A problem and its solutionWhen any De Anza club camps as a group we face this problem: Someone in a nearby campsite
will expect the worst (noise, etc.) from an obviously college-age group. And they will be quick
to complain about any rule infraction (some of which can result in heavy fines, impoundment of property or revocation of camping permit).
The Outdoor Club has been very successful in combating this. We've had rangers tell us we had
the cleanest group campsite they'd ever seen (it wasn't hard).This section details some problems
we've had in the past when people weren't thinking, or just didn't care, but it isn't meant to
make you think the club has had a lot of problems, because we haven't. In early 1998 the
insurance company wanted to keep us from doing ocean kayaking, because it is statistically
dangerous, but the De Anza Risk Management office spoke up for us -because we have a good
reputation.
We keep a clean, non-smoking campsite and strictly follow all park rules, especially about food
storage.
If this were a younger group, state law would say all the students need to be "in line of sight" of
the faculty member on the trip. So we'd have to do all of the same activities, and hike like a
string of ducklings.
Since we're older, we get some breaks. The trip itself and possible hike(s)
with faculty are the only "official" club events. If you go skating, skiing, sledding or snowboarding you're
on your own. Yet you are still expected to follow all park rules and use reasonable safety
precautions. You're expected to let us know where you're going and when you'll return (and to
check in when you do). Carpools are expected to use safe cars, wear seatbelts, and have drivers
with insurance. Cyclists (including over 18 years old), are expected to wear helmets.
Basically, we're not being treated like fourth graders, and we need to assume responsibility. The
Outdoor Club has a good reputation at De Anza; we intend to keep it that way and keep the
freedom we have to try new things. Please don't join our trip if you can't get along with these
rules.
Some things we've tried that work, especially if you plan ahead
Bring (borrow?) thermoses. Then you can go on a night hike and have hot chocolate ready and
waiting for you afterwards without banging around pans at 2 a.m. to heat it. On summer night
hikes we've brought backpacker's size stoves to make hot chocolate, but in the winter you don't
want to stop that long on a night hike, it's just too cold. (No, the screw-top water bottle you
should bring on all walks or hikes won't freeze in the time you're out hiking, it's only likely to
partway freeze overnight in your tent, so you won't need to carry a heavy thermos on long hikes.)
Get the evening's and morning's wood supply split early or even better, before the trip, so you
have enough light to do it safely.
A large group like ours is bound to be noisy at times, but noise is the first thing other campers
complain about to the Rangers. When a friend who is enjoying herself immensely starts singing
loudly at midnight, please remind her that people are trying to sleep.
Turn off the car stereo before you enter the campground, and don't use your car stereo to
broadcast music to the campsite. The best music solution really is to bring headphone cassette
players so you can play whatever music you want as loud as you want. We promise not to
snicker too much at your air guitar but we might place bets on which song you're listening to. Or
skip the music and listen to Mom nature's avalanches, and if we're lucky, coyotes singing. If you
bring a boombox to play use it away from the campsite, sit near it and turn it down low, so it
can't be heard very far away from you so you don't spoil other people's wilderness experience.
The club encourages acoustic guitars, but not drums.
There wil be coyotes IN the campsites. (Experience shows they sing better than some De Anza students.)
If you arm your car alarm it will go off when a coyote puts his paws up on a window to get a
look inside, waking up the whole campground. If you think you really need to use your car
alarm, someone can drive you back when you park your car at day-use.
You can find the instructions to turn off the loud beep your car makes when you use the keyless "remote" pushbutton on your keychain to unlock the car. Then you won't forget about it and wake up everyone in the middle of the night.
If you want to talk to someone in another campsite, go there and talk, don't yell.
No alcohol consumption. It's especially dangerous in the outdoors in winter.
This rule is not just mentioned to make the college happy, it is a trip rule.
De Anza's rules require that you camp with the group. Don't sign up for the trip and then decide
to go out on an impromptu cross-country ski overnight.
It's tempting to hang out in the dry, heated restroom when it's raining, and a few girls did on the
'98 trip. They also invited a guy into the restroom to talk. If another camper had walked in on them
before one of our group did, we all would have been watched closely by the Rangers for the rest
of the trip (and the guy in the restroom could have ended up in jail- yes, there is a jail in
Yosemite Valley).
