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...In These Hills...

Welcome to this electronic Philmont journal.

This is a recollection of two, two-week periods spent trudging through the 137,000-acre wilderness backcountry of Philmont Scout Ranch back in my middle teens.

I started writing this a little late -- almost 15 years after the fact. It hadn't occurred to me until then that my memory of these events was getting too fuzzy. And so until then I had never imagined that it would be useful to create a written journal. Like many kids, when I went to Philmont, I did not keep a written account of anything. Everything was experienced in the moment, and it never occurred to me then that it would need writing down. That was about 15 years ago, and things change.

I first went to Philmont in 1983, when I was 15. There were, and would be, many things changing for me then, and so the treks came at a significant time.

Making this Journal

Deciding to reconstruct 15-year-old events is one thing. Doing it is more difficult. Photographs seemed to be the most obvious means of recollection. I had taken my own photographs during the treks, but, these were of poor quality both in physical clarity (I used a wretched 110 camera) and in subject content (pictures of distant skylines, with no people in them, impressed me at that age, but tell almost nothing of the trek). To make matters more difficult, most of these pictures were still tucked away somewhere at my parents' house, inaccessible until I could visit home again.

Until then, and until I could enlist the help of a few of the others who were part of my treks, I relied on what skim information I did have on-hand -- a few pictures, souvenir trail maps that I had annotated only after my return from each trek, and my fuzzy memory. But, with those, and the kind assistance of others on the web, I was able to form a rough outline of my itinerary. Thanks go to all those who helped me in this -- Patrick Bonz (NPS), Russ Campbell (Clark's Fork Staff), Mark Dierker (Apache Springs Staff/NPS), Dennis Depenbusch (Ranger), Michael Latsch (Security), Warren Williams (Trekker), David Harris (Ranger), Utah Cox (Trekker), Randall MacDonald (Trading Post), Bill Veley (Trekker), Doug Gentry (Trekker), and Richard Pettys (Trekker). Thanks also go to David Willcox (Trekker), Jay Jolicoeur (Staff), and Michael Shearer (Staff), from each of whom I borrowed one photo.

The initial outlines I had drawn up were incomplete, and in a few cases, incorrect. When I finally was able to return home and locate most of my Philmont information, I discovered that I had made several mistakes, and that in fact things that I had recalled from memory were not quite correct. The second phase of this project was a considerable improvement: Armed with at least one of my actual used-on-the-trail trail maps, photographs, and Crew Leader's itinerary sheets, I was able to better fit the pieces together.

Although I was a Scout, geography and orienteering were never interests of mine -- at least at the time I went to Philmont. We certainly got through the itinerary without getting lost, but I really never had a great sense for large-scale geographic features. For example, although our 1984 trek was essentially an arc which encircled Black and Bear mountains, I remember having a hard time easily recognising which was which, and exactly where each mountain was relative to our view from the trail. I think that at that age, my attention was occupied more by the trees than the forest (both proverbial and literal).

So, getting my bearings was a crucial issue in this new project. However, in the years since becomming an engineer, this was a much easier task. The exercise of having to interpret every detail in my photographs, and compare them to the topography of the trail map, caused me to become very familiar with Philmont's geography. In a relatively short time, I came to know the layout of the land quite well. Which mountain was Black, and which was Bear, became second-nature knowledge.

After about a year of toying with this project in my spare time, I was actually able to contact a couple of my old crewmates. With their assistance and that of the aforemention folks, I have produced this journal as it stands today.

So, I think now that I've come to the point where pretty much all that can be recalled has been recalled. Although it is certain that many things have been left out, at least I can rest assured that the details which I have managed to get written down will not be forgotten.

I originally made this record for myself, but I'd like to share it also with those who helped me, and with anyone who went with on these two treks. I hope you will enjoy these pages. If you have any comments, please feel free to contact me by e-mail.

So, without further delay, let's hit the virtual trail. Click on either of the two trail signs below to start on either of the two journals:

Photo Show and Other Stuff

The journal itself has pictures throughout, but I have also compiled an on-line "photos-only" slide show which lacks the narration in the above two links, and contains my entire photographic record. In case you care to look at it, you can go to it from HERE. (There is also an entire collection of much better scans of these photos available on the CD-ROM version of this journal only.)

As for other Philmont-related web pages, below you can access the Philmont Ring of Home Pages. I'm also providing an actual list of interesting Philmont-related links which I have found.

Philring
"I wanna go back to Philmont."
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