Chapter 4

We did some grocery shopping in Bozeman the following morning before we made the final leg of our trip to Yellowstone. The last time we had been camping, I was still in elementary school, and our equipment consisted of air mattresses, worn out sleeping bags, a Coleman stove and lanterns, and regular cooking stuff from our kitchen at home. The technology had changed. Now there were ultra-slim sleeping pads and high-tech bags that would keep you warm down to minus 80 C, and food that came freeze-dried in plastic wrapping. LED lights with tiny batteries replaced the bulky lanterns of my youth. The only thing that remained very familiar to us was the fishing gear.

Thinking back to Grandma’s comment and realizing that I didn’t want a reconstituted menu for each meal, I convinced Dad to buy a big cast-iron skillet in Bozeman along with bacon and eggs for breakfast, and some other fresh food we could cook to add to the REI meals. At the last second, I added a wire rack that enclosed a filleted fish, allowing you to place it to cook over coals or a campfire.

Dad nodded when he saw what I had. “What about the food though? Aren’t there bears?”

That was one thing I had allowed myself to be talked into buying at REI – a bear bag. I held it up, “If they don’t have places to store it, we’ll put the food in here and tie it up high in a tree overnight, or while we’re out of camp. If we keep our purchases of fresh food down to what we can eat in a one or two day span, we should be fine.”

He laughed, motioning for me to load up our purchases into the vehicle. With everything secured, we made our way to the West Entrance, showed our newly acquired National Park pass, and asked for directions to the campground we wanted. We were informed that it would take us close to 30 minutes to get there, provided with some information about the park and our campground rules, and sent on our way. We had prepared ahead, and brought some firewood with us into the park so we could enjoy our fire pit. In addition to that, we had several large bags of Kingsford charcoal briquettes, some old newsprint and a chimney starter.

With me navigating this time, Dad got us to our campsite and we parked the Tahoe. It was only three o’clock, but we thought it would take us a while to get the site set up. Before that happened though, we wanted to walk around, find the facilities and lake, and get a good view of the land. A quick twenty minute hike had everything familiarized for us, so we came back and got to work on pitching our tent.

I gave Dad the collapsible shovel while I started to pull various items out of the SUV. The foundation tarp, tent, sleeping bags and pads all went into one pile. Food, cooking utensils and the like went into the lockable food storage containers provided by the park. Fishing gear was organized and laid out on the picnic table, ready for some pre-dinner angling. When I turned around, Dad had selected what was originally a fairly flat spot and had completely leveled it. His contractor’s eye was sufficient enough that I wouldn’t have bet there was a quarter inch of slope at all to our foundation.

I tossed him the tarp and some stakes to put through the grommet holes in the corners. The hatchet was sent flying through the air for him to grab and pound the stakes flat in two swift blows. Having secured the tarp, Dad proceeded to clear debris from around our location making sure any rainwater, should there be rain, would drain off and away from the tent instead of puddling next to it, leaving us nice and dry.

In the five minutes it took for him to see to our protection from flooding, I had pulled the tent from its bag and read the instructions. It was pretty easy to put the shock poles together, working them through the slots in the fabric prepared for them. It was halfway up when Dad grabbed one side, I the other, and we placed it squarely on the tarp. Two minutes later saw it fully assembled. All that remained was for the corners to be staked, guy lines to be rigged and our final tarp to be lifted into the air, covering most of the area we planned to use, keeping it dry and comfortable.

Dad hammered in the stakes on his side, and tossed the hatchet to me; I followed suit. It’s funny, a guy not in construction will hammer at a nail until it bends every which way. Give a framer the same task, and two mighty whacks later the nail is in wood, securing whatever it was supposed to. The same principle holds to hammering stakes into the ground; as long as it’s not too rocky, a couple of whacks and the stake goes in true and straight. Let’s just say both Dad and I have skills and leave it at that.

I threw the bedrolls and pads back into the Tahoe, locking the doors behind me. We picked up the fishing gear and headed toward the lake, passing our neighbors who were just on the way up the road on an afternoon walk. They had seen us pull in and didn’t believe it when we told them that we were already set up; it was a young couple, early thirties, with twin girls, probably not more than seven or eight years old. All four of them accompanied us back to our campsite to check out what we had done.

