Backpacking Lost Maples

This weekend I guided an UT Outdoor Recreation backpacking trip to Lost Maples State Natural Area with Ellie.  Since my trip the previous weekend had been cancelled, this was my first trip as 'lead guide' - although it did not really feel this way since Ellie and I essentially split the role.

I started communicating with my assigned guides for the trip - Ellie and Morgan - about a week before our departure date.  Morgan ended up not guiding the trip since our participant numbers were low (just 8 for a trip that could take at most 12) and she was stressed due to upcoming tests.  So it ended up being just Ellie and I.  We led the pre-trip meeting on Wednesday, where we met the 8 participants and handed out gear.  Our eight participants were an interesting mix where no one really knew each other before starting.

I planned a menu of my favorite backpacking meals, and then completed a food buy on Thursday from 11am to 1pm, and then repackaged and labelled food for the trip on Thursday afternoon.  I met with Ellie back at the Outdoor Center around 2pm on Friday to pull gear for the trip and make our 10 piles of group gear (one for each person on the trip).  Our participants began arriving at 3:30pm and we departed shortly after 4pm.

The drive to Lost Maples State Natural Area was slow due to Friday afternoon traffic.  We had dinner at Whataburger in Fredericksburg and then made the remainder of our drive to Lost Maples in the dark.  My car enjoyed Above & Beyond and Tritonal podcasts during the drive. :)

Once we arrived at Lost Maples, Ellie and I were unable to find any self-registration envelopes, so we wrote notes on pieces of paper promising to come check-in and pay on Sunday afternoon and left them on our windshields.  Then we drove to the western parking lot (which surprisingly only had one car in it), unloaded, and then took the West trail 1.95 miles to Primitive Campsite E.

Once at Primitive Campsite E we selected a nice site and Ellie and I gave a demo on how to set up a tent.  Then the participants set up the other three tents.  Ellie and I shared our tent with the one female participant, so we all settled our sleeping pads and sleeping bags into our tent.  Once everyone was settled in, Ellie and I discussed our plans for Saturday with the group, and then we all sat in a circle around a lit up orange Nalgene and told various jokes and stories.  Around 10:30pm a relatively large and loud Boy Scout troup rolled into our campsite, but luckily they set up camp reasonably far from us.

Around 11pm, I walked back to the pit toilet 0.26 miles away.  On the way back, I stopped in the middle of the trail and turned off my light.  The stars were amazing.  I took a deep breath and realized that it is moments like this that always draw me back to backpacking and guiding despite the stress and physical demands of some of our trips.  It really put me in a relaxed mindset for the rest of the weekend.

I slept relatively well on Friday night, even dreaming about the Boy Scouts waking up early with a trumpet call.  Luckily this did not actually happen, and I awoke to my alarm at 7am.  Ellie and I got dressed and started cooking our hash browns and sausages breakfast.  We brought 2 sausage sticks and 1.5 bags of hash browns - in hindsight, 2 bags of hash browns would have been a better amount.  But I do not think anyone was hungry at the end of breakfast.

We had camp packed up by 9am, and then did some circle + story stretches.  After stretching, we hiked 1.03 miles through Mystic Canyon to the turn-off for the West Loop trail.  I opted to stay with the backpacks while the rest of the group went on the 2.37 mile loop trail.  Darren left me his folding chair, so I got to relax in peace for about an hour.  I saw a few other groups hiking on the trail, but I spent most of the time studying the various birds flying overhead.  Once they finished the loop trail, then we had just 1.11 miles to our lunch stop at Primitive Campsite C.  We arrive for lunch shortly after noon.

Lunch consisted of tortillas, peanut butter, sunflower seeds, and apricots.  We also should have had honey with lunch, but no one got it out.  Around 1:15pm we continued onward towards Primitive Campsite A.  The first 0.35 miles were a rough, steep, uphill climb.  But then the next 1.37 miles were flat and downhill.  We stopped for some scenic overlooks and generally enjoyed the scenery during this hike.  Once at camp, Ellie, Elizabeth and I set up our tent and then we all sat together and played cards until 5:30pm when we all walked back up hill to watch the sunset from a scenic overlook.  The first scenic overlook we tried actually could not see the sunset, but the second one actually yielded a great view of the sunset.  This was another peaceful, rewarding 'this is why I backpack/guide' moment.

