Last Weekend’s Camp Outing

“What a wonderful backpacking trip on the West Mt Baldy trail!  Eight brave Scouts and two lucky adult leaders drove up Friday night to Pinetop, AZ for a night at the cozy Komar Kabin (owned by Landon & Quentin’s Grandfather).  As it turns out, a night of sleeping in the cabin helped save our energy for mother nature’s onslaught on the remainder of the trip.  After a continental breakfast of comfort food at the cabin, we drove to the West Baldy Trailhead and headed out with our backpacks.  There was plenty of warm sunshine on our backs on the hike up to basecamp, which only took 3.3 miles to get to our destination.  However, upon arrival all of us aware of the large, looming storm clouds and the sounds of distant thunder.  Only moments after establishing basecamp and enjoying our freeze-dried lunches, the heavens opened up and unleashed heavy rain and loud thunder for the next 4 and ½ hours.  So much for our plans of an afternoon hike!  Instead, the boys huddled in their tents playing the longest game of Uno known to mankind.  Fortunately, the rain stopped around dinner time, which allowed us to emerge from our tents long enough to eat.   Once darkness took over the campsite around 7pm, and without an adequate supply of dry wood, plans for a campfire were extinguished and everyone assumed an early bedtime.  

Lessons from mother nature continued the next day as steady rain, but without thunder, returned before dawn.  The constant downpour slowed down to a drizzle by 7:30am in time for everyone to eat a quick breakfast, break camp, perform a police line and head back down the trail.  On the previous day, we found many other hikers with us on the sunny trails.  Sunday morning; however, we had the muddy trail all to ourselves, which resembled more of an irrigation trough by then.  Driving away from the parking lot tired and mostly soaked, the vehicles registered an outside temp of 50 degrees.  What a difference to return to double the temperature back at the church parking lot, which finally gave us a chance to complete our “thorns and roses” ceremony.  You can probably guess what was the most common thorn, but there were certainly plenty of roses to go around for this adventurous crew who braved the weather!

See below for a link to pictures from the outing:

https://bsatroop648.smugmug.com/2019/Mt-Baldy-Backpack-Trip-September-2019/