So I am currently in Taos, NM (sometimes home of Julia Roberts) hanging out in an internet cafe. My cel phone is absolute garbage and although the Spring website says I should have roaming digital service here, alas, they are liars and I do not. So I would post a sweet photo of the snow covered Wheeler Mountain, but I cannot. Speaking of snow, it is COLD here. Obviously it snowed last night at the higher altitudes and here in town the high yesterday was 63 with a chilly low of 34. Right now it is a cool 58, which means I am sporting jeans and a fleece.

Plans for the next few days include washing my car, going to the movies, visiting WalMart, and just browsing art galleries and the like. I'll head over to Philmont come Monday morning. More updates should come in the next few days.

And here I shall stay for the next few months.

If you have never seen the canyon you should make a point to come visit. It is impossible to put into words how enormous the canyon actually is. You have to see it to understand.

Turns out it is kinda cold and windy here. It actually snowed for about five minutes while I was out hiking.

Yesterday I hiked about 5 miles along the rim trail.

Have been here for two days but there is no cel reception. Photo is of my campsite. More will be coming tomorrow.

Played blackjack for 5 hours last night starting with $50. Made $50 and a free buffet for two. I am a little sad because at one point i was up over $150.

Star Wars slots

Not bad for a random coaster outside of an amusement park. A little pricey at $12 per ride.

And the fountain.

Appropriately named I guess.

2.99 for the cheap stuff. Damn you Chevron. Anyway...can someone look and see if the western portion of Mountain Time Zone observes Day Light Savings? As i post this i think it should be 8pm but my
phone and clocks everywhere say 9pm. Im west of Phoenix.

The mountain backdrop is pretty sweet.

Stupid pole.

Name that movie.

A scenary change but still miles and miles to go.

Last nights accomodations actually were nice. Even with a busted sign.

Miles and miles of nothing. Makes for an impressive sunset though.

Only a few hundred miles (5 actually) on I10 before I say farewell to Texas.

I could take him.

The use of any photographic equipment while riding Superman Krypton Coaster is strictly prohibited.

Superman floorless coaster

You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villiny. I represent OSU with the Woody hat.

13 to 7 Rangers win.

Texas vs Tampa Bay. The Rangers have the hand well in hand at 13 to 6 in the top of the 7th.

The Titan. This one was huge and fast. Someone look up the stats for me. The operator said 250ft and 85mph.

Its a beautiful day in north Texas.

...Callin Baton Rouge. I crossed the Mississippi last night around 8pm. Today is north to Shreveport then west to Dallas.

Food, local beer, outdoor cafe, band, and The Girl from Ipanima (surely spelled wrong so someone help me out).

My first trip to this great state.

Doak Campbell Stadium

Its Doak Campbell Stadium (for those college football fans who read the blog). What university?

My Grandma's favorite photo of me

Still sporting the OSU hat though.

Brad, you should get this one.

All gone.

Monday at the aquarium. Pics include fish, whale, crab, jelly fish, and Kate.

Kate and I on the Georgia Cyclone. My photo is a picture of a TV screen - that should explain the lines.

Six Flags Over Georgia

We rode Chang twice. I am throwing up this photo because it shows how artsy I am (note the framing with the tree).

Six Flags KY was great. Kate is taking a turn driving and it is her first time actually driving a manual anywhere but a parking lot. One stall so far but otherwise flawless. Off to Atlanta.

Whats up Doc?

And I'm spent...

This is test number two of a picture to the Philmont blog again.

Program is the Philmont word for staff lead activities. Program can be anything depending on what camp the participant arrive at on any particular day of their trek. Rock climbing, black powder shooting, tomahawk throwing, gold panning, spar pole climbing, logging, horseback riding, mountain biking - these are all programs found at Philmont.

At Clark's Fork, our program is full blown Western Lore. If cowboys did it back then, we do it now. This means we act and dress like cowboys. We wear jeans and flannel shirts with boots and big hats (belt buckles optional). As a cowboy camp, we have the following program daily:
Horseback riding - Every day at 9 and 1, the Wranglers at Clark's take out up to 20 participants on a 2 hour trail ride. Crews sign up for the trail ride in advance and make sure to arrive at Clark's by their scheduled time. There is no open riding. The ride is relatively calm and slow with horses walking the trail in a single file line.

The best part about trail rides is helping kids get on their horse. These horses are not the horses you see in the movies, that people just jump right on. These are more or less wild horses for 9 months of the year, that we ride for the 3 summer months. So these are huge horses and getting on them takes a good deal of work. You have to bounce and jump and really pull yourself up. And kids typically don't get that. Also some kids are only 14 and they are small anyway, so there is no way they are getting onto this huge horse. So we throw them up there. It is funny to watch.

