It’s our last day as we wake up to a 38 degree morning. We are finishing a little over 70 miles on our 10 day trek. We are excited about getting our 2nd shower as everyone stinks. I wish I could say that leaving is bitter-sweet, but right now it is only sweet. We can not wait to get on the road tomorrow morning to head home.

We left Dan Beard camp early because we have to cover about 8 miles today. After about 4 miles we caught Mr. Brian at Metcalf Station. We were glad to see him able to finish the trek with us. As we take our break we are able to work a push cart on the railway as some of the other scouts lay more track.

We stopped about .44 miles west of Pueblano Ruins to let another trek pass on the trail. As we waited for our crew to get started again one of our leaders saw a decent sized black bear up the mountainside under 100 yards off the trail. We were .44 miles west of Pueblano Ruins. He did not care about us as he was busy flipping rocks and pushing open old tree bark for his next meal.

After seeing the black bear, the scouts got surprisingly better at hanging bear bags. They started paying closer attention to their smellables a little closer each night.

When you think of camping you think of sitting outside next to a rolling stream looking at the wilderness around you enjoying things and taking it all in. The truth is when you’re on a trek like this it takes a lot of work to do anything and everything throughout your day. Even the smallest things like getting undressed and dressed inside your one man or two man tent takes a lot of energy at 9000 feet. Making dinner every night requires hauling a bucket of 5 L worth of water back to camp and boiling it to make sure that it’s purified before we eat dinner. Of course, then you must sanitize all the dishes with the boiling water and then cook your food and then clean all your dishes after everyone’s finished. Then you must properly prepare any leftovers to be hiked out as trash. You then must finish hanging all your bear bags appropriately. You can then finally wiggle your way into your tent and make it into your hopefully sweat free nightclothes to lay down for a while so that you can do it all over again the next day. Overall, this has been a great learning experience for all of us and even though it’s been tough we are absolutely loving every minute of being together out here in this beautiful country.

Mr. Brian, as the scouts all call him, has been missed very much over the last couple of days. He had to head back down because of elevation problems. He has made it back home safely. We all wish he was up here with us now, but several of us are envious of him being back in Weatherford probably eating a steak and having a nice soft bed at night. We hope all is well back home with Mr. Brian and his family.

We made it to Baldy Town and were greeted by the director who explained where everything was located. He stated that they had hot showers, but that was a lie. We still did not care. We grabbed our next 30 bags of food that we have to pack for the next couple of days. Several of the scouts were able to go on a mine tour that was 900 feet into the side of the mountain. Dan and Dylan made the summit to the top of baldy which was 12,400 feet where they traveled through about a mile of snow. Our camp for two days is down the hill at 9,200 feet. We are still having a great time and may have a few future Philmont staffers among our group.

Nathaniel, our chaplains aid for the trek, gave the first devotional last night. He was a little nervous about it, but did a great job. We were both surprised to have everyone in the group chime in during the reflection time sharing what they are experiencing out in God’s wonderful creation. This place definitely has a competitive physical effect on you, but it also seems to be having a positive spiritual effect on many of us.

We had the best time with that stupid burro. They only carry about 50 or 60 pounds, and ours was extremely cooperative. We saw a couple others along the trail that were as stubborn as you might expect them to be. The crew decided to call ours “Dukie” at my sons request. This allowed for a whole round of continual jokes around potty humor which is right in line with our normal scout humor. Braden and Jacob quickly became the main caretakers of the beast mainly because they just enjoyed having something else to concentrate on besides the long trail ahead.

It seems like Mount Baldy was a long ways off in our pictures of the beautiful mountains around us. As we continue on our trek it is amazing to me that every day it looks like something that we may actually get to see up close and personal.

We spent the night before last at Ponil campgrounds which is a fully staffed area with a program and the chuckwagon dinner. We all enjoyed not having to cook for ourselves that particular night especially since as were coming down from our campsite that day we were rained and even hailed on as we came down the mountain side. This has been an adventure the boys and I will never forget. Yesterday we hiked 4 miles up a mountain with the burro and that is quite a task.

Our feet hurt, our shoulders and hips are sore, we are all sunburnt, and did I mention that it is raining right now. In spite of all of this we are all in absolutely great spirits as I play “You are my sunshine” on my harmonica from my tent while it rains.

We are learning a great deal about always using proper Philmont camping etiquette from our ranger. A ranger is assigned to each trek group and they stay with you through your second night out. This has been great for the scouts to be trained by someone other than us and we can also always use the extra knowledge as well. This is some of the most beautiful area we have ever hiked and the group is growing each day. We are all looking forward to the staffed camps that we will hit next. Thanks for everyone’s prayers and efforts allowing us on this awesome adventure.

Thanks,

Brandon Thomas

Assistant Scoutmaster