Camping trip #2

Camping trip #1 was an adventure, but given a taste of freedom, we knew there would be another. The following year, we were a bit older, and although I wouldn’t say wiser, we were undoubtedly bolder. Our stories of chattering coyotes and piss pots ensured a larger group this time, and there were six of us for camping trip #2. Most of the veterans were back, and as we had proof that we didn’t die the first time, some of the more cautious parents finally allowed their sons to join us. A campfire was still forbidden- pyrotechnic explorations would need to wait until next year, but we still had our adventures.

We realized that hiking up and biking down for dinner wasn’t feasible, both in time and energy, so we opted for lunch beforehand instead. We then picked up supplies (a wider variety of junk food this time) and left our bikes behind at my parents’ house before collecting our packs and starting our journey. We planned our day much earlier, so we were on our way to the summit by early afternoon. The only other difference was the tent. Last time, it had bent my friend’s framepack, so we devised an ingenious idea of dragging it up using a foldable shopping cart. I mention this, as it will be important later. Pulling a shopping cart with a 30-pound tent up a mountain is one of the reasons we eventually scrapped the idea of tents altogether, but until we could have a campfire, we were forced to lug the thing up the mountain.

Being well-supplied and with more time to reach the summit, we opted to meander and explore. The land behind my parent’s house is diverse. First, wetlands surround Chicopee Brook, which my family calls the swamp to this day. It takes up about twelve acres, so it’s rather significant. In the winters, it would freeze, allowing for all sorts of childhood fun, but in the hazy summer, it was a considerable obstacle and home to swarms of mosquitos. Therefore, we first had to travel down Route 32 to skirt around the swamp via a little dead-end dirt road. Silva Street was dangerous territory for a group of teens with framepacks. Some rough kids lived in this area, and the next street over was a trailer park rife with bullies- it was the proverbial other side of the tracks, and we were marching through their territory with bullseyes on our backs. Several of those kids ended up in prison for some pretty heinous crimes, so this is not just a childhood fear. They were a real danger. Luckily, it was hot, and being six of us, we had numbers on our side. Few paid us any attention, at least that’s what we hoped.

At the end of Silva Street, the road terminated into a washed-out path that passed through a little hedge before coming to the fast-moving and rambunctious Chicopee Brook (death place to the piss pot). I say rambunctious because if you look at it on the map, it is the most twisty-turvy waterway in Monson, full of oxbows, bends, and crooks. The brook powered much of Monson’s industry, pushing it to a meager mill town in the late 19th and early 20th century, but once the brook got to my neck of the woods, it lost all sense of purpose. Although the Chicopee Brook is probably only twenty feet across, it was deep. In most places, you can’t see the bottom. Luckily for this intrepid group of hikers, someone in the distant past erected a homemade bridge in the form of an old truck bed covered in plywood.

After avoiding the jagged holes and balancing on beams over the rapids, we made it across alive. The trail continues to follow the brook until the smell of tar and flint fills the air, and you come to the tracks by an old trestle bridge. These rails are busy now, but they saw maybe one train a day back then. They are now part of the New England Central Railroad, which runs from New London, CT, to Alburgh, VT, and then Canada beyond. It mainly moves lumber, metals, chemicals, and crushed stone. But back then, it was called the Central Vermont Railway, owned and operated by the failing Canadian Railroad. The transition happened around the time of this trip, which would see the eventual resurgence of the line, but at this point, it was tranquil and a fun place to play. The trains often ran at night, and hearing their horns echo around the hills on the summit of Chicopee Mountain is just neat.

After the tracks, the trail meandered through a field used to grow hay for a horse farm with the aptly named Scott’s Barn (not mine, but may still be my namesake as it is visible from my parent’s house). This meadow is a bright and cheery place full of lazy butterflies and wildflowers but stands in juxtaposition with the shadow-riddled pine grove at the foot of Chicopee Mountain. Here, things get interesting.

In 1955, a terrible flood hit the Connecticut River valley after two hurricanes passed by Southern New England. Hurricane Connie produced 4-6 inches of rain, saturating the soil. Then, about a week later, Hurricane Diane came through and dropped 20 inches over two days. The result was the worst flood Monson had ever seen. In the ensuing rain, the face of Chicopee Mountain collapsed, producing a pile of boulders hidden beneath the pines. It is an eerie landscape with some sizeable rocks precariously leaning against trees or balancing on the edge of oblivion. The debris field produces countless little caves and all sorts of places to explore, which we did. We then crossed a little spring-fed creek and came to the powerlines cutting through the wilderness that separates Chicopee Mountain from Bunyan Mountain. From here, it is a challenging 45-degree hike up to the trailhead, which then leads to the summit at 800 feet.

