This was our only totally dry camp of the trip, two nights with no electricity, water, or dump beyond what our rigs could do. The location was a group favorite – quiet, very remote, massive views, great hiking, and an excellent cook-group-provided taco salad. (OK, so Marcia and I were team members.)
Two interesting dynamics came to a head here. A couple of caravaners got in a heated discussion with our leader over how things were being run. The leader, to his credit, was receptive and things improved on the remainder of the trip. The other incident involved an independent cuss with a walking stick and we suspected some health problems. He broke off from a hiking group and chose his own route. Search groups spontaneously formed when he didn’t return in a reasonable time. He eventually returned on his own upset that people were looking for him, but it took quite a while to get the searchers back into camp. One searcher publicly and rightfully bawled the guy out for hiking alone.
As a sidelight, we knew parts of our campground were verboten as having special meaning to the local Indians. Our errant hiker, and separately some of the searchers, stumbled into an area behind a ridge that was obviously used for ceremonies. At first the site appeared empty, but a searcher did encounter some Indians that offered a beer and help, and warned of a bear in the area. The next morning the bear was seen in our camp.
The gentlemen lounging in the camp chairs are Henry and Carlos, our parkers of the day, not working too hard. More about Henry in a later posting. Carlos (as I read him) is a successful serial entrepreneur from Texas, and he and Rosemary are nice people. Carlos is well-read on Burning Man and would really like to go, Rosemary more hesitant.
At this camp he and Rosemary drove back to Banff, parked their trailer, and drove to Calgary to catch a plane to a Dallas wedding. They rejoined us a few days later in Hope, British Columbia.
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