After sunset, we walked back to camp and Ellie and I cooked the pasta, carrots, celery, chicken, and spices meal.  It turned out really well, and was the perfect amount for our group!  After dinner we chatted for a while, but we were all pretty ready to retire around 9:30pm.  I put my backpack under the vestibule in my tent since it contained all the trash for the weekend and the Sunday breakfast food, but did not think to tell everyone else to do the same thing since the forecast predicted the potential for rain.

I slept really well Saturday night, and was very well rested Sunday morning.  I awoke at 7am despite my alarm not being set to go off until 7:30am.  I enjoyed just laying in my sleeping bag for those 30 minutes.  However, the periodic dripping I heard on the tent implied that it was either slightly raining or had rained over night.  A look outside showed that it had not rained, but it was gently misting.  Hence, I put my rain gear on before getting out of the tent.

I heated water for an oatmeal breakfast while Ellie and Darren went to filter another 8 litres of water.  We all ate, and then took down our tents and packed up camp.  We had just a short 1.3 miles back to the main parking lot, and then another 0.15 miles to our cars.

We loaded up, and then stopped at the visitor's center.  I got to buy a new state parks pass using the trip card since my park pass had expired in December.  This is one of the few perks of being a volunteer adventure trip guide with RecSports, and I'm very happy to have a state parks pass again! :)

Then we took a scenic drive to Stonehenge II in Ingram, TX where we ate lunch shortly after noon.  We had pitas, lettuce, hummus, peppers, olives, avocados, Pringles and Oreos.  Again, I think the amount of food was just right!  We then drove about 40 minutes to Dairy Queen in Fredericksburg, and then home to Austin.  We arrived back on campus around 3:40pm.

Once back at the Outdoor Center, we unpacked the bags, hung the wet tents, disinfected the sleeping pads, hung and disinfected the sleeping bags, cleaned the dishes, and put back the various other supplies.  Once all the participants left, Ellie and I reviewed the trip evaluations, finished cleaning up, and returned the cars.

For my first 'lead guide' trip, I think everything went very well.  The post-trip evaluations were very positive, with the only negative comment being that we should have taught more about how to backpack on your own.  This is a common comment - among both participants and guides - but the truth is that our program is ran more as a guide service than as a teaching program.  However, if someone asks me to teach them skills or involve them in cooking/filtering/navigation processes, I'm happy to.

Some particular post-trip thoughts:

• I planned the meals well - both in terms of meals that people liked and in terms of proportions.  I was also happy with the very limited amount of trash I had to carry around - I also did a good job repackaging food in the Outdoor Center before the trip.
• Ellie and I communicated well, and worked well together.  Really no complaints.  She is cool to work with, and we created a good, relaxed vibe for the trip.
• Ellie and I also did a good job of communicating with the participants.  I think they likely had a good idea about our plans and schedule throughout the trip.
• I personally had no knee pain during the trip.  I did wear my IT band, which does seem to make a big difference.
• We did not need the first aid kit at all during our trip.  No pain medicines, mole skin, ect were needed!
• I would not change anything about the trip except I would have worn long-sleeves and/or sunscreen on Saturday and I should have asked the participants to put their backpacks under their vestibules on Saturday night since the chance of rain was high.

On the hill overlooking the lake

The lake and our lunch spot

Darren's collage from our Sunday morning hike

 Just four bags of trash!  That's great trash management! :)

Backpacking Lost Maples

This weekend I guided an UT Outdoor Recreation backpacking trip to Lost Maples State Natural Area with Tommy and Sara.

We had our pre-trip meeting on Thursday evening where we met the participants, went over the trip itinerary, and gave out backpacks.  It was interesting to find out that only two of the twelve participants were male, that we had three foreign exchange students, and that most of the participants were freshmen.  Most of the participants seemed to not know each other prior to the pre-trip meeting.