Chuck wagon dinner - A chuck wagon is a wooden wagon that would accompany folks going west or cowboys on a long stay in the fields. This wagon carried supplies which basically consisted of all the food and cooking equipment. Since our program at Clark's consists of doing everything cowboys do, we lead the participants in making their own chuck wagon dinner. This is a big treat for crews who sign up for the dinner since they have been eating dehydrated food for 10 days straight. This is typically the best meal they will eat on the trail.

Our dinner is stew and biscuits. We cook the stew in a big pot over a fire. Biscuits are baked in Dutch ovens (link) over hot coals. The participants help make the stew (for a can actually, so really just help open the cans) and prepare the biscuit batter. They build and tend the fire. Campers are also in charge of cleaning up after the meal is over. The PCs supervise the entire event which typically last about 4 hours start to finish. Chuck Wagon Shelter below.


Branding - One of the best things about stopping at a Western Lore camp is the opportunity to brand your boots. Nothing is more manly than pulling a hot iron from the fire and scorching some leather in the imprint of the Philmont brands. The state of New Mexico requires that all horses and cattle be branded with brand of their respective ranch. Philmont has two brands: Bar P Crazy S, the cattle brand, and Slash Crazy S, the horse brand.

Every hour, a PC in charge of branding for the day will hold a demonstration on how to brand. Participant listen to some history and general information then a safety demonstration about branding. Then they grab some gloves, pop off their boots, and go crazy. Brands are heated in a fire which they build and tend. They may brand any item they like, so long as it does not have a pulse. I have seen kids successfully brand many things: boots, belts, walking sticks, heavier weave shirts, hats. I have also seen kids try to brand many items un-successfully: t-shirts, waterbottles, canteens, plastic things, bandanas, and food. No participant has ever been hurt on my watch or at Clark's Fork while I was working but there is a story about a kid who tried to brand his arm. It did not go well.





Campfire - Every night just after sun down, the staff puts on a cowboy campfire. We typically have a few guitars, a fiddle, washboard, spoons, and a lot of vocal power (not always in the right key or at the right pitch and sometimes not even the right words). We tell stories, sing songs, throw out the occasional poem, and just basically have fun. Typical songs may include: The Gambler (everyone loves), Lonesome Dove, Night Rider's Lament, Ghostriders, The Real West, This Cowboys Hat, Just Can't See Them From the Road, Amarillo by Morning, and many many others. Most of the time there is a rough outline of what we will be doing and who will be talking next. Sometimes we just make it up as we go. Every campfire ends with an emotional closing and the Philmont Hymn.

Roping - Roping demos are given all day long whenever anyone asks. All PCs are taught how to rope and we constantly practice. We will show staffers how to rope properly then let them have at all the roping dummies in our front yard. Kids roping below.


Horse shoes - I am not sure if cowboys actually played horseshoes, but we do. We have 2 or 3 sets and someone is typically playing at all hours of the day. By the end of the summer, I am pretty good at "throwin shoes" yet hate the sounds of the shoe hitting the pole.

Porch Talks - Not really considered "program," one PC is in charge of sitting on the porch all day and making sure we welcome incoming crews and escort them to their campsite. This person also invites the crew onto our porch and spends 5-10 minutes reviewing all the camps program and laying out any ground rules or safety warnings.

Staff Chess Challenge - Invented by yours truly, I challenge any camper who would like to play a game of chess. The last summer I was there, I played over 200 games of chess and lost about 9. I'll have to check the scorecard. I still have it somewhere (and I will be sure to keep this seasons score card as well). Kids playing some chess below.


Click on Clarks Fork for a run down of one crews day and a few pictures as well.
BSA Troop675.org Philmont pages

This is a shot of our base camp, called Tent City, from Tooth of Time ridge. The rows and rows of green boxes on the left are staff tents. The rows and rows of brown things on the right are campers tents for incoming and outgoing treks. The red boxes are buildings (office, dining hall, trading post, health lodge, logistics, etc).

POSTAL MAIL and PACKAGES
-From April 14 - April 30, I will be on the road. May 1st I arrive at Philmont and will have access to receiving mail. Mail is delivered out to Clark's Fork every time we have a food run or most times a staffers returns to Clark's from days off. This means mail is delivered about once a week. Letters are always good. Post cards from your summer vacation are entertaining. But packages are always best. Anything I can eat is most valued with homemade things being prized above all else.

