The Great Camping Adventure by Bob Johnson

My best friend Bradley and I were Cub Scout participants.  It was a wonderful program and we learned so much about ourselves, our abilities, and developing friendships. Advancement was a big part of being a successful scout. During our last year of the program, at age 11, we decided we had enough knowledge to go on a solo camping adventure.

Bradley lived on a farm about seven miles from our little town in central Montana. It was a flatland farming community. Acres and acres of crops such as wheat, barley, durum and oats covered the country side. His family raised a few cattle to supplement their income. Farmers were at the mercy of Mother Nature in that part of the world so hedging a bet with cattle was not uncommon. 

We picked up knowledge from manuals, other group adventures, and listening to our leaders and older members of Scouting about camping. 

We decided we were ready. The handbook told us to make a list of essential items for successful adventure. We did that. Bradley’s dad had a pup tent. We kind of knew how it set up. Check. We found some old binoculars in the garage and although only one lens worked we decided it would suffice. Check. A compass, we didn’t have a clue how it worked but read where it was an absolute necessity in outdoor trekking. Check. Matches. Check. A scout knife. Yes, I had just gotten one the year before for Christmas. Check. We had our own sleeping bags, pillows, and a change of clothing. We had learned to be ready for any change in weather so we packed a couple of winter parkas, just in case. This is Montana, in August, where the temperature is about 85 degrees. You never knew. 

Now food. This was an open subject so we decided to bring packable and easy prep items. We got some carrots and two big potatoes from his Mom’s garden, and some beef jerky from the pantry. A quart of milk, an apple, and a couple of Clarks Bars. We would not starve. We wrapped the vegetables in tin foil and dumped all of our supplies into a large paper bag. We were off. Wait! The manual said we should have some kind of shovel for digging latrines, and fire pits. It showed a picture of a folding backpack tool. We looked around and decided the snow shovel leaning against the back of the house might work. It was quite large and cumbersome but a shovel was on the list of things to bring so we dragged it along.

We debated where we should camp. The farm had 80 acres of hilly pasture land south and east of his home. He had hunted gophers in that area so he knew it would be an easy hike. He did mention that there were occasional coyote sightings up there and they could be heard at night. We decided, after much thought, of setting up camp about fifty yards from the house. We nestled and wrestled our tent up between two rows of caraganas. They were hardy bushes that served as wind breaks for most farms and ranches in this windy dry region. We felt like our set up was well hidden and private. 

The excitement was great, as we were on our own in the wilderness. The first order of business was to build a fire in a safe area. The snow shovel wasn’t exactly easy to use, but we cleared a fire break area about six feet around our chosen site. The plan was to dig a fire pit in the center. That’s what the manual said, so that’s what we did. The actual digging of a hole in that ground was difficult. The shovel was really worthless at this point so we found some old dead branches, sharpened them to a point and stabbed at the earth to loosen it up. Success! We had what we wanted in about an hour. 

There wasn’t an abundance of twigs  and kindling to get our blaze going so we walked up to the barn and grabbed some dried out boards that had, in years gone by, been some kind of a shed. The fire wouldn’t take off as we struggled to get a flame. We had to think on our feet as we were intrepid explorers so Bradley ran back to the house and found a stack of newspapers. We bunched them up in the hole, covered them with small pieces of wood and struck a match. We were down to the last bundle of paper, crouched around the pit and lit our last match. A piece of wood had actually started burning. We were cooking now! 

We added fuel until we had a substantial blaze going. We talked about the fact we should have had some marshmallow or hot dogs. Maybe next time. The bed of coals burned brightly and we moved the embers to the side of the hole, buried our wrapped vegetables and covered them with the hot coals. We decided it would take a while to cook so we went on to other things. 

The farm reservoir was a short distance from our site so we walked over to it. There was something wonderful about a body of water. The water was anything but clear and beautiful. The cattle came in the far side for drinks and sloshed around in it during the hot days. Cattails, water lilies, and other unidentifiable plants adorned the edges of the water. We threw rocks at different targets, waded into the murky liquid, tried to track down a couple of croaking frogs, and talked about getting a jarful of the water and boiling it to drink. We read that in our scout books too. We didn’t do it. Too much work. It was time to eat.

We found we had left the foil wrapped food a little too long. The potato was quite black and the carrot did not look like a carrot. No hot food tonight. We covered the fire pit with dirt and poured enough water on it to drown an elephant. A proper scouting move. The jerky was good and it was cool to drink milk out of the carton without being yelled at. We took turns chomping on the apple. It was a contest to see who could take the last bite. Needless to say only the stem remained in that game. I lost, but didn’t have a bunch of apple seeds in my belly. The chocolate bar for dessert and we were set to roll the sleeping bags out. 

We had to haul straw from the barn to use as a bedding cushion because we had set our tent up on a rock pile and needed something to make things more comfortable. We looked for cattle and coyotes with our monocular and dug a three inch deep moat around the tent in case a monsoon of rain might hit us. The canal would sweep the water away from our domicile. 

It was time for bed. We wrapped up in the sleeping bags and tried to out burp and out fart each other. Each attempt of quality noise, of course, was followed by giggles. It wasn’t dark out yet but dusk was fast approaching. 

Sometime in the next hour or so we had run out of jokes and scary stories. I went to sleep.

Suddenly I was awake. There was an animal at the tent entrance. The coyote had come to drag us away. I heard some noise that I thought was deep growling. I was terrified.

“Tippy, get out of here!” Bradley yelled.

The family dog apparently had come up to see what was going on at the camp. 

The ten o’clock hour came and my camping partner and I were snug and warm and safe in our sleeping bags. A plush pillow cradled my head. The floor of the living room was soft and cushiony. I went to sleep.