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The 99-Cent Tent
The boys still possess the indestructibility of youth. Clay and Ron are both younger men than I and regularly take part in strenuous activities. That means that I, graying and only semi-fit, have to find a way to keep up with this pack of supermen for a week. I should be out walking or running every day, or maybe doing pushups or losing a few pounds, but somehow I never get around to these sensible preparations. Instead, I scheme and I plan to pack very, very light indeed. While the other guys lug 50-pound packs through the terrible terrain that we must traverse, mine will weigh the barest minimum amount I can contrive. At one time I thought that I might get it down to 10 pounds, but it now seems that I will have to haul a little more weight than that. Still I continue to experiment. Last Friday I visited Shirey's Hardware and bought a medium weight 9 foot by 12-foot clear plastic drop cloth. This was somewhat thicker than sandwich wrap, but still in the same family. I opened it up flat on the floor at my office, applied duct tape at various strategic points, and in half an hour had created a pyramid shaped tent with floor dimensions of about 6 feet by 6 feet. I rolled up the finished shelter and put it on my postal scale. It weighed a mere half a pound. Our normal troop tents are not a lot bigger that this, and weigh 9 pounds or so. Now that is the sort of edge I will need to survive! The other great thing about this tent is that it only cost 99 cents, if you don't count the cost of the duct tape. The big question now was --- would the thing work? Later that afternoon, a bunch of us from the troop met at the Scout Room in the Mason's Building, got geared up, and hied ourselves off to Camp Coffman for the weekend. This is our third time at this old-fashioned ex-Boy Scout camp near Kossuth, and this expedition held few terrors for me. Some old cheese, left un-refrigerated in the grub chest when we were out last month, did add an odd odor to the proceedings, but I didn't care. I hugged my new tent and my old briefcase to my chest and organized the departure. By 7 p.m. we had arrived and everyone was merrily setting up camp and exploring a bit before dinner. My little plastic wonder went up like a dream. Sure, when I was inside it, I kept hearing my Mother's voice saying, "Don't EVER put your head in a plastic bag!" Also, it was a bit disconcerting to have the Scouts come over and look through the walls of my tent when they had a question to ask. Still, my Mother's voice faded away, and the Scouts came to accept, even to admire (do I kid myself?), the novelty of my little plastic shelter. When it came time to go swimming, it felt distinctly odd to change in a transparent enclosure, but I just picked my moment and made short work of it. I liked my little tent! The afternoon was hot and buzzy with insects, but behind the overflow of the dam, it was cool and noisy with the splash of water and the happy screams of boys. Beaker and I had a good time splashing the other Scouts, and they in turn, made sure that we did not remain dry very long. After the swim I tried another experiment. Food is going to be a problem on the backpacking expedition. What is the least weight of food I can take along and survive? I had brought a little Sterno stove to Camp Coffman with me. This weighed about two pounds, including lots of fuel. I also had brought along various dry foods to try out with this stove. Now, as it got dark, I poured two cups of spring water into a small aluminum pan, and put this over the slight blue flame of the stove to boil. To the water, I added the contents of a package of Lipton's Rice and Savory Chicken. There was no chicken at all in this package of oddly colored rice, but you could definitely tell that a chicken had been near it at one time. Next I squirted a little liquid butter into the pan, and then I sat and waited for the rice to suck up the water. The package said that when this happened, it was dinnertime. By the time that this wondrous transformation of the rice occurred, it was full dark and the smell of the experiment had brought four Scouts out of the night with spoons in hand. Two cups is a lot of rice to eat, but the five of us made short work of it and agreed that this was a mighty fine rice and invisible chicken dish. I do believe that I will see if a grown man can survive on such fare for a week, though I will certainly be longing for a greasy cheeseburger at the end. The rest of the weekend was glorious. The older boys slept on the old parade ground with their heads poking out from beneath a tarp that they just laid on top of their sleeping bags. During the night a heavy dew fell, and in the morning Curt could be heard to scream in horror, "My hair is wet, my hair is wet!" That morning we got the old flagpole working, after clearing a hornet nest from its mechanism. Then, with Curt playing the role of Camp Director, the younger lads practiced doing flag ceremonies in preparation for summer camp, and to get yet another step closer to becoming Tenderfeet. We hiked over to Deer Rock, and once again wondered about this peculiar remnant of the 1800's. We went to Balancing Rock, explored the Ice Cave and got bitten by bugs. Later, some Scouts learned to fly fish, while others were content to sit around and listen to strange stories of days spent at Camp Coffman long ago. Ace and I found ways into the many remaining camp buildings and saw what had changed since my days as a counselor here in the early sixties. We all swam again, and had a campfire, and then slept again. The tarp boys, very leery of the dew, opted for a tent that second night. Sunday morning was another beauty. We ate our breakfast and then marched in silence across the Swinging Bridge to the old campfire circle. There I ranted away in amiable fashion for 10 minutes or so, and then it was time to break camp and head for home. Would you believe it? As I walked toward my little clear shelter, intent on taking it down, the plastic at its peak finally gave under the strain, and it fell in a heap to the ground. Having already decided that an opaque, nylon version would be better for the trip, I laughed out loud, balled up the plastic and said, "The great thing about a 99 cent tent is that you can throw it away at the end of the campout."
No
less than three thrifty Boy Scouts piped in unison
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"Give it to me!" |
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I
am in a bit of a tizzy. In just two weeks, I am to set out on a
backpacking adventure with Clay Williams, Ron Kopko, and a bunch of
the more experienced Scouts in the troop. We will be driving to the
Grand Canyon of Pennsylvania, where we'll spend five days humping
our gear through the howling wilderness of Tioga County.