Larry Goldsmith's 1998 Philmont Journal
July 7, 1998: Day 4 - Urraca Camp to Miners Park
| The scheduled wake-up was at 5:00 AM -- but the actual wake-up was at 5:43. I guess the plan has changed. It seemed that we are still timing our crew with a calendar as it was 7:05ish when we finally get out of camp. Since this is where we will be losing Brendan, we decide to go to Inspiration Point for breakfast and take the Wilderness Pledge. The views are spectatular especially with the view of the Tooth of Time. The cover picture of me on the home page of this journal was taken there. |
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After saying our farewells to Brendan, we are back at Urraca Camp and starting back up to Urraca Mesa at 8:45. As we are starting up, the crew puts Tim Lingelbach in the lead and told him to set a steady pace and that we would stop for a 5-minute break at the top. Denis and I both had done this trail before and looked at each other thinking that there was no way that we would make it to the top without stopping. Much to our surprise we arrived at the gate at the top of the trail in 30 minutes without a stop. As we crossed Urraca Mesa and started back down toward Stonewall Pass, we stopped at the lookout we stopped at yesterday. Blake recovered the bear bags that he left there. We continued down through Stonewall Pass and on toward Lovers Leap Camp. |
| Leaving Lovers we missed the trail to Miners Park and ended up on a small trail that looped us through the woods and dropped us back on the road. We finally found the trail from the road and took it to Miners Park arriving at 11:30. We were too late to get the 1:00 PM rock climbing program at Miners but were able to be scheduled for the 3 PM program. Hopefully, any rain today will hold off until after then. The staff agreed to open the showers for us so we got a quick shower and did laundry before setting up the tent or having lunch. |
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We left camp at 2:50 for the 3:00 rock climbing program with the clouds rolling in. On the way there was a brief shower and then another as we approached the site. When we arrived at the program area we met up with Crew 704-I-8 (Advisors Peter Karl and John Ippolito) leaving. They had been waiting to climb since 1 and were just told that the area was closing due to the wet rocks. We turned around and headed back towards camp. About half way back the skies opened. You could see the stream of water building the trail and flowing downhill. We went and checked back at the staff cabin to see about getting the tomorrow's 8:00 AM program but assumed that it wasn't possible. We were surprised when they were able to squeeze us into the program. Now we have to hope that the rocks dry out.
It started to rain again about 6:00 PM as we were trying to have dinner and it is still raining now at 9:00 PM. The crew has done a good job of coping with it all so far. A few are short on dry clothes so hopefully it will dry out in the morning.
At Advisors' Coffee this evening, the mood was lightened considerably by the Camp Director's reading of Dr. Seuss' "The Cat In The Hat" is a spirited fashion. We also learned how lucky we had been to get our Conservation Project taken care of so early in our Trek instead of today. Our sister crew, 704-I-6, had done the project today and was caught in a heavy hailstorm enroute from Crater Lake to Miners Park late in the afternoon.
