Father-Son Campout

This past Friday-Saturday was the Stake Father-Son Campout, or, as I thought of it, the greatest test to date of my fathering skills. I’ve had all of the kids for extended periods of time by myself, but always on my home court, or at least a home court, but never in the woods with fire, snakes, and bears. To say the least, I feared tragedy.


We were camping at Water Canyon, in the Cibola National Forest near Magdalena. After driving though some uninspiring desert plains, you ascend through the foothills to a secluded canyon in the mountains with a stream running near the campsite. Except for the occasional cholla cactus, it felt a lot like the Uintahs.

After setting up camp, we had dinner. We then went on a little hike up along the stream, which meanders around, but never widens more than 3 feet across. In spots, the trail dead-ended on one side, so we had to cross and take it up on the other side. We then scrambled up the hillside and got a view of the canyon from above. We repeated this hike Saturday morning, but with more adventure.

It was early Saturday when we began hiking. Isaac’s internal clock means he wakes up around 6 am every day, no matter how tired he is or how late he stays up. So we were hiking by 7:30. As we hiked up the canyon, I heard a sound to our right, at the top of the hill. Four deer ran off through the brush not 100 feet away. Later, 2 more deer crossed the trail 50 yards ahead of us. Here the boys stop to watch some sort of bug, which to them was more interesting than the deer.
We stopped about a mile into the canyon, at a spot where a large, sheer outcropping rose from the canyon floor. Seeing a great opportunity, I scaled up 50 feet or so while the boys tossed pebbles into the stream and looked for more bugs.