Novice Backpacking Workshop: 2021 Report
By Will Schaefer, AMC Potomac Chapter Leader
The annual Novice Backpacking Workshop, which will take place at the Summit Bechtel Reserve in West Virginia, has a little something for anyone seeking to build their comfort level, skills repertoire, and essentials list for a night or nights out on a trail. The clinic starts with two nights camping not far from our vehicles, so attendees can set up camp with as much help as needed, and with some comforts typically left behind when backpacking. Think ice chest (no booze, but yes, fresh milk). Running water. Toilets. Even Showers. In this comfortable venue, trip leaders cover skill lessons and equipment demonstrations that will be put to use the third night, which we’ll spend out on the trail. In our May 2021 edition of the workshop, lessons we covered included:
§ clothing and footwear essentials,
§ choosing a campsite,
§ shelters and sleep systems,
§ meal planning and cooking.
We also demonstrated ways to pack, practiced Leave-No-Trace principles, hung bear bags and placed bear canisters, sourced and treated water, and practiced stream crossing technique. Along the way, many saw animal footprints and owl pellets, deer and woodpeckers, planets and meteors in the night sky, rhododendron and trillium flowers on the wooded mountainside, a bald eagle, and, for some lucky campers, mama black bear and cub (though with proper food storage techniques, not in camp!).
The venue is the Summit Bechtel Reserve, a Boy Scouts of America outdoor jamboree center on 10,600 mountainous acres. It is adjacent to the 70,000 acre New River Gorge National Park. The reserve is built for various scouting adventures, and, while our clinic navigates still wild country, the infrastructure on the expansive reserve, including trailheads with maps, pavilions, marked trails, backcountry camping sites, and access roads provides an accessible wilderness in which to learn.
An unexpected lesson occurred in my group. While approaching the mountaintop campsite for our third night I spotted large mammalian footprints, clearly an even-toed ungulate (the order that includes deer or pig families), and I was excited to possibly see wild elk! Elk are being reintroduced in this area. Much to my delight, the next morning I spotted the lone animal, grazing near the edge of our clearing. She was dark, almost all black, most certainly not an elk, but an exceedingly not rare West Virginian wandering black cow.