We finally made it with plenty of light to spare (damning the Devil’s Incline all the way). We set up our tent and finished everything by about four o’clock. It was July, so we had about four hours of good daylight left to continue our explorations. The ridgeline of Chicopee Mountain is about 2,500 feet long, and after the collapse mentioned above, it has many cliffs, some more than 150-foot drops. For a time, both Bunyan and Chicopee mountains were very popular with rock climbers. Access issues with the closing of Monson Developmental Center (MDC) pretty much snuffed that out. But back then, it was a great place for teenage boys to test their bravery or stupidity, depending on how you look at it.

Looking back now, we were stupid. In our late afternoon exploration, before diving into the protection of our tent for the night, we slid down a rock face on our backsides to a narrow ledge about two feet across. The views of the valley were spectacular, and we marveled at the cliff’s drop to a jagged pile of rock about seven or eight stories below. It was all fun and games until we turned and realized that getting back up without gravity’s assistance would be a real challenge, especially with all the pine needles about. We tried to climb back up, but the stone was slick, and we just slid back down. One of my friends almost went over the ledge, saved by a frantic pull of his tee-shirt. We panicked. Remember, this is still before cell phones and the sun is getting low. It’s not like we would have died, but a rescue operation of six teens from a cliff would have been in all the papers in a small town like Monson, and the shame would have been lasting.

I know I will get a call from my mother once she reads this. Don’t worry, mom. We eventually skirted down the ledge and around a corner, finding a crack we could use as leverage to climb back up. Needless to say, we were spooked and decided that we had enough rock climbing for one day and retired to our tent for the long night.

Our abode for the evening was a five-person tent stuffed with six teenage boys and their packs. The expression, like sardines in a can, doesn’t give it justice (and probably smelt just as bad). But we made due. We tucked into our pile of junk food, famished from our brush with death, and awaited the blanket of darkness that would turn the mountain into a ghost den.

The night continued as you probably expect. The discussion got crude at times, and the forest filled with giggles. There are small tests of manhood and fantastical stories that could not be true (and probably weren’t). We were a bit braver now, so there was no piss pot, but our frantic trips outside of the tent to relieve ourselves became flashlight spotlight shows peppered with demeaning statements about the size of things accompanied by lots of laughs from the audience.

Then, things got serious, and conversations moved to our fumbling explorations with the opposite sex. Strange theories arise as we try to understand their mystery. We devised strategies and played out scenarios. Games of “she’s so hot” lead to arguments over our tastes for beauty. Six teenage boys’ brains twirl and wonder as we try to unlock the mystery that is the teenage girl- to no avail. It is a useless endeavor, and we resort to stuffing our faces with Doritos and Snickers bars lubricated by Dr. Pepper and Mountain Dew to ease our depression. It gets late, and dialogue dwindles to the sounds of the night and snores.

That is until we heard that damned shopping cart move. Now, let me be clear here. Before entering the tent, we folded that cart and laid it on the ground by the tent’s zippered flap as it wouldn’t fit inside with us and our packs. We were sure of this. Upon hearing it rattle about, all our eyes shot open. “What the hell was that?” is whispered. Hands moved to an assortment of knives, and flashlights clicked on. I unzipped the screen window and shined one of our tender torches into the dark wilderness. The cart is no longer by the door but sitting several feet away, open and upright.

“Oh…my…god.”

An animal couldn’t do this, right? It was either a ghost (MDC is not far away, and it has plenty of ghost stories), aliens (Palmer, MA, is known for UFO sightings), or a human hand (a few of us have older brothers, and we did pass through that neighborhood of bullies). We all moved to the windows with weapons ready and shined our flashlights into the night. We didn’t see anything. It’s silent- nothing stirs about other than our hearts trying to burst from the cages of our chests. Then, we spotted a greenish light in the distance. It looks like a street light, but there is nothing that way for miles, and the forest is dense. Perhaps it could have been a campfire tinted by forest greenery, and it was all just a prank, but who knows? Locked in a tent in the middle of nowhere, it could be just about anything our imaginations could think up, and they immediately sped through all the options as we debated what to do. Should we investigate? Hell no. But we certainly weren’t going to sleep either. Luckily for us, the rest of the night was peaceful enough, and eventually, the strange light vanished. We never figured it out, but it still ranks in the top ten of my scariest experiences.

Well, that’s two trips down. Both proved to be adventures, and the experiences assured that they would become a tradition. Camping trip number three would not disappoint. It would be a two-night excursion during the tale end of a hurricane and would introduce fire into the mix, but further particulars must wait until next week. Until then…

Cheers!