This is another story from my “youth” – there is no deep political meaning, no “moral” of the story. It’s just a story about a hike – and a dog.
The Challenge
Boy Scouting had a huge impact on my life. From leadership lessons to survival skills, physical challenges to a breadth of knowledge learned; Boy Scouting was a “game changer” for me. And, of course, Scouting gave me my first taste of teaching, and of a form of coaching, that would end up setting my career path.
We did a lot of hiking and camping in my “Tenderfoot” years in Boy Scouts, and I was thirteen when I took my first major backpacking trip. My troop, 229 out of Kettering, Ohio, sent us on an “expedition” to Philmont Scout Ranch in the mountains of New Mexico. I was fresh out of eighth grade, a wrestler, swimmer and track athlete, and I thought I was ready for the challenge.
But there’s nothing like that first ten-mile day in the 8000 feet altitude of New Mexico with a forty-five pound backpack. I remember cramping up as we worked our way out of the valley into the mountains, thinking maybe I had appendicitis, and they’d have to send me back. It wasn’t such a bad thought, the climb was tough, the air thin, and I was challenged by the effort.
Chili Mac and Dehydrated Ham
But it was a cramp, not appendicitis, and after the first two days I adapted to the altitude, the effort, and the dehydrated food. By the way, there’s an amazing transition that occurs on every long-term backpacking trip. That first night, no matter what the menu item, powdered and dehydrated food tastes like — well, it tastes bad. Even the chili mac, something that you might even serve at home, just isn’t particularly good. It’s eat a few bites, then crawl into your sleeping bag.
But somehow there’s a magical transformation that occurs in the pack, as the food gets jostled and tossed on that second day. When that day’s journey ends, the tents are pitched and the fire going, the dehydrated onion soup followed by rehydrated noodles and ham in tomato sauce with “Bolton biscuits” (unbreakable, non-crumbling biscuit product) and powdered chocolate pudding is the best!!
Traveling America
So I learned a lot about backpacking. My family moved to Cincinnati and I joined Troop 819. We hiked on the Appalachian Trail (AT) on the Tennessee/North Carolina border, again on the AT in New Hampshire off of the Kancamagus Highway, and in the Maroon Bells of Colorado. We had great adventures, and by the time I was an adult, I no longer dreaded that first day with the now sixty-pound pack and steep elevation changes. We’d been snowed-in on the Roan Plateau above Rifle, Colorado in June, and covered the incredibly steep elevations changes of the White Mountains in New Hampshire.
We hiked a lot with the troop, and one of the places we enjoyed with the Susquehanna Trail, only a few hours drive away in north-central Pennsylvania. I was nineteen or twenty, old enough to drive one of the vehicles, when we took a crew on that trail. We dropped our vehicles at a little town called Cross Fork, and headed up into the mountains.
In the Woods
That first night, as the rookies groaned and crawled off to bed and the Scoutmasters lit their tobacco, I noticed something moving, just beyond the light of our campfire. It seemed fascinated with the remains of our dinner, and got just close enough for us to recognize as a dog we’d seen as we left our cars and trooped through town. He’d followed us up onto the trail, and come the six or so miles we climbed to our first campground.
So we set some food out for him, and went to bed, thinking he’d turn around and head back to Cross Fork. The next day, the adults hiked at the rear. That’s not because we were “stragglers”, but this way it was the youth leaders directing the hike, and the younger kids didn’t struggle back by themselves. Even in following the map, it was all about leadership. I’ve walked dozens of miles, knowing it was the wrong way, and waiting for a fifteen-year-old to figure it out. We had everything we needed, so what if our excursion the wrong direction left us too far off-course to correct that day. We could bed down wherever we needed to and straighten things out in the morning.
Blue Tick
And being in the back meant that we would get glimpses of anything following us. And that dog, instead of going home to Cross Fork, was getting closer and closer to our group the whole time. But nightfall when we reached our second camp, he was about ready to come in and join us. Dinner closed the deal, and we had another friend along for the trip.
He was a “blue-tick” coon hound, and when he got to know us, he was incredibly friendly. We didn’t have a name for him, just called him “dog”. But that seemed silly, so as we sat around the fire that night, I tried to guess what his name might be. After all of the usuals, from Buddy to Spot, I started working through the first names of Presidents (I would eventually become a history teacher). He didn’t respond to George or John, and I got all the way to Dwight with no luck. There already had been a couple of Johns, so I used Kennedy’s family nickname – Jack.
The dog’s eyes lit up, and he ran up to me. Whatever his real name, Jack was the one he wanted us to use. And so we had another in the line of stumbling Scouts working through the Pennsylvania woods, though this one was pretty agile – Jack, the blue-tick coon hound.
