This past weekend was my first outing after moving from ASM to SM. I have been hanging at almost all campouts for the last 2-3 years. This outing had myself, 2 other adults and the first year scouts travelling a very gentle 1.8 miles on the AT to the New Tripoli campsite while the older boys and a pair of leaders traveled 6.5 miles Southbound into the same site.

I made the other leaders jealous by cooking a nice steak (packed in frozen and thawed at the site) on my Element woodstove with my Flyz Grill. Things went well and the predicted rain came in a little earlier than expected, so it was off to our shelters a little before dark.

As I lay relaxing in the steady rain, I noticed that I had a small seam leak in my winter tarp (I brought the winter one to have a larger dry space and possible storage for boys gear), I realized that this was the first really good rain that I this tarp out in. As the rain got stronger I knew this was not going to be pleasant. The drip was about 8 inches above my head and it would then roll down the hammock. For a while I used a bandanna to soak it up before it got to my pillow, but it was up to about a drip every 1-2 minutes and we were in for about 5 hours more of rain (some very heavy), and then it dawned on me that I had my rain jacked just hanging on the whoopie sling of my gear hammock (under me), so I got up and draped it over the top end of the ridgeline. With the hood over the gather of the hammock I was able to adjust it so that it didn't block any of my view. This worked perfectly. Each side of the jacket hung below the hammock and diverted the drips and I slipped off into the kind of sleep you can only get in a hammock on the tail in the rain.

Then at about 2:30 in the morning I awoke to a nature call. I was wondering if I could just hold it, sitting still, and I heard a disconcerting noise and my head end was quickly lowered into the gear hammock below. I took this as a sign that I should get up and pee. Upon coming back to investigate I found that my UCR had slipped...after hanging in it for 8 hours!! I'm guessing the rain had something to do with it, but I just brought it back up to the correct position milked the bury and made sure the small piece of bungee cord that I use for the tension was in place and I had no more issues. I'm glad that I had the gear hammock below to break my fall. No other major events, but I am really sold on hammocking. I was able to break down all of my gear and pack everything up before breaking down the wet tarp that gets stuffed in an outside pocket of my pack.

The old down side was that I didn't get to hike enough, but I guess that's one of the sacrifices that one makes when you accept the role of Scoutmaster.