A dear now passed camping companion of mine and I knew each other for more than 30 years as we shared experiences as permanent National Camping School staff insturctors for BSA high adventure Adirondack wilderness guide trek leaders as well as on many personal wilderness hikes, canoe trips, and campouts together. Some practical jokes of various kinds followed us on both sides along the way. Sadly, Keith passed away quite unexpectedly just over two years ago while on an easy trail hike near his home with wife and dog.
Keith and I would often banter back and forth, frequently about some new piece of outdoor gear or gadget we may have seen online or at some outdoor outlet. It was easy to get him to experiment with oddball kinds of stuff. I would tell him: “Hey Keith, the next time I see you I want to know what you thought of this or that widget I found for you, bring it on our next outing and we’ll evaluate it in the field.” That is at least partially the reason that at a very small group of friends memorial gathreing with his wife, she counted 31 bivy sacks he had accumulated, most never having been used, almost as many sleeping bags, tents, several kinds of snowshoes, and various other smaller amounts of what most might consider as nearly useless widgets never to be seriously used. I ended up with a bunch of it gifted to me, including two canoes, a 12’ Hornbeck and a Wenonah Kevlar Prospector, along with a partial bag of Keith’s ashes. The gear that no one needed or wanted was donated to the local BSA council.
In the end Keith may have had the last laugh. Since we each had had Subarus, he teased me, “Hey P, when you going to get that new Subaru Wilderness edition being advertised? Six months after he passed, I had one. Thanks for that, my friend.