Scouting

Dad made time to plan and lead our 50 mile backpack trip in Yosemite National Park. He was not our scout leader, but I love the memory and the bonding that came from the trip. I remember being somewhat scared of the 50 miles. Can I make the hike? Can I carry the weight? Can I survive blisters and bears? I never questioned going...Dad would be there.

Kristin Hughes made the trip laughable. He whittled a stick every night at campfire. "I am making a knife. I will use it to cut the balls off any bear who enters camp." That is a direct quote to the best of my knowledge. I know Mom, he should have rephrased. This is still funny for many reasons. The knife Kristin was using to whittle his "bear knife" was a big pocket knife, probably 3 inches of blade and the same in handle. The stick that was whittled started off at about one foot in length. But when he was finished, the "bear knife" was smaller than his pocket knife! Anyway, to finish the story, we did see bears on two different occasions. We had been taught well to keep all food and edibles in the bear bag, strung high in a tree, away from camp. One of the scouts had left his toothpaste in his backpack propped up next to a tent. Our tent. Dad had explained that noise was our friend. They had told stories of yelling at bears beating sticks together to frighten them off. They even went as far as to rush at the bear in groups. I saw it first hand.
We were asleep. Jared, Kristin and I had all dozed off. I felt a hand on my shoulder. I heard a whisper. "What is that?" It was Kristin. It was dark. The moon was out, but it was dark. And then I heard it. A brushing up against our tent. There was a big shadow. I heard a tear, a grunt. My eyes were wide. I was wide awake. We didn't speak. Kristin gripped his bear knife. He was scared. I was scared. Jared slept on. We never could easily wake that kid, but finally his eyes came open. Possibly, he could feel the intensity of our shaking. The fear on our faces and the noises out side all seemed to register to him at once. I spoke. "Should we rush out and make some noise?" My whisper was quivering. We three knew there was a big man eating beast with in reach of us through our paper-thin tent wall. Jared quietly moved to the tent door. I lined up. Kristin was in the middle, right behind us. We were trying to decide if we should really confront the bear when we heard another tent unzip with fury. We heard shouts. We unzipped our tent. I jumped out. I had a flashlight. I was yelling and screaming. "get out of here bear! As I turned to aim my light on the intruder I saw Dad. This gave me courage. My light zoomed in on the biggest bear back-side I ever wanted to see! It was running off. About 20 feet from our tent he stopped, turned, stood on hind legs to look at us. He was big! But we were many, 3 leaders from Dad's tent, and Jared, myself, and...where was Kristin? He poked his head out of the tent, knife still in hand. Too funny. We all gave him so much grief. He did gain back my respect the following night when an even bigger bear kept circling our new camp. We decided to keep 2 guards posted with the fire stoked, 2 hour shifts. Kristin and I took the first shift. When ever he would see that bear he would shake his knife at it and talk about castration. I was glad he was there.

The following night we were preparing our bear bag rope. We caught it high, on a big branch. We tied a stick to an end and took turns pulling each other up and swinging back and forth. When it was Kristin's turn, we pulled him up to an unreal height, tied off our end, and left him sitting while we all jumped in the lake for a swim! He was such a good sport, humming to himself and still smiling 30 minutes later when we let him down.

We had a blast. I can't even remember which scouts went on this trip. But I do remember Jeremey stayed at home. He was too 'wimpy' to make the prequalifying hikes. He was not allowed to come. I wonder how it would have been to be Jeremey, sleeping through it all, not hearing a thing, never facing the bear. I remember telling him all about the beast. I, of course, made the bear even bigger than it was. I made myself the sole hero. I left out the part about being scared. I was tough. Jeremey knew it.