The father stood there, staring at our new domicile in open-mouthed awe. Dad broke the ice and extended his hand.

“Hi, I’m James McKenzie and this is my son Tim. Welcome to our campsite.”

“Bill. Bill Emerson.” He took Dad’s hand and shook it. “This is my wife Angie and our daughters Tara and Sandy.” Dad shook everyone’s hand as they were introduced, providing his name and a “Nice to meet you.” I remembered my manners and did likewise, although I had to coax the girls a little bit before they would shake.

Bill kept looking around, “How did you get all of this done so fast? It took us an hour to set up, and we have the same tent as you do.” When he spotted the foundation tarp he just groaned. “I knew I forgot something.”

Dad looked at his watch, then at me. I simply nodded.

He clapped Bill companionably on the shoulders and turned him back toward the neighboring site. “Why don’t Tim and I give you guys a hand with your setup before we go fishing?” I saw Angie smile gratefully as she turned her girls to head back to their site. I could hear her telling them to pull out everything from the tent so we could get it set up better.

I put the fishing gear back in the SUV, grabbed the hatchet, the shovel and extra stakes and ran down the little road that connected our two campsites.

Dad was already surveying the area available; I could tell that he didn’t find the location that the Emersons had chosen to be optimal. I learned another lesson from Dad that day – diplomacy. I hadn’t really seen him be diplomatic on the job since he owned his own company and ran his own crew on his own projects. Sure, he was always friendly and considerate, but everyone on a job site knew that he was the boss and it was his way or the highway.

I saw a different side of the man as he dealt with Mr. Emerson. He asked Bill if this is where he wanted the tent set up, all the while subtly pointing out the benefits of the placement he would have chosen. He had Bill’s agreement that the other area would be a better fit for the tent, while leaving the space it was currently occupying available for the picnic table (which had been dragged out of the way) to sit. Dad walked off the approximate size of the tent at the new placement and marked corners with stakes I had brought. He motioned with his head for me to begin leveling and clearing. I simply grinned and got to it.

While the dirt was flying and being packed down in new locations, Dad asked Bill if he had an extra tarp, suggesting that perhaps he and Bill could raise it over the picnic table to provide cover for meals. By the time the girls had emptied the tent, Dad and Bill were working on pulling the stakes. I winced at the shape of the metal anchors. They would have been better used as horseshoes.

I had finished up my prep work and followed Dad’s lead, “Mr. Emerson, could you come over here to check the level of this location?” When he turned to me, Dad, standing behind him, nodded approvingly. I noticed that Mrs. Emerson caught our little by-play.

They trooped up to look at my work. Dad pointed at a slight rise that I hadn’t quite gotten worked out, speaking quietly to our new neighbor. Bill looked hesitantly at me, “I think there may be a spot right over there that needs to be taken down slightly.” He pointed and held it while I came over to look at it from his perspective. Son of a gun, they were right. I grabbed the shovel and with only a few motions, had it smoothed out.

I came back to where the men were standing.

“How’s that?” I asked Bill.

He glanced at his new friend, but there was no hint for him there.

“It looks good.”

I smiled and put the shovel aside.

“What’s next?” Dad asked Bill. Mrs. Emerson had brought out the foundation tarp from somewhere in their mini-van’s cavernous interior. She handed it to him and he opened it, spreading it on the ground we had just prepared. “Now we need to secure this.”

His wife handed him some stakes and a beat up old hammer. It was no wonder those stakes were bent worse than an old man’s arthritic hands – that hammer didn’t have a flat surface on it. I winced as the first blow drove the stake sideways into the soil. The next five strikes weren’t any better, and the first stake hadn’t even been driven half-way down its length. The worst part was that Mrs. Emerson and their girls were watching Bill with pride.

Dad came to the rescue. “Bill, why don’t you get a fire started for your family? That’s always a nice touch at a campsite. Let Tim stake this down, after all, isn’t that why we had kids anyway? Let the kids do the chores.”

I could tell Mr. Emerson really wanted to finish assembling the tent, but he couldn’t resist the softly worded requests and suggestions of the alpha male that was my father. Bill handed me the hammer; I saw Dad’s eyes flicker at our good stakes and the hatchet and I gave a barely perceptible nod.