So the idea is to think about whether others would be offended,
annoyed or complain about your actions, and not be afraid of telling someone else on the trip
when they are blowing it. (Not to mention that voices are amplified from the restroom-if
you need a dry place to hang out make it the laundromat, cafeteria or your tent).
Snowballs can hurt. Plan never to aim at someone's head. Toss them rather than aim a
super fast ball. Move your snowball fight to an empty area of the campground instead of within our sites so people who don't want to participate don't have to. Never throw them directly at animals you want to shoo away from the
campsite.
Also follow the specific park rules (count on it, someone will report you to the rangers).
Please don't hike or snowshoe in Nordic (cross-country) ski tracks. Walk alongside, but not in
the ski trail.
Bikes are not allowed on hiking or ski trails or off trail, only on bike paths and roads. Winter
weather in Yosemite Valley frequently is nice enough for bike riding or roller blading. No snowmobiles. No
personal snowplows either, wise guy.
Park rules require that we sleep six people to a campsite, so sorry, you can't pitch all the tents for
multiple sites together in one site. People learned this the hard way years ago when the Rangers
made us move tents and all that gear in them when people ignored this rule.
Don't collect firewood in the valley (it's all green and smokes anyway). Don't cut branches off
trees, or collect rocks, pine cones, flowers or any natural specimens anywhere in the park. No
chainsaws. No hunting. No firearms.
Smoking campfires cause a lot of pollution. Yosemite rules say fires must be put out completely
using water. People have gotten into
arguments over this one. Yes, at some places you can bury a fire in dirt, but not in Yosemite. Use
water, lots of it, and get the fire completely out so it isn't smoking at all. First-timer's instructions has detailed instructions on how to put out the campfire.
Don't leave a campfire unattended even for a few minutes. No, the people in the next campsite
are not going to take responsibility for it while you go to the store (big fines and people have
been blacklisted from future club events for this one).
Quiet hours are 10 p.m. to 6 a.m., and if we are a wise group we will try to be quiet by 9 p.m.
Please respect this even if the jerk in the nearby motor home is ignoring the no-generators hours
of 7 p.m. to 7 a.m.
Don't dig trenches around your tent. Even if it's really, really, really wet. It's okay to remove any pebbles, stones, pinecones, etc. from where you will pitch the tent.
No feeding any animals. Those Cheetos aren't good for you and they're
worse for the squirrels.
The park's stream and river fishing season is closed for the winter.
Store food in one of the campsite bear boxes with the latch completely slid down into place and
latched, or with it double clipped, if that's the kind in your site. Use both latches if there are two. Photos of the latching system on one kind of campsite food storage locker are at: Using a campsite food storage locker
Your shower kit has toothpaste and other things that smell like food to animals. Store it in the
metal bearbox, too.
Get the food/toiletries out of your vehicle right away. In 2005 Yosemite started warning: "Bears break into cars during the day time. So even while on a day hike, store all scented items in lockers."
No food can be left out while people are gone from the campsite, even for a short trip to the
trash bin. After dark, raccoons, coyotes or bears get into the bear-proof box if you leave the door open for just a
minute while you turn your back.
People used to be able to store food out of sight in their car trunk, or in the car with a blanket
over it, but the bears have gotten good at recognizing the shape of an ice chest, or just noticing
smells coming from passenger compartments or trunks. They put their claws into the top of your locked door and will pry it open
like a sardine can lid. Then they will claw out the back seat to get into the trunk. After getting your food,
they could go for the next car, even if it doesn't have food in it, so don't risk other people's cars
by making the mistake of thinking it won't happen to you.
We saw bear tracks in the snow in
Yosemite on a January Ranger snowshoe walk, and one broke into a car (not
one of ours) in Feb. 1999.
---- The bears don't truly hibernate all winter in mild winter places like Yosemite and would like to get into your car, as in these Park Service photos:
 
No food storage in cars is now a park policy. Smart people realize this also means no dirty
dishes, trash you didn't want to deal with late at night, or even a stove because it has spilled food
bits in places you can't clean easily. The animals don't know that soda can, cracker box or ice
chest is empty, so deal with empties as you would with food. The spare can of motor oil is shaped like a food container so they'll go after it, too.
