This week’s moment in troop history comes from Bill Hoover, one of our past scoutmasters and a longtime charter organization representative and supporter of local scouting.
The 1998 High Adventure was conducted out of Camp Gorsuch, Great Alaska Council, Chugiak, NE of Anchorage. This was the camp’s trial offering of a high adventure trek. We don’t know if the program was ruled a success and continued. They are offered elsewhere, however.
We joined Scouts and Scouters from several other councils on the ten-day trek. We were divided into two groups based on age, physical fitness, and level of risk aversion. The major differences of their treks were the amount of time spent on glacial travel and repelling into crevasses. We were driven to a trail base leading into the Chugach Mountains. We were truly in a wilderness, not accessible other than by air. Each group was led by a professional guide. The “advanced” group got the oldest and most experienced guide. The other, the “easy-go,” group got a much younger man with a skill level somewhat questionable.
Fortunately, the weather was warm and dry. This caused the grizzly bear population to migrate down to the Sound. Unfortunately, this limited potable water sources to seeps, and runoff near the top of a glacier or snow field. Water in glacial feed streams isn’t potable because of its till content, i.e. ground up rocks. This and how cold the water was, led to no one being willing to bathe. Bear proofing food and smellables was essentially futile because the only trees were short aspen.
The first day the easy-go group hiked far enough to be near the base of a glacier, after crossing a roaring stream using the buddy system. We had to carry everything needed for 10 days, including all food. The meals got a little lean around the eighth day. We cooked on white gas stoves, requiring being lit as little as possible. Each day we hiked near or onto glaciers. The easy-goes packed up enough equipment to be right at the face of a glacier. We set up camp and hiked onto the glacier, avoiding crevasses. Getting back down was easy by glissading, i.e. sliding on your feet, like skiing. That night we crammed as many of us as possible into each tent. This was necessary because we carried in less than half the tents from base camp. This turned out to be fortuitous. The wind that night was gale force, causing the tents to roll over, “sleepers” and all.
Climbing mountains to the top of snow fields was a favorite activity. These are the white streaks high up on a mountain side. Their slopes are steep enough to provide sufficient gravity for boots to slip on the surface.
Because food was almost gone we left a day early for the trail head. The guide had a cell phone with him, used to order pizza. This apparently wasn’t unusual because the delivery man had no trouble finding us. Upon returning to Camp Gorsuch the first task was to turn-in the equipment. Most of the tents had to be replaced because of wind damage. The next was a shower. I never knew that a warm shower with soap could be the best thing since __________. Use your imagination to fill-in the blank.
The advanced group spent more time on glacial travel. They learned to avoid crevices, cracks in the ice sheet. They learned how to rope up, including hard hats, ice axes, and crampons. They saw a crevice from the inside by rappelling into one and safely back up. They summited Calliope Peak in the Symphony Range, and left their names on a rock there. They watched an iceberg calving into Portage Lake. Unlike like the grizzles, some black bears stay in the area, giving the crew the pleasure of watching a black bear wandering through their base camp when the returned one day.
Standing: Dave Hall, Martin Burg, x, Jim Scheider, x, x, C. Briggs, Sam Hoover
Kneeling: x, Bill Hoover, x, x, x, x
X’s: D. Heiss, J. Hirt, M. Dieckman, B. Rillinpeck, B. Pidegon, J. Hoggett, S. Ramsey
Can you help us identify any of the scouts in this photo? Please tag them or contact us!