Tommy and I met at the outdoor center at 2:45pm on Friday to finalize preparations.  We checked the gear that had been set out by the Outdoor Center staff, selected what food to take with us, and then divided all the food, tents, and group gear into 15 piles of approximately equal weight and size.  We had two group water pouches (one 6L and one 4L), so those piles were obviously heavier.

As the participants arrived we gave them sleeping bags and pads to add to their packs.  Then we told them to each select a pile and also put that into their bag.  We departed at 4pm as planned.

Traffic was rough leaving Austin, but the participants in the Suburban I was driving were talkative and seemed to be getting along great considering they had just met.  We reached the Fredricksburg Whataburger at 6pm, where we stopped for a quick dinner.  I enjoyed some chicken nuggets and fries, and we got back on the road around 6:30pm.  After dinner most of the car slept although Sara stayed awake with me and we chatted some.  I followed Tommy's Suburban the entire way.  Once we reached the park we filled out the after hours registration cards and parked by the trail head for the West Trail.  There was a boy scout truck projecting flying eagle designs into the skies using lasers by the trail head, which we though was a bit excessive and certainly not LNT since they were causing light pollution as well as pollution from the gas generator they were running to power the lasers.

Lost Maples SNA trail map

Once we had our packs on, we headed for back country primitive campground E.  After hiking 1.73 miles (with one uphill climb), we reached the campground, where we found only one family set up.  We selected an area, and then set up our five tents.  Tommy led a demonstration on how to set up the 3-person tents, but broke a tent pole while setting up the tent so we took that tent as the 'guide tent'.  We helped the participants set up their tents after finishing ours.

Once the tents were set up, we all walked out from under the cedar trees to look up at the stars.  It was a new moon and a clear night, so we could see so many stars!  Tommy studies astronomy, so he pointed out some constellations.  We could also see the Milky Way!  This was only the second place I'd been able to see it (the first was Big Bend), so that was pretty near.  Eventually some of us walked back to the composting toilet 0.25 miles away, where we ran into some boy scouts who rudely shined their lights into our faces and called us Sasquatch.  Not a good way to greet others on the trail.  Most of us went to bed around 11am.

Tommy started the night sleeping outside the tent, but he opted to crawl in around 3am since the bugs were too bad outside.  This forced Sara to the middle of the tent and me to the right side.  When we awoke at 7:30am (after snoozing our 7am alarm since it was still pretty dark out), we noticed that Tommy had a dead mosquito on his face that he had apparently killed during the night!  We started packing up and started water boiling.  We made some coffee and oatmeal with the hot water.  We left camp around 9:30am.

We had a short downhill stretch before walking through Mystic Canyon.  After 0.88 miles we reached the turn-off for the 2.37 West Loop Trail.  My backpack was substantially heavier Saturday than it had been Friday, since some people in our group did not claim some food items and tent parts when we packed up Saturday morning so the guides were all forced to carry more.  Personally I ended up with almost an entire tent (rain fly, tent, stakes), oranges, and cutting boards in addition to my original supplies.  Feeling the additional weight, I offered to stay with all fifteen backpacks while the rest of the group went on the loop.  I had forgotten my hiking poles at the UT Outdoor Center, so my knees were already getting sore.  I talked to the many groups passing by and took some pictures during the hour it took the rest of my group to complete the loop.  We had a small snack once they returned, and then hiked the 1.11 miles to the lake at primitive campground C.  Once at the lake, we stopped for lunch.

Lunch was pita bread with sausage, cheese, tomatoes, avocados, oranges, and cookies.  I sliced the three blocks of cheese and tomatoes while Sara sliced the sausage and a participant sliced the avocados.  I only ate cheese and avocado, since I really can not stand pita bread.  After lunch we relaxed and some people played with some of the dogs around the camp.  We saw some fish and snakes in the pond!  As we were getting ready to leave, about three different boy scout troops arrived.  This caused us to discuss (1) how some of the troops seem to have a wide range of ages an (2) how we saw so many boyscout troops and boys out with their families but no girl scout troops and fewer girls out with their families.

