In October, a group of Massachusetts teenagers running an Instagram account called “Boys With A Bus” built a four-story raft on the shores of the Missouri River and embarked on a 5-day adventure through the Big Sky wilderness. Along the way, they met Dan Schrock, who invited them to visit Big Sandy High School and share the tale of their adventure. Over the last few months, the Mountaineer has relayed the story of these young men and their modern Huckleberry Finn style journey. Thus far, we have looked at their presentation to the students, the story of how a group of Ivy League bound, private school kids found themselves traveling the same waterways as Louis and Clark, and the various challenges they encountered along the way on their journey (including a sinking raft and problems with their planned means of propulsion on the river). This week, we will be hearing in their own words what made the journey worthwhile.
Amidst all of the struggles to keep their behemoth of a boat afloat, there were plenty of moments where the young men spotted the beauty of Northern Montana, which few know exists and even few get to see.
Kevin Han, who is bound for the University of Chicago next year to double major in Economics and Humanities, pointed to the evening they spent camping with Dan Schrock. “That night, the night of the crazy Northern Lights, the massive solar flare. The six of us sat on our roof deck and looked up for hours just looking at the Northern Lights. It was dancing all over the sky. It was insane. It was just like, sort of like a misty haze. We’re all from cities, so we’ve never seen them. I hardly see the sky. Yeah, it’s a completely different world out here. It’s super awesome.”
Benjamin Siegel, who will be attending Yale next fall, explained that his favorite moments involved “relaxing on the top of the raft on the turf, just hanging out as we’re going through the white cliffs, with the huge sort of caverns on either side. It was, it was awesome, really relaxing.” In our conversations, Ben was also the young man who brought along a book or two to read while sitting on the deck on the river. He described reading Huckleberry Finn before the trip and how it enhanced his enjoyment of the trip.
Benjamin Rhodes Croft, who will be attending MIT next year to double major in business and AI or possibly AI and Mathematics, explained that his favorite moment in the trip took place after one of the more strenuous portions of the trip. “We had finally made it past some of the tougher parts of the journey. We were floating down kind of this nice stretch of the river as the sun was setting. We checked if it was deep enough, and we started jumping off the top of the boat into the water. It was just really good vibes. We were really excited to kind of be in that moment in life.”
David Rule, who was the only young man not from Massachusetts. David is from Wyoming and has a degree in Neuroscience. He ultimately found it was quite a bit more profitable to make a living building tiny houses and document the work for his YouTube channel. He explained “One day, we spent the entire day fishing and we had absolutely no luck… no fish. It just felt kind of
pointless. So we docked up at the end of the day…” He thought to himself “I’ll throw a couple lines out, just see what happens.’ And then I come back and my rod has, like, shifted. I go to feel it, and it feels like it’s just snagged. I reeled it in and it’s coming up, there’s nothing pulling against it and I think ’I don’t know how it’s snagged because it’s just sitting out there but I don’t know, maybe a fish pulled it and got away.’” After several minutes of trying to break his line free from the invisible snag at the bottom of the river, David began to think: “If there is one down there, it’s a monster. I start pulling and I feel like I’m dragging something along the bottom of the river. And then then it starts fighting! I realized ‘This is a fish!’ I end up reeling in this giant carp.” David described the excitement of the catch even though it wasn’t the sort of fish you would eat, it was a catch after a long frustrating day of not catching anything. To top it off, the carp was huge! To add to the joy of the catch he explained that “I reeled this in on the cheapest rod and reel. We got a bunch of really cheap fishing rods at Walmart. And I remember after a day of no success getting that carp. That was kind of the huge that was a highlight of the trip for me, for sure!”
Justin Chen, who is going to Penn next year, talked about hiking in the white cliffs in the Eagle Creek area. He explained how much he enjoyed the beauty of the area and how nice it was to be on dry land again for a while.
Sebastian Romero, who will be going to the University of Chicago next year and double majoring in Economics and Business, celebrated a birthday during the journey. “We’d been eating a lot of canned food and cereal during the trip. And then it was my birthday, actually on the raft, and Ben actually made me a great meal. It was eggs, ham, and toast. It was the best thing we had on the raft.” He went on to explain that when they passed the Virgelle Ferry, and worked to get the boat under the ferry wire. Ben acquired the supplies for the birthday breakfast “going under the Virgelle Ferry, the lady there sells eggs and pies and everything. So we’re floating by and she comes out with a bunch of eggs. He’s like ‘Oh my gosh, eggs.’ So yeah, being able to cook a really great breakfast.”
Interviewing the young men from the Instagram group, there were several things I found most interesting about their high points to the trip. First, they were most excited when discussing the challenges that they overcame. When they talked about the enjoyment, many of the sweet spots were essentially in contrast to the hard times. They enjoyed a good meal after eating canned food or swam as friends after fighting the river all day or caught “the big one” after catching nothing for a long time. The other is that the rest of the high marks were associated with the beauty and grandeur of Montana. There are parts of Big Sky country that very few people get to see because they are far from prying eyes and the bright lights of the cities. Those are what really make our great state amazing. The two together are essentially the joy of Montana encapsulated perfectly. It has historically been a rough country where a particular personality has scratched out a life, finding great joy in bonds forged through the work and hardship and the untouched majesty of this country. The young men who traveled the Missouri discovered all of that in 5 days and were all the better for it.
