Day 2 at Philmont, August 6 -- We had breakfast of waffles, ham. Orange juice and milk.  After breakfast Craig held a shake down inspection to make sure we knew exactly what items to take on the trail and what items we could leave behind.  All extra gear was stored in a crew locker.  At 10:00 am we boarded on a bus and were off to our trail head Ponil.  It was here I arranged to get our commissary supplies for the trek.  With our food distributed we were on the trail to our first camp Bent Camp.  We arrived at Bend Camp at 11:45 am set up camp and prepared our first trail lunch that consisted of crackers, dehydrated jelly, squeeze peanut butter and orange drink and fig bars for dessert.   After lunch Craig inspected our camp and then reviewed scouts skills of map & compass and first aid necessary for our trek.  With successful completion of our scout skills session we were free for our first days journey of side hike exploration in Philmont.  We went up steep hills along ridges, and experienced great views. 

At 5:00 pm we had a dinner of ham, potatoes, beans, grape drink and Philmont Peach Cobbler for dessert.

After dinner Bob Stuart, bear bag specialist showed us how to hang a bear bag over a rock cliff. 

We all went to bed at 8:30 pm.  At about 11:00 pm we had our first thunderstorm, after a quick check to assure that camping gear was secured under the dining fly it was all over before midnight. 

Day 3, August 7 -- We woke up at 6:00 am, had a cold breakfast of juice, cereal and milk but NO HOT Chocolate because we could not get a fire started. 

We broke camp at 7:30 am and got to the Ponil Corral at 8:30 am just in time for our pack animal session on how to pack and care for our burros which we were to have on the next part of our trek. 

With our instruction out of the way and our four legged beasts all packed we left Ponil and at 10:30 am we were headed for Old Camp. 

We climbed up Horse Canyon and stopped for lunch at the top of the ridge before we descended down into the other side of the canyon on our way to Old Camp.  During lunch we could see that a thunderhead was forming and Craig advised us what to do when we get to camp.