Earlier this year I was presented with an opportunity. There was a winter Field Training Exercise and no one was available to take the cadets from the Payson Squadron. It would involve driving the cadets up to the top of the Mogollon Rim where we would join other cadets and senior members at a campsite in the Tonto National Forest. I do a lot of hiking and have quite a bit of experience with camping, so I volunteered.
We left Payson Friday evening and arrived at the specified location, where a forest road left Highway 87, at about 8:30 p.m. From there we drove back into the forest to a large campsite where everyone set up their tents. It was supposed to be a winter exercise in the snow, but while the temperatures dipped to the mid-teens at night, they climbed into the high 50s during the day and there was no snow to be seen.