Derek Walden
Staff - Clark's Fork, Camp Director
Philmont Scout Ranch
47 Caballo Road
Cimarron, NM 87714

EMAIL
-From April 14 - May 20, I plan to check my email at least once every 3 days. While on the road, I will check at wireless hot spots and in base we have a wireless network. After May 20, I will probably only check my email on days off. This will be about once per month. So, feel free to email me anytime just don't expect a timely reply.

philmont@derekwalden.com

CELLULAR PHONE
-My voicemail will be active the entire time I am away although the unit may or may not be powered up. From April 14 - May 20, I will have daily access to my phone and will return calls as best as I can. From May 20 - August 18, feel free to leave a message and I will return it as soon as I go on days off. This should be about once per month.

513-403-1914

My typical day at Clark's Fork lasts from around 7AM-9PM. Wranglers typically wake up around 5AM and wrangle the horse to the coral, saddle the horses, then come down for breakfast around 7 to 7:30. Breakfast is served in our cabin. All staff (wranglers and PCs eat together) at our one huge table. Immediately after breakfast, program begins.

The first horse ride starts at 9AM. Branding runs every hour on the hour. Porch talks are given all day long as each crew arrives. Lunch is a little after midday (or whenever the wranglers finish up the morning trail ride) and last 1 hour. The afternoon horse ride starts at 1PM. All other program resumes after lunch.

Chuck wagon dinner preparations typically start around 3PM. Chuck wagon dinner is served around 5 or 5:30. Clean up starts immediately after dinner. Advisors coffee on the cabin porch is at 7PM. Campfire starts around 8PM and typically runs for a little over an hour. Last season I worked at Clark's we would always come back and play popular songs on the porch for an hour or so after campfire for anyone who wanted to stay. Some nights the staff would stay up and goof around, playing cards or just relaxing. But most nights, we would all turn in well before 11PM.

Backcountry staffers typically work 6 days on and 2 days off or 9 days on and 3 days off. As the Camp Director, I will be working longer shifts of only a few days off per month. My responsibilities as CD will be to oversee the general workings of the camp and make sure everything is running smoothly. Although I have a lot of procedural responsibilities, my job is to make sure everybody is doing what they are supposed to be doing and help out where needed.

As of right now, it looks I will be following this route. Destinations descriptions will follow.

Where are you going?
Philmont Boy Scout Ranch is located just outside Cimarron, NM. Cimarron is in the northeast corner of New Mexico and the ranch is located at the base of the Sangre de Christo mountains.

How long will you be gone?
Aug 20th. Until May 1st I will be driving cross country. From May 1st until May 21st I will be working Tent Crew in base camp and from May 21st til August 17th I will be Camp Director at Clark's Fork. I plan to return to Columbus, OH by August 20th.

Can I write you?
Sure. I will be checking my email as often as possible, but postal mail is the best bet.

Derek Walden
Staff - Clark's Fork, Camp Director
Philmont Scout Ranch
47 Caballo Road
Cimarron, NM 87714

For more info about contacting me, read this page.

Clark's Fork is a backcountry camp at Philmont. Clark's is located at the north western base of Tooth of Time ridge, directly north of Shafer's Pass.

Clark's is one of three horse camps in the backcountry where participants can go on a trail ride. In addition to horseback riding, scouts can learn to rope a steer or brand with hot irons. For dinner, scouts get the rare opportunity for a home cooked meal called a chuck wagon dinner consisting of beef stew and Dutch oven biscuits. And at the end of every day, the staff puts on a cowboy campfire.

The camp itself is little more than a cabin in the middle of the woods. The Camp Director or CD (me) sleeps in the cabin on a small cot near the radio (our only real form of communication with Base). The 5-7 other staffers, called Program Counselors or PCs, sleep outside behind the cabin in large green wall tents. About 200 yards up a hill to the East, is the Wrangler Bunk House and Coral. The Head Wrangler and his 3-4 Wranglers live, work, and sleep up in the bunk house. The Wranglers are more experienced horse riders and are in charge of wrangling the horses in the morning, saddling the horses, care of the horse, and primarily taking out 2 trail rides per day. The average trail ride has 20-25 campers with 3 Wranglers supervising and lasts about 2 hours. While separate, the PCs and Wranglers eat all meals together and often times overlap in responsibilities. The latrine/outhouse sits about 20 yards behind the staff cabin. Imagine a hole in the ground with a plywood box on top - welcome to our bathroom. Another 50 yards beyond that is the shower house. Don't get an ideas of glory here. This is a wonderfully inviting open air concrete box with a few shower heads mounted on the walls. We use it sparingly 1. because we don't care if we smell and 2. because Philmont is typically under draught conditions during the summer months which means we practice strict water conservation.