After lunch we struggled up a 0.35 mile steep trail to the plateau overlooking our lunch spot.  This was a tough climb!  We stopped for pictures at an overlook, and then continued 1.37 miles to primitive camp ground A.  We had to endure a short but steep downhill segment shortly before camp, and rested in a grassy meadow for a short while after the downhill stretch.  Then we completed a short hike to primitive camp ground A, where we picked a grassy area near the trail to set up camp.  Sara and I quickly put up our tent, and then most of the group walked to a stream on the other side of the camp ground to filter enough water to fill both water bags and all the personal water containers.  The guys used the older filter to fill the water bags while the girls took turns pumping, holding the input tube in the water, and holding the output tube in each personal water bottle.  I spent the majority of the time holding the output tube.  It took us about 45 minutes to fill all the containers.

Once back at the camp ground, Tommy and I started cooking dinner while Sara rested after taking Benadryl for her mild rash and itching.  Sara, Tommy, and I thought the macaroni and cheese dinner turned out great - box mac and cheese is a comfort food - but unfortunately most of the participants did not seem to enjoy it.  After dinner most of us hurried back up the steep trail to the plateau overlooking the lake and primitive camp ground C to watch the sunset.  Only about a third of our group made it in time to see the sunset, but the sky was pretty even after sunset.  After enjoying the views, we all made our way back down the trail in the dark using our headlamps.  Most of the group stayed up for a few more hours sitting in a circle and telling 'scary' stories.  We had a great group!

The next morning we had oatmeal, bagels, coffee, oranges, and hot cocoa (as in, adding hot water to cocoa powder - thanks Tommy!).  I noticed a trash bag hanging from a tree, and although I did not think we had brought any trash bags, decided to throw trash into it after noticing Sara put trash into it.  Later Ian saw someone else putting orange peels into it and realized that we had mistakenly been using his clothing trash bag as a real trash bag.  Learning lesson: do not hang your clothing in a trash bag from a tree and not expect others to throw trash into it.  He took it well, but insisted on throwing away everything - clothing included - once we reached the dumpster at the trail head.

We had a quick hike out after breakfast.  While the group waited with Sara at a picnic table and used the bathroom at the trail head, Tommy and I walked to the parking lot near the other trail head to retrieve the vehicles.

We had planned to stop at the Stonehenge II replica in Hunt, TX on the way home.  However, no one had enough cell service to get good directions before the turn off, so we decided to follow the printed directions home after stopping for some snacks at a gas station.

It's an interesting experience now that I'm forming some strong opinions about ecological, sustainable, and ethical outdoor practices and tourism because I struggle with how to approach situations where I'm talking with people who are doing things I do not agree with seemingly because they do not know any better.  I  find myself struggling to find a good, non-confrontational response and instead just remain silent.  How do I find my voice without causing conflict and upsetting people?  How do I present my opinions in a compelling manner?  A few examples from this weekend: Sara saying how great a 'snake farm' that we passed on I-35 was, two participants pooping in the woods instead of in the nearby composting toilet (one because they said the toilet smelled too bad, another because they claimed they could not find the toilet), people talking about how great riding camels and elephants were on trips abroad, and both participants and other campers getting too close to/poking at crawdads and snakes.  As a guide I feel like it's my responsibility to educate people, but at the same time I do not want to upset anyone.  It's tough.

Guiding lessons learned / Pro tips:

• Tent demos are great, since they both teach the participants, decrease frustration, and speed up the process of setting up tents
• When backpacking, carefully allocate items across participants
• Separate food items across people by breakfast/lunch/dinner?
• Try to separate tents/group gear evenly
• Make sure to only take gear and food that we need

• Tell participants why surveys are important
• Bring some extra large zip lock bags and a few trash bags
• Repackage much more food in the OC before leaving to cut down on size and trash
• Actively find ways to bring LNT into discussions more

Stick insect on my tent

Our group taking a break in Mystic Canyon

Near the turn-off for the West Loop Trail

The group overlooking the valley and primitive campground C

 Overlooking the valley and primitive campground C

 One of the few trees that was changing colors during our visit