Moore Family
                                                                                        of Arizona

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Philmont Scout Ranch Backpacking Trek in Summer 2007

Alan & Alex attended a 2 week backpacking trip in northern new Mexico in summer 2007.

Crew: JJ, Bryan, Brian, Robby, Chris, Alex, Riley, Kevin  Advisors: Alan, Ken, Jim, 

Troop 278 of Ahwatukee sent a 12 member Crew to Philmont in 2007 - the year of the 100th anniversary of Scouting worldwide. Our last night on the trail was the actual day of the 100th anniversary. We carried with us a 'Kudu Horn' - the same type of horn blown by Lord Baden Powell to signal the start of the first ever Scout camp on Brownsea Island in England at 6am on the 1st August 1907. Our crew took turns carrying the horn for the entire trek and blew it on arrival and departure from every camp, we explained the story to anyone who was interested - a lot of people... Many people tried blowing the horn - a few succeeded!

We finally blew our Kudu Horn from the top of Ponil Camp at 11pm on the 31st July - exactly 100 years to the minute after Lord Baden Powell.

Many people at nearby back country camps had said they would wait up late to listen for it... 

Philmont Trek - The Fellowship of the Horn - July 21st – Aug 2nd 2007

7/16/07 –    Monday - Final Pack Check at Fire Station – 7:00 pm

7/19/07 –   Thursday - Drop off Pack at Ken Link’s house to load in trailer – 7:00 pm

7/20/07 –   Leave for Philmont at 6:00 am from the Link’s House (arrive at 5:30 am)
Friday - Uneventful drive up though Payson, Heber, Holbrook, Gallup, Albuquerque, to Santa Fe. We ate at Bert’s Burger Barn – an interesting institution that looks like it had seen better days. Alan was game for the Coyote Cafe – but no! We stayed the night (for free – ranger was a Boy Scout)) at Hyde Park 8 miles outside of Santa Fe, NM

7/21/07 –   Saturday - We left Hyde Park late - because it seemed we were locked into the campground – in fact there was another way out but different than the way we went in… delayed us by 30 minutes. It was an interesting drive up to Taos – and we stopped at a MacDonald’s for breakfast on the way. Nice drive up past Eagle Nest Lake on our way to Cimarron and Philmont Base Camp. We did arrive as planned at about 10:30am. Registered at Philmont at ~11:00 am, had lunch at Philmont at about 11:30 am saw the first of several traditional Philmont Ranger led pre meal ceremonies atop the bell memorial. All stories or jokes culminating  with “I want to go back to Philmont!!”

Later we visited the Tooth of Time Trading Post before we checked into Tent City for the night.

7/22/07 –   Sunday – We picked up our group gear, and conducted pack checks – no issues with our Ranger Eric – he was impressed with our gear and training.
In our own weigh-in Riley’s pack was heavy (even with nothing in it!). We did get rid of some stuff…

                  Depart early afternoon - bus dropped us off at Six Mile Gate. We hiked to Anasazi Trail Camp only about 3 miles and 300’ elevation gain. Practiced using the Map & Compass, bear bagging, cooking skills and using the sump. Ranger Eric was impressed with the Jet Boil usage & more so with the Kudu Horn story – we all blew the horn! Food was Spaghetti & Corn.

The bear bagging with pulley & parachute cord was problematic at first – good for the Oops! bag though. Heavy duty bag was good - but bulky!
fitful sleep first night on trail.

7/23/07 –   Monday – a couple of miles to the Tyranosaurus-Rex tracks and on to Indian  Writings – a staffed camp but not one we were camping at. We decided to do dinner for lunch while there – Ramen noodles with Rice & Beans. We did an  interpretive tour of the Petroglyphs with a passionate ranger. We had birthday cake here for Robby!  

                  We headed out towards Old Camp – it hailed on the way really hard (first rain). As we arrived we blew the Kudu Horn – a future tradition for every campsite. Dinner was lunch (hot would have been good – but I did make hot tea). It continued drizzling that evening so we did not return to Indian Writings for the ‘Anasaziball’ contest. Did not rain at night… Though everything was still a bit damp in the morning. Ranger Eric says we are doing fine and he will leave us early – good news really - but we liked him!! Total today was 6 miles and approximately 300’ elevation – easy. 

7/24/07 –   Tuesday – dry morning at Old Camp – but still some wet gear. We headed out alone (no Ranger) to Dan Beard a staffed camp – arrival announced with the Kudu Horn. We got there early after a fast 6 miles and about 900 feet of elevation. We settled in on a high campsite above camp – lots of damage from the fire years before still evident.