Clark's is one of the largest backcountry camps with 10+ campsites on the Northern and Eastern sides of the cabin and another 10+ campsites in a meadow about a quarter mile up the hill due West of the camp. A typical night at Clarks sees 70 campers. A busy night sees 150.

I am happy to announce that I will be spending my summer working at Philmont Boy Scout Ranch in Cimaron, NM as the Camp Director of Clark's Fork.

Philmont (named after the original land owner, Waite Phillips, and the location of the ranch at the base of Sangre de Christo mountains) is a high adventure backing camp which sees over 10,000 scouts each year. Participants, ages 14-18, hike on a 10 day trek where they carry everything they need from camp to camp over Philmont's 137,000 acres. The average hiker will cover 60+ miles and endure elevation changes from 6,000 to 12,000ft. Over the course of their 10 days, hikers will spend some nights at un-staffed camps and some nights at staffed camps where they can participate in "program" like rock climbing, mountain biking, black powder shooting, horseback riding, and spar pole climbing.

I have been to Philmont twice as a participant, once when I was 14 and once when I was 18. I have also served on staff for two summers, once as a Ranger and once as a Backcountry Program Counselor. A Ranger is a staffer who escorts each trek through their first three days at Philmont: Day One in base getting food, gear, medical check, maps, shake down, etc, Day Two is first day on the trail, Day Three is second day on the trail, Day Four is the Ranger's "hike-in day" where he hikes from wherever he is on the ranch back to base. A Backcountry Staffer runs program at any of the 32 backcountry camps that participants visit on their trek. While a ranger will have maybe 15 or more crews in four day intervals and will hike all over the ranch, a back country camp will see up to 13 crews in one day with a whole new set of 13 crews arriving the next day. My second year on staff was as a Program Counselor at a camp called Clark's Fork. Clark's is a western camp where the program consists of horseback riding, branding, roping, chuck wagon dinner, and campfire. This year I will be returning to Clark's as the Camp Director.

My stay at Philmont will be from May 1 – August 15 (approx). At Clark's we do have electricity and running water in our one cabin. The CD stays in the cabin (with the radio in case of emergency) and all PCs sleep outside in 2 person walls tents behind the cabin. We have an outhouse (hole in ground) and a shower house (4 shower heads mounted on wall of open air concrete square). We have no TV, no newspaper, no internet, no cellular phones. We have one supply truck which brings up a week's worth of food every 7-10 days. We typically work from 7AM-9PM everyday, with 7 days on followed by 2 or 3 days off. The days are very hot, topping out in the high 90s, and although our location is in the mountains (not the dessert) it is a very dry heat. A humid day is anything over 5%, although towards the end of July it will rain every day for 5 minutes between 1-2PM (this is jokingly called "The Rainy Season"). Hail is pretty common. The nights are dry and cold with lows between 35-50, depending on altitude. We have almost every type of animal imaginable including deer, elk, buffalo (our own herd), mountain lions, and bears (we lock our garbage in a bear proof metal box, the campers hang theirs 15 ft in the air from "bear cables"). Although I wouldn't describe this lifestyle as "roughing it," I am sure many of you would. It is a hard lifestyle, but a fun one. Which brings me to my request: WRITE TO ME.

Four months in the middle of nowhere, even seeing 100+ campers per day, you miss your friends and the comforts of home. As I have done before, I promise I will write a letter to anyone who sends me something. If you mail me a letter or a package, I will write you back with an update on how things are going. Letters telling me what is going on with you are great. Anything which tells me what is going on in the world is great (one year my friend Phil summarized important news stories).

BUT, we always like packages best. Food is excellent (home-made desserts are most valued, then store cookies and candy). Anything I can eat is excellent. Contraband is also good (cigars, news/entertainment/sports magazines, um other kinds of magazines, toys (I once got a GI JOE), mix CDs, etc). Surprise me. Go crazy. We are always so excited to get mail, we break down weeping with joy and gorge ourselves on the edible contents.

Derek Walden
Staff - Clark's Fork, Camp Director
Philmont Scout Ranch
47 Caballo Road
Cimarron, NM 87714

I leave Cincinnati for my cross country drive on April 13 or 14. I have a pretty good outline and timeframe, but there is time built in to simply stop and check out anything that I think might be interesting. Possible destinations include Louisville, KY; Atlanta, GA; Columbus, NC; Tallahassee, FL; New Orleans, LA; Dallas, TX; San Antonio, TX; Grand Canyon, AZ; Las Vegas, NV; and finally Cimarron, NM.

This is test #3.