of mis-labeling is that the 2000 renumbering was based on a
lot of bad data - treks that have not changed for years got listed as a
dozen miles longer or shorter, with a corresponding higher or lower rating.
Those errors have for the most part been since corrected - the listed
mileage is back to what it was before - but the ratings have not changed.

My Trek comparison chart now includes my re-assessment of the rating - an
admittedly subjective call, but one I tried to consistently make.

- Al Thomson, Troop 236, Schooley's Mountain NJ
Treks 1999, 2001, and 2003
Autumn Adventures 2000, 2002, 2004, and 2006

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Received on Tue Mar 28 09:04:02 2006