The boys did the obstacle/challenge course with Ranger Allison. They had fun and did a great job of teamwork – especially getting the whole crew over the wall. They planned well and were left with Brian Saba at the top & JJ jumping – I think this was a great choice – but really looked hard – eventually about the 10^th attempt was successful!! The other items were human rings, balance platform, tire wall, & spiders web.. The general plan here was ‘leave no trace camping’. Did some washing & drying & sent a postcard (purchased from TOT-TP). Dinner was Mashed potato, Rice & chicken & chocolate pudding for desert.
In the evening there was coffee on the porch – then music - Guitar/ harmonica/ songs. We did “dry ski racing” against the Tennessee Crew tonight (they won). We also did a Kudu Horn challenge (we won) and a 2 man dance off with Chris & Robby against 2 from Tennessee – Chris won.

                  A dry night. In the morning before we left Allison tried out the Kudu Horn – we told her to listen out for the Kudu Horn at 11pm on the 31^st!! I gave her the troop’s web site address.

7/25/07 –   We hiked the fence line trail to Rich Cabins approx 6 miles and ‘850 feet elevation. We blew the Kudu Horn up on the ridge trail before we arrived and got a wave from camp. We arrived and met the Rangers – an interpretive location (off Philmont) so they are all in character.

                 We found a campsite just down the trail – nice bright day. At Rich Cabins they do woodcutting (2 man saw and axe) chicken catching, cow milking etc.

I sent another postcard & we had fresh fruit at the cabin (apples & oranges). Nice chat with the Rangers. One is an opera singer…

We re-supplied at the commissary & then cooked dinner. In the evening we went to the cabin for the entertainment… There was a packed house for the story of Ghost Cat! Great!

Including audience members telling parts of the tale… Then we had music and singing – Just fantastic music and vocals – 100% professional quality.

7/26/07 –   We hiked out the next morning (late start) towards Greenwood Canyon trail camp. We crossed the creek a few times and stopped at a beaver dam – but it looked a little abandoned. We did see a few dead fish…? We blew the horn on arrival - about 5 miles & 1000’ cumulative elevation today. We had some light rain just as we arrived – set the tents up quickly. We cooked dinner in the drizzle. Riley sat on Alex’s folding chair and ripped the stitching out of the seat – he was given the repair/sewing kit and mended it…

7/27/07 –   We were a little late getting breakfast & packing up so we saw about 3 Crews pass us – we also knew there were at least 3 more that had set out before us and must have camped further up Greenwood Canyon. Since we didn’t see them as we hiked out we had six crews ahead of us. It was a long hike up and up and up.

Pretty unrelenting steep elevation gain for about 6 of the 8 miles. One by one we reeled in the other groups. It would have been faster but for the ‘catch them - wait 5 minutes, catch them - wait 5 minutes’ before finally catching & passing them routine.  Robby always wanted to go faster…

Anyway - we passed all 6 crews by mid afternoon and pulled away fast after that. All the elevation training we did was paying off big time… We arrived at the saddle with Mt. Baldy in the background (~11,000 feet) – a great photo opportunity.

                  Another crew coming down from the side trail from Baldy peak took our picture (whole crew) – and were then amazed to see Robby Link start pulling rocks out of his backpack - 1, 2, 3, 4, …. All the way to 13… He’s quite insane!

We stayed for about 30 minutes and saw no other crews coming up. We hiked down the switchbacks about 1000 feet down to Copper Park trail camp. We set up camp and Robby climbed into his tent and slept the rest of the afternoon. The rest of us visited with other crews including Tennessee and also checked out the tailings from a couple of small scale mining operations

                  About 8 miles & 2200 feet elevation gain today. 

7/28/07 –   Up at 3am (ouch) – set off at 3:30am sharp to climb Mt. Baldy for Sunrise. Totally dark - new moon. We went straight up the hardest but fastest path – straight up the scree slope. Step - step - step – slide back down. 3 steps up - slide 2 steps down! It was very hard, in places we slid back down 6 feet at a time. Climbing straight up the scree was very hard going all the way - but we persevered until we were on solid ground and found the trail.

