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Ok, Ok.....

The truth of the matter is that they lied about food in their tent.

To tell the truth about food in the tent would expose themselves as neophytes with no business camping in bear territory. Rather than admitting stupidity, lie and blame the bear

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The following tale took place in about 1958 before the real backpcking rage began. At the time, bears were all over the Smokies and the use of bear bags or food lockers was not general

I was about 16 when the preacher asked me to take a hike with him and his son. The trip would be on the Appalachian trail across the high crest of the Smokies from New Found Gap to Davenport Gap. It was a distance of about 35 miles and would be 4 nights and 5 days on the trail. Thumper also to go with us.

I was an Eagle Scout, an experienced camper and had spent a good bit of time in the Smokies. I was able to add some experience to the crew on what was to be a great adventure.

After a very wet and uncomfortable night at the severely crowed Ice Water Springs Shelter we awoke to a clear morning. At breakfast we learned from the other hikers that there were bears. That is, we will have bears in camp at the other shelters. Later that morning, on the trail, the precher advised us not to worry..……. He could smell bears and we would certainly have advance notice of a bear’s presence.

That evening we arrived at the Peck’s Corner shelter. It was a sturdy open front Adirondack stone lean to with a chain link fence across the front, After supper we saw a mama bear and two cubs emerge into the clearing below the shelter. She sent the cubs up a tree and ambled toward us to check out the smell of our supper. Having had bears in camp before, I knew that if we beat on our pans and yelled , the bear would go away. That is what happened.

The next day we made good time and arrived in the early afternoon at the Tri Corner Knob shelter. Already there was a party of young women, good Presbyterian girls, from Queen’s College in Charlotte. preacher did not like the idea of another night in a crowded shelter, especially one with nearly all women. He decided we should continue to the next shelter. We had plenty of daylight and it should be no problem. At some point before leaving we were advised…… there’s a mean bear at that camp.

Somewhere along the trail we encountered some of the Queen’s stragglers. One girl was hiking in sneakers and the going was slow. We were told a bear took one of her boots and carried it away.

The Cosby Knob shelter was an Adirondack lean to made from logs. It had no comforting chain link fence enclosure across the front. We settled down, ate and went to bed. It had been a long day. Then we heard the bear. It was just outside the front. We had our packs hung from nails on the log beam across the top front roof line. The packs and the food were what the bear was after. We yelled and beat on something and the bear apparently left. It was hard to tell in the dark. Anyway, we returned to our sleeping bags.

Sometime later, we were again disturbed. It was the bear. The ol’ bear was at home, his home, and he knew all about it. He waited and then came from behind and climbed up on the roof to get the pack from above. I don’t remember exactly what happened, but we discouraged the bear. He left the roof. It was apparent that something must be done to remove the temptation. The solution was to take a length of parachute cord and throw it up and over a tree limb and suspend all the packs and food off the ground out of harm’s way.

The bear came back and gave his attention to the packs. It turned out that by standing on his hind legs and swiping with an extended paw, he could barely reach the heavy steel framed rucksack. He swiped one of the pockets and out came our bottle of pancake syrup and a tin of crackers. The syrup bottle broke and made a mess. The bear took off with the cracker tin. We found the cracker tin the next morning mangled, with tooth holes and no crackers.

So there we were. It was the middle of the night, we were tired from the extra miles. The bear was a better player of the game than we. Something had to be done. There was only one solution. Find a higher branch. Throwing a stick tied to a parachute cord over a high branch at night in the dark is no mean feat. It was however finally accomplished, again.

My job was to snub the line around a nail in the shelter while preacher hoisted the packs as high as he could over his head. It was being done and then it happened. I can’t remember if the cord broke, or if the knot gave way, but the pack fell. It crashed onto preacher’s head and shoulders, knocked him aside and hit the ground beside him. He shouted “DAMN!!!”

There it was…. the preacher said DAMN!! It is a memory still firm in my mind.

The next day we had only a few miles all down hill, so we dumped our excess food in the garbage pit down below the shelter. Included was a big plastic bag of peanut butter. As we were saddling up to hit the trail, we heard a commotion at the garbage pit. There was loud coughing and gagging. We concluded the bear found the peanut butter and devoured the bag whole.

We gained a day and spent 3 nights and 4 days by skipping Tri Corner Knob Shelter

The memory of that wonderful adventure across the high crest of the Smokies is one of my favorites.