Watch For Bears!

It's never good to run into an ex-girlfriend while you're out camping. Especially if things with that ex-girlfriend didn't end so well because she couldn't take the hints that things are over and you were too afraid to be too blunt to let her know it just wasn't working for you. More about that at the end of the story.

Marja and I went camping at the end of June with some friends in our ward. One of our friends that sings in the choir wanted to go on a back packing trip. I was really impressed that some one who doesn't trust nature too well was up for the adventure. We borrowed some old backpacks from my dad and my mom watched the girls overnight while we went on our trip. It was interesting to see how tight my old backpack was that I used when I was 14. I must have put on a little weight since then, because I could barely get my arms into the straps. Mari agreed to go but was a little bit worried about bears. She remembers the poor boy who last year or the year before was killed by a bear up the American Fork canyon. I assured her there were no bears and that I had never even seen a bear in Utah, let alone in a canyon near where we live. Of course, just as we were getting to the parking area for the trail, my friend Troy begins to describe how when he took the scouts last up this trail, they saw a bear. So that night we slept with a hatchet in our tent because that was the closest thing we had to any sort of weapon. We hiked up for about 45 minutes and then came to a meadow which had some old well-used fire pits. So we placed our backpacks at the forest edge and continued hiking up to a gorgeous waterfall.
It was a fun hike and there were amazing wild flowers. We had bug repellent, but there really weren't that many bugs.
At one point, Troy here, felt he needed a hand to cross the bridge. We wanted more people to come so I may make this photo into a flyer saying "Please come, we would enjoy everyone's company.
This is a picture of the group that hiked up to the falls. One couple, the Johnsons, couldn't stay overnight because their baby sitter wasn't planning on it. The other three of us enjoyed a nice camp fire and talked late into the night.

In the morning, Mari was the first one up. She and I got up and after about 4 attempts (well, really about 40 matches) I got a fire going. Troy and Marla were still asleep in their tent at 9:30 so Mari and Becky helped persuade me and Ryan to go and ditch their tent. It was fun watching them struggle to find anything. After about 5-10 minutes, I started feeling bad because they still hadn't managed to get out, so we went and put their poles back in. I'll have to make sure I am one of the first ones up at our next trip. I'm sure Troy would love to return the favor.

Then, that morning we were standing around the fire as it was dying out and up the trail comes this small family. A set of parents and 3 children ( one was in a pack ). One of our campers called out in friendly fun, "You guys need to get some baby sitters." The mother made a snappish remark about how they've brought them up here much younger than this. I was kind of surprised by her response. Her husband came over and starts remarking about how he thinks this area is in the Lone Peak Wilderness and you are not supposed to have fires up here. We looked at each other and thought, well why were these huge fire pits here. Other people obviously had used them. Then I realized who the mother was. It was the Jenny from my high school that I went out with for a while and that my brother Stephen loathed. I didn't really say anything to her and I wasn't sure if she recognized me but it was kind of awkward. They were hiking up to the falls so they kept on going. We packed up our gear, put out the fire, and headed down the trail. When we got close to the bottom of the trail, up comes a Lone Peak Fire Marshall. Uh-oh, I thought. I just walked on by him and he stopped Troy and Marla who were behind us and asked if they had come from the summit. They said no and we continued on down to pass yet another fire marshall. When we got to where our cars were, there was a fire engine and a couple of police cars. I went up to one of the policemen and asked what was happening and he told me that they were just investigating some smoke. I looked back up the canyon but there was no smoke. We hurried out of there as fast as we could. I figure, that husband of Jenny's must have called in our fire. Even with this event, we had a great time.
By the way, I checked it out, and I believe that we can have fires up where we were. Just in case you want to know, Dad. :)