Well eventually we were on a clear path heading for the peak, and daybreak started - grey then brighter as the first of us stepped up onto the flat summit. Lots of scree even at the top - quite a bit of wind - cold! We took out the kudu horn. Just a few minutes after the last of us reached the peak we saw the sparkle of the first of the suns rays of this day on the horizon. Nobody lower down would have seen this moment. We blew the horn for all we were worth - everyone had a picture with the horn and the sunrise! We could look done on the landscape lit by the early dawn light dawn. Upon clouds thousands of feet below us  gliding over the landscape - eventually casting long streaky shadows off to one side... down below to the lake and smaller mountains in the distance. We stayed for about 30 minutes - then descend on the Baldy Town side a little to find some shelter from the winds. We stopped for another 30 minute for breakfast before starting down the mountain. The first crew we met coming up was very disappointed to discover that they would not be the first crew to the top that day (by well over an hour!).

                  We descended very rapidly passing more crews struggling slowly uphill and arrived at Baldy Town by 8am – the Ranger wanted to know how we got there so early… They chastised us a little for hiking in the dark and then agreed it would be great to be on the peak for sunrise!

Had some coffee on the Porch, Picked up mini salamis, Toblerone & pickles at the store and re-supplied at the commissary. We also refilled water and most of us had a shower. I posted another postcard – an appropriate picture of Mt. Baldy.
 

                  We then set out for French Henry – it opened up and rained as we arrived – we were able to shelter pretty well. We did panning for gold and also Blacksmithing where everyone was rechristened “Tim” for the duration (makes life so much easier for the blacksmith...)

We hiked back over the steep “wall” to Copper Park camp along with a tag along adult joining a crew at Copper Park partway through their trek. Today we covered 10 miles and 2800 feet of cumulative elevation gain.

Back in camp Chris sat on Alex’s repaired chair and leaned back – crack! the hinge broke and the tube folded in half – the chair was history… Still drizzling in the evening … continued pretty much all night… we turned in for an early night!

 

7/29/07 –   We also slept in a bit in the morning to make up for our previous days exertions and lack of sleep. After breakfast we retraced out steps to Baldy Town to get some more steritabs and dumped Alex’s broken chair in the trash.

We hiked on to Miranda - a staffed camp. We had dinner for lunch on arrival & then did the tomahawk throwing competition and then it started to rain just as we got to the cabin. We did the mountain man lodge visit while it rained – perfect timing. French speaking ‘Armand’ conducted the tour – he was great., When the rain stopped Armand took us to the Black Powder range where we all got to shoot (rained a little) – we hurried off after this because we were late for the burros.

We went on down to the corral to pick up our Burros – the guy was pretty weird… He only had one Burro for us though. He was not happy that we were late picking him up. The only thing that saved us was the Tennessee crew arriving even later than we did… We learned to pack the Burro – this took a good while…

We named our Burro “Badass” (seemed appropriate at the time). We hiked on with Badass to Baldy Skyline Trail camp. We blew the Kudu Horn as we arrived and another crew across the other side of the camp were the first to ever complain (so we blew it again!)

Some rain again tonight but not bad under the trees. Lunch for dinner and off to bed. About 5 miles and 300 feet cumulative elevation gain today.

7/30/07 –   Early start but time taken repacking the burro – for the time taken the limited weight on one burro makes this of limited practical value. Badass was struggling today – he has a cut on his leg just above the hoof and he’s obviously in pain. It has been treated but it’s open again and he’s stumbling from time to time and is keen to go slow. We hiked slower than we normally would for about 6 miles & 800 feet cumulative elevation gain to Pueblano.

                  We set up camp and relaxed for a while – saw some deer in the meadow. We did the spar climbing and in the evening there was a huge gathering of rangers (and crews) for a massive Loggerball game in the evening. The Loggers won (of course).

That night sitting on the porch (tea coffee, cookies & corn!) we heard of the crew hit by lightning above the tree line on Mt. Baldy. We had seen the storm swirling around Baldy and heard the one thunderclap while we were at Miranda the day before. Apparently several Scouts were affected by an indirect hit – one needed CPR and an ASAP air evacuation to Santa Fe for overnight observation. Seems that crews raced down the mountain relaying the message to Baldy Town where the alert was given & an Air Evac was ordered. Then the rangers from Baldy Town drove a Suburban most of the way up the mountain on the mining road/trail and ran the rest of the way with a stretcher to get the injured scout to a suitable landing spot - quite an effort.

                  This was really not an obvious driving road and running up Baldy is no picnic no matter how fit you are!  The Scout is expected to rejoin his crew later in the week - quite a scare for their advisors.