Just because people are in the campsite or there is a big campfire burning does not mean that food not locked in a bear box is safe
from animals.
If you leave a box of groceries sitting while making trips back and forth from the car they'll get
into it, even though there may be people nearby. Raccoons may climb in through an open car
door or into a truck bed and drag off a whole loaf of bread while you are unpacking.
Especially after dark quick coyotes or raccoons will get into the bear-proof box if you leave the
door open for just a minute while you turn your back.
In the morning deer may wander through the campground. You'll grab your camera to get a
picture, forget about the sweet rolls on the picnic table, and before you know it, the deer are
eating your breakfast.
Likewise while on a hike, leave your snacks in a daypack pocket, and leave the daypack on the
ground, and ground squirrels can chew into the pack in seconds.
The raccoons are interested in even just licking dirty plates, so do dishes and clean up right after
meals or put the stuff away in the bear box before you move to the campfire.
Pack the food for the trip carefully so you know where it all is, and
so it's all in the same containers. On the '98 trip one girl (student body president)
in a hurry to pack at the last minute stuffed some hot chocolate mix into her
clothes duffel bag, and forgot it was there. When she arrived at the
campsite, the duffel bag went into the tent. Shortly (within minutes) thereafter
the raccoons snuck into the tent, dragged away the hot chocolate mix,
and bothered people the rest of the trip looking for more.
There will be whole families of raccoons in the campsites.
(And raccoons know how to unzip tent doors !!!)
The animals mostly don't bother groups that are vigilant about food storage. If you are awake
and being quiet you might hear a coyote sniffing around your tent in the middle of the night, but
he won't bother you if you were careful about food and scented things being put in the bearbox.
If someone were to be so #X!*RRR! stupid as to feed any raccoons that come begging, they'll
get more aggressive and bother us the rest of the trip.
These are not isolated incidents we are describing here, we need to be vigilant about not letting
animals get our food. and we need to even pick up after other people. Flagrant violations
can get you kicked off the trip.
Don't do dishes in the bathroom sinks. Dish water should be poured into the utility sinks
(usually on the side of a restroom building), not poured on the ground.
Club campsites, and all restaurants, stores, visitor center, etc. in Yosemite are non-smoking. If
you do smoke, park rules say no smoking while walking or hiking, or in any area with flammable
materials. Put your butts in a litter bag, and dispose of them in a trash bin, not on the ground.
If you do smoke, it will constrict blood vessels to your fingers and toes and make them colder, so
don't smoke if your toes are cold or it can be painful.
Don't assume someone else brought the trash bag to the bin.
At bedtime, use a flashlight to check under the picnic table for lost
potato chips and cooking items you forgot you set down on the ground during cooking.
Below: a cook set down a container of pasta sauce under a picnic table bench and forgot about it. We found it with a quick flashlight sweep before we all moved to the campfire.
Don't approach bears, but if one approaches you, or if a bear should enter camp, the park service
says "act immediately, throw objects at it from a safe distance. Yell, clap hands and bang pots
together. If there is more than one person, stand together to present a more intimidating figure,
but do not surround the bear." Don't do this if you are between a mama bear and her cub, or
more importantly, NEVER get between mama and her cub (s). The same rules go for a bear you
might meet on the trail. Report all incidents and sightings to a Ranger. Read more at: Bears
If animals get anything from you, NEVER try to get it back from them until they abandon
it.
Immediately clean up any scattered garbage or food animals got into.
You will be required to let us know your hiking, etc. plans. We'll have a binder to write in. If
you don't write in the book, we won't know where to send a search party for you. Previous people
have written notes on it such as:
-Upper Yosemite falls 10:50 to about 6 p.m. (list of 10 names)
-Lisa & Don easy spots-lower Yosemite falls, Mirror Lake, museums. Back around 5:00
If your plans change, or you return and decide to go to dinner or on a night hike, we'll need more
details. Please put them in writing, rather than asking someone to tell the advisor (they'll forget),
so we don't send a search party for you. Likewise if you decide to drive home because you miss
your electric blanket, we'll need it in writing.
We realize this is a nuisance to some of you, but it is a De Anza sponsored trip, and we'd like to
be able to keep doing adventurous events off campus.
Learn to build Campfires that don't smoke too much.
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