Mountain Man Rendezvous

During spring break, Dave and I went to the Mountain Man Rendezvous, a Mesa District Varsity Scout event held every 2 years. Dave has been going for years and was even the Booshway (head guy in charge) there 8 years ago. This year he was the head cook, cooking for a crew (the event staff) of 250. This was my second time attending, and this year I was in the kitchen along with his cook staff of 11 other men.

The Rendezvous is a three day encampment where the Varsity age scouts (14 &15 year olds) come with their teams and leaders and participate in events that are mostly from the Mountain Man era ( early 1800's.) These events include black powder rifle shooting, knife and hawk throwing, primitive fires (flint and steel, bow and drill and just drill), leather crafts - making medicine bags (these are like necklaces with a small pouch that the MM wore.) There was also archery, bullet casting, repelling, and many others. There were over 30 events for the boys to choose from and rotate to. The boys come in teams of 2 -10 boys with 2 leaders and visit and participate in events for two days, where they learn new skills and practice them. Then on the last day they participate in a competition event, called the Colter Run. This event is named after the famous Mountain Man John Colter who had to run away from the Indians across Montana prairie, "buck naked" for seven days before arriving at a trading post. (A little history lesson there - I could go on, but you've probably already scrolled down to the pictures by now.) For the Colter run, the team of boys run to ten different events, do the required skill, run to the next event, and lastly run up the long hill. They are timed and the team with the best time won a nice prize.


Several of the men gather round the main camp. The long jackets they are wearing are called "Capotes."

A view of the upper camp, with all the primitive tents.

Primitive Camp

Russ and Trent Durfee in front of the Chuckwagon Trading Post. "Chuckwagon" is Russ's Mountain man name.

Trent plays the Indian flute.

Primitive fires using flint and steel. "Firebird" Laurie is getting ready to time the boys. Two years ago, I was at this outpost helping teach boys to start fires.

Dan prepares something in the dutch ovens.

One of the more popular events - bull riding (no its not too primitive).

The women folk. All of us women (about 20 in a field of 1000 men) got to stay in one of the nicer cabins, where we got in some good girl talk and bonding time before bedtime.

Larry stirs up a a big pot of chili, while Dave seasons the meat in the background.

The guys made the yummiest pancakes.

We had a whole family of brothers there at the Rendezvous. Five of the Riggs (Ray, Wes, Ken, Wayne, Larry) brothers cooked in the kitchen and the other brother, Charl, was camping with his team of boys.

My main responsibility was to take tickets at all the meals. Dave told me to give them a hard time if they didn't bring their ticket, but I ended up sneaking in several tired mountain men who just happened to forget their ticket back at their outpost (event station.) I received the Mountain Man name "Ticket" while I was there this year.

Laurie and Bonnie - friends for over 18 years! She's an awesome firestarting lady and has many primitive skills under belt.