[philmont] Autumn Adventure

My wife, Linda and I are at home after spending six nights at Philmont
during our 8th all-adult Autumn Adventure at Scouting's Paradise. Time
spent at Philmont is great anytime but a week in the back country when
there are only a few crews is exceptional. Additional information about
the Autumn Adventure program is here:
http://www.scouting.org/philmont/camping/season/autumn.html

As far as I could tell, there were only three crews at Philmont last week.
Our crew, one from Round Rock TX and one from the Dallas area. Bill
Sheehan came down from New Jersey to hike with the Dallas crew. Meeting
Doug Latimer and several other members of this e-mail list was nice too.

We saw several bears, and a group of bear hunters on horseback with a pack
of dogs, in the Ponil area. Getting in our tents while camped at Ponil
and knowing that bears were nearby was somewhat scary but we made sure
that smellables were in the metal boxes that Philmont staffers use during
the summer. BTW, Philmont is closed to camping this week due to the Elk
season.

Our crew of 13 visited Ponil, Rich Cabins, Indian Writings, Miranda and a
couple of other camps in the area around Miranda. Our guide was Cindy
Oursler, a Philmont veteran of five summers, from Kansas. Cindy worked at
Rich Cabins this past summer so getting to harvest and eat the corn and
squash she planted during the summer was a highlight for her. Our crew of
Texans plus one California computer geek didn't make too many "Dorothy"
comments to Cindy as we wanted to stay in her good graces.

The weather was excellent and 8 members of our crew climbed Baldy last
Wednesday. I now have a new hero as one of the guys making the climb is
age 75.

I'm pleased to report that Mark Liechty pretty much behaved himself
throughout the week, probably because he was driving a rental car with a
Texas license plate.

I'm also happy to report that Cajun John LeBlanc (aka Obi-Wan Coon___)
does indeed use an external frame backpack and that he doesn't wear Crocs.
 John does like to cook and he can talk quite a bit too.

Before arriving at Philmont, Linda and I spent two nights at the Casa Del
Gavilan, the bed & breakfast near the Tooth of Time. At the Casa, we
visited with Jimmy Moore, a long-time friend from Waco, and met Steve
Taylor, Scout Executive for the Daniel Boone Council in Ashville NC.
After visiting with him, I'm of the opinion the BSA would be a whole lot
better off if we had more SEs like Steve.

In case you haven't heard, we have an impending medical crisis in the
Austin metro area. It seems that almost all area chiropractors and
orthopedists are booked solid for the remainder of the year due to knee
and hip injuries occurring as thousands of Texas Longhorn fans have jumped
off the UT football band wagon. If OU wins the game this Saturday, we'll
probably have to declare a full-fledged medical emergency. :-)

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)
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