A Mouthful
As we hiked, Jack would wander away from the crew for a while. But I’m sure the dozen boys we had made so much noise as we tromped along, that Jack could find his way back to us easily. He’d run up, check on us, then head out again. That night he caught up with us as we were pitching our camp. But this time it wasn’t a joyful run. He slunk into camp, whining as he came up to me. Jack had made a big mistake. He tried to catch a porcupine, and got a mouthful of quills for his trouble.
We debated what to do about a dog we didn’t know with quills around his mouth. It was clear Jack couldn’t eat in that condition, so we had to do something. Porcupine quills are a lot like fishhooks, they go in easy, but they’re barbed to come out ugly. But, unlike a fishhook, you couldn’t just push a dozen barbs the rest of the way through Jack’s lips and pull them out from the inside. There was only one way to help him.
Hot Pot Tongs
We always carried Hot-Pot-Tongs, basic pliers made of forged aluminum. They were lighter than regular pliers, and designed to lift our pots off of the fire. But they worked like pliers in a “pinch”, and so I decided that they would work on Jack.
For the next twenty-four hours, Jack and I performed the “ritual” of quill removal. He would slink up to me, whimpering, and wait for me to get the Hot-pot-tongs. I would grab a quill, and jerk it out. Jack might let me get two, but then he’d run off just outside of the camp, and wait for a while. Eventually he’d come back, wander up to me, and we’d do it again.
It took most of two days, with twenty miles of trails to cover in the time, to get all the quills out of Jack’s mouth. But we finally got him “quill-free”, and Jack was happy to consume his portion of whatever dehydrated gastronomic delight we were serving that night.
You’re Gonna Die
In the Pennsylvania mountains you have to worry about two wild animals. The first are the rattlesnakes. The hang out on the rocky outcroppings, usually ones that provide the best views over the scenic valleys. It makes sense to do a bit of checking before you decide to take your pack off, sit down and enjoy the view.
There’s an old hiking joke about the guy who gets bit on the butt by a rattlesnake. His buddy runs back into town to get the doctor, but all the doctor can do is give him treatment advice. “Well,” says the doc, “you take your pocket knife, and you cut ¼ inch deep wounds through the bite marks.” “Yep” says the buddy, “I can do that.” “Then,” the doc says, “you take your mouth, and you suck the blood and venom out of the wounds.” “What!?” says the buddy. “You suck the venom out,” says the Doc, “that’s the way to fix your friend”.
The buddy runs back up the mountain, to find his friend laying on his stomach, moaning, “What did the Doc say?” The response – “the Doc says you’re gonna die”.
We did see a rattler on this trip, right in the middle of the trail. We detoured around it, worrying about its mate the whole time. But the other wild animals that can really cause trouble are black bears. Bears do one thing well, and that’s find food. So leaving food around camp, or in the tent with you, is just a bad idea. We had to emphasize to the kids, that the candy bar for the middle of the night might be a great snack, but it might not be for you.
Night Attack
Anyway, one of the last nights on the trail, we had to sleep in a “dry camp”. That meant no running water around, and we had to conserve our supply. We set up our tents, and as we were turning in heard some thrashing around in the woods. The leaders made sure the food supply was secured in the trees and we went to bed.
But there still was something moving around out there. And as my tentmate and I settled in, we worried about what might happen. In the middle of the night, I woke up to something rustling up against the nylon tent wall. I put my hand against it, and felt fur on the other side. Was there a bear right beside us? I carefully started to unzip the front door, but before I could get it open – fur and legs came flying into the tent!! We were under attack!!!! – by Jack, who obviously was as worried about what was out there in the night as we were. So our two-man tent became two men and a dog for that night.
Jack’s Back
So after a week or so out on the trail, we finally completed our circuit and arrived back at Cross Fork. There’s kind of an American contrast: a bunch of grimy, dirty, no-shower-in-a-week kids and adults marching with packs down the Main street of a little town. But we were surprisingly welcomed. Town kids watched us coming in, and started yelling “Jack’s back, Jack’s back”. Jack said his goodbyes to us, and returned to his home in Cross Fork, Pennsylvania. As it turns out, this wasn’t his first excursion with a backpacking group. He was the “town dog;” everyone was happy to see him return.
It’s been a while since I’ve been out on the trail. My backpack is in rafters above the garage, along with all the other equipment gathering dust over the years. But I still remember the elemental peace that hiking brings, when the biggest concern of the day was getting up the next mountain, checking out the views along the way, and getting the porcupine quills out of Blue Tick Coon Hound’s mouth.
