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When I enrolled online with Outward Bound I had no idea what I was letting myself in for. I was soon to learn. The bounders met at the airport and were put in to two groups, under and over 18s, with about 10 in each group. Then it was straight in to the bus and up in to the Sierra Nevada mountain range looming over Fresno city.
When I enrolled online with Outward Bound I had no idea what I was letting myself in for.
Staring out the window at the arid landscape and munching on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with my new companions, I felt like I was headed for some sort of brat camp.
About four hours later we arrived at base camp and met our instructors Witney and Josh. We were told to empty out all our belongings, selecting only the bare essentials which were squashed in to our backpacks with the rest of the group kit.
Our packs were supposed to look professional; at first mine was just lumpy, but I was going to get a lot of practice in the weeks to come.
Introductory sessions included setting up ‘bivis’ (floorless tents), lighting stoves and, of course, the ‘Ds of dumping’ (American term for a call of nature) during which we were introduced to Joe Dirt (the shovel) and the wide variety of back country toilet paper, leaves, sticks, stones, pine cones…
Much of our conversation in the next three weeks was to be about which of these was best for the butt. Part of the philosophy of Outward Bound is to Leave No Trace, not even footprints unless they are planted firmly on the trail.
We had to scrub pans with pine cones and sieve out the food residues on to a screen. All our waste was packed up and taken with us. If we did not eat everything at meals some poor soul would end up with a bag of smelly refried beans swinging from their pack the next day.
My first taste of Leave No Trace came the next morning at breakfast when I carelessly kicked some dirt in to my finished bowl of cereal and was forced to drink it up with the dregs of my food and lukewarm water, instead of pouring it back on to the ground, an attraction to bears with their sensitive snouts.
It was the simplest things that could cause discomfort. Take sleep, for example. Sleep is sometimes taken for granted but, when you don’t get enough of it, it becomes a luxury. One day we woke up in the early hours and trekked to a ranger station for a service project uprooting Cheatgrass (an invasive weed); after a re-supply we continued the trek until the following morning. This epic day was the beginning of the toughest phase.
Another luxury is food; fresh fruit, vegetables, bread, milk, and water, which is not always easy to find. I once filled up from a stagnant looking pool; iodine kills most things, ignoring the ‘floaties’ or trying to see them as healthy bacteria!
Our diet consisted of cereals, rice, powdered potato, beans houmus and milk, salami (of which there was always plenty), crackers in peanut butter, jam, tins of tuna, chicken and kippers. Thinking about food and discussing what we would like to eat if we could choose, was the next best thing to actually eating the food itself, and sometimes helped with putting one foot in front of the other.
The most challenging aspect of all Outward Bound courses is Solo, consisting of two days and two nights spent in complete solitude. There are strict rules; no watches, books or cameras allowed (although pen and paper are permitted); no attempt at communication unless it is an emergency; no going outside your designated Solo site; and small rations of food.
Surprisingly, I wasn’t bored; I spent most of the time sitting in the same spot with a majestic mountain for a view; I thought about things; I read and updated my journal; I wrote a long letter to myself and took the opportunity to sleep as much as possible!
The only discomfort was the large red biting ants that loved attacking my bare skin. At first the whole thing had seemed rather boring and pointless, but during my Solo I realised how lucky I was to have two uninterrupted days of complete solitude and in such awesome surroundings.
Bounding in the Sierra Nevada showed me something new about living. Living is not flicking on a light switch, standing under a hot shower or toasting a slice of bread in the toaster. It is lying in a sleeping bag on the bare earth, and after having done several sets of sit-ups to generate warmth, looking out and up at the star-crammed sky - that’s taking life and bounding with it.
For more information on courses visit the Outward Bound website
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