Later in the evening there was a great campfire sing-along with12 musicians attending from different camps - fantastic violin (fiddle) player…

7/31/07 –   Today after breakfast we completed out service project – trail repair right opposite our campsite.

Then we packed Badass again (he’s even less happy today with his leg) slow going as we head for Ponil – our last camp. The crew was less cohesive today very spread out on the trail with Badass slowing down the tail and the leader not slowing. Long slow day going at this pace – we’d have been much faster without him (not his fault).

Arriving at Ponil staffed camp the leading team was in the salon/canteen before those of us with the burro even arrived – we then had to take the burro all the way down to the corral - pack the gear away and carry all the gear he was carrying back to the saloon (I was not pleased with the lack of teamwork – breaking down right at the end…) Today we hiked about 6 miles mostly downhill.

We all got to the ‘Saloon’ for sarsaparilla & peanuts. Got our hats branded!
We set up our camp at a high up campsite up above the chuck wagon dinner site. An alfresco Pilot to Bombardier was right nearby. Later spent some time talking on the porch with coffee & snacks (advisors only). Off to the chuck wagon dinner – followed by a music theatre show in the saloon (same great violinist). At about 10pm the Tennessee crew joined us at our campsite for campfire & jokes/skits – at  11pm we blew the Kudu Horn for the 100th anniversary of scouting – 100 years to the minute!! And so to bed!

 8/1/07 –     Up early for a shower and then we had a chuck wagon breakfast and then went on a horse ride around and above camp – Alan’s horse was Peyote and Alex’s horse was Boone. We enjoyed this although it was a bit slow. A quite beautiful day. Back in camp we packed up and hiked about 2 miles slightly downhill to the bus back to base camp.

Overall our hike had covered 70 miles and 7,250 feet of cumulative elevation gain

Back in tent city and settled in we visited Villa Philmonte and the Philmont museum. We also visited the Tooth Of Time Trading Post and purchased badges of all the places we camped & visited + belts and T-Shirts… There was a chapel service tonight (rained & cut short)… There was also later a special ceremony for Scouting’s 100 years – we took out the Kudu horn for a blast in front of ~300 attendees at the arrivals hall.

8/2/07        Early start and a straight through drive back to Phoenix. We listened to some CD’s we bought of the Philmont songs (some good, some no so much). In Overgaard we stopped at the Red Onion for a late lunch and got back home about 7pm. We were all tired – but very glad to be getting home – still we would miss Philmont.

                   Maybe some of us will be – “Going Back to Philmont”…

Gear Ideas:

What I wish I brought:

·         Ear Plugs for sleeping

·         Pouch for solar charger

·         Adapter for solar charger to charge camera & phone
      - OR better extra camera battery (had one didn’t last)

·         Phone Card for use at base camp

·         Wish we had a lightweight dining fly & poles

·         Belt leash for pocket knife

·         Mesh/lightweight carry bag with strap for snack/gear/hat water etc around camp

·         Spare hydration bite valve & tube repair kit (not that we needed it – others did)

·         A chair that was lightweight (check) and indestructible (not!)

·         Phone that doesn’t run down fast in roaming mode.

·         A suitable Arizona gift for our ranger Eric…     

What really worked well:

·    Use of 3x JetBoil stoves for cooking & tea/coffee.

·         Snack pocket on backpack pack waist strap

·         Hydration system in backpack

·         Mini clothes pegs on pack (flag & drying stuff)

·         Solar charger for steripen

·         Mini nail brush (toothbrush end)

·         Lightweight fleece jacket

·         Fold up plastic bowl for washing/feet/clothes

·         Kudu Horn (fun & well worth the weight)

·         Lightweight tent with outside boot storage vestibule

·         Roll up platypus water bottles for cooking etc.

·         Zip off pants

·         AZ flag / bandana

·         Multiple seats (stool, trail seat, trekker seat)

·         Mini notebook for journal.

 Other:

·         We took lots of repair gear and needed little of it (if we hadn’t we would have…)
      - buckles, clevis pins, tape, pole repair, tent repair, shoelaces, wire, velcro ties, 
        sewing kit, mattress repair kit, headlight bulbs. – we used the sewing kit once.

·         The Oops! bag parachute cord & pulley was a good idea but still needed the heavy
      weight line & bags too (possibly could get lighter rope though).

Copyright (c): Alan Moore 2006 - 2014       Page Updated: 12/16/2014     Page Views: