SAR

SAR stands for "Search and Rescue", which is sadly a very real event that I mostly likely will participate in during my career with the Park. Unfortunately, I was too busy at work this week and missed the formal training; I would really like to have attended so I would be more effective and knowledgeable of SAR procedures, come time for me to find somebody - it could be a matter of life or death, and I want to know what I'm doing! As touristy as the Park can get, it's easy to forget sometimes that this truly is a rugged, unforgiving and sometimes dangerous place - and people to do get lost, hurt, or worse.

Yesterday, I was supposed to meet my friend Mark on the west side for trivia night and to watch Ghost Hunters, but he got called out on a SAR to look for a man who had been missing since Sunday - his van had been parked at the Colorado River Trailhead on the west side for a number of days and he missed his flight home. It doesn't take training for what they need to do right now - hike, hike, and hike until they find this guy. Needless to say, at this point it doesn't look good. They were out until after 9 pm last night, and they headed out again early this morning. As of right now, he hasn't texted to say that they have found him. I guess when the ranger Jeff Christiansen had gone missing, the Park essentially shut down for 2 weeks and every able individual hiked all day, every day, trying to find him. Tragic but very real. A sheep researcher had fallen off a cliff  in 2003 when I worked here before, right after I met him. Good luck to the SAR teams. I might try to get involved with SAR when I am more settled; there are many great organizations around here.

I am going to head down to Fort Collins today and try to get my Colorado license! And by the way, car insurance is less than HALF what I was paying in Michigan! Which is important because as of right now, I am insuring two cars and a motorcycle. :) No luck in finding the right place to live, though. I had stopped to look at a cute little cabin outside of Lyons, and it seemed promising... except it was wayyyyy to close to the other houses around it, all which were owned by the landlord (an old lady) and her adult kids... and she started telling me how much she cries every day since her husband and son recently passed away. Very nice lady, but not quiet private enough. She did say she thought I was the answer to her prayers because she was worried about who to have rent the cabin. Hear that mom, somebody said I was the answer to their prayers! That lady just doesn't know any better. :)

Me overlooking Estes Park with Longs Peak and the Rocky Mountains in the background. (Taken by Joe)

Brrrrr

Happy Memorial Day!

I'm here, alive and well, busy as always. I worked 20+ hrs of overtime in the past two weeks, then had a busy weekend doing fun stuff and enjoying the sunny warm weather... until last night, it got cold, windy, and snowed up top on Trail Ridge Road... Which sucked because I was going to go over to Grand Lake for their little parade, but the road was closed this morning. Oh well. Slept all day and now looking for cabins or whatever to rent. Yawn. Even strong coffee can't seem to get me going today!

Trail Log: hiked to Emerald Lake with Joe yesterday (3.6 miles round trip); one of the very few hikes I haven't done out of the Bear Lake Trailhead. It was short and easy compared to the other hikes we have done so far, but probably the most spectacular in terms of scenery. There were a million people on the trail (forgot about the whole "mass influx of tourists" thing over holiday weekends) but we scrambled up some rocks away from them all. It's always great hiking in the snow wearing shorts. :) My photos aren't on here yet, but I'm going to post a nice one or two that Joe took.

Work should be slowing down; the air curtain burner goes back this week, so tomorrow we are going to the West Side to clean it up. I had to drive the loader up Trail Ridge Road for about 50 minutes going perhaps 10 miles an hour, up all those steep curves... Pretty boring, actually, but hey how many people can say they've done THAT before?? Ok, besides all the roads guys.

I finally got to fell my first trees as hazard tree chainsaw kitten this summer! We had some pretty large, tall (50-70' ft probably) lodgepole that needed to be dropped, skidded out and hauled away; my aim was just a little bit off and my cuts were a little crooked, but not bad for not having done it in months! I admit that I got very VERY sick of driving that freakin' double-clutch POS dump truck back and forth all day, grinding gears (it's not just me, the truck is just fundamentally ridiculous to drive!) and breaking the chains that hold the tailgate on... We had planned 10 hrs or less of work on Friday, but things just went so slowly I ended up not getting home until 8 pm. Yikes. No wonder I'm so tired!

Joe's photo of Hallett Peak and the Dragon's Tail (spire on right)

Go go go, all the time!

Phew! Glad that's over!

I'm mixed right now about being finished with living on the west side of the park in Grand Lake. It's colder, quieter, less people, and NOT where I really pay rent... but I really liked the people, the laid back attitude, and I'm going to miss it. I was getting exhausted and stressed out from having to eat out EVERY night (too much of a hassle to bring all my cooking stuff from my apartment in Estes) and having to share one truck between three people, but now that I'm back in Estes - along with the swarms of vacationers that are going to be saturating town from now until October - I am a little bit sad. I was even getting to know the restaurant and bar owners in Grand Lake, and our trivia team was making progress - still terrible, but improving! I'll have to go over there to say hi every once in a while.

BUT I am finally catching up on sleep, errands, and everything else that I neglected while I was over there! It's taken me all weekend to adjust to NOT being busy - my life has been GO GO GO GO! And suddenly STOP!

I was praised for my hard work over the radio after I ran around with 6 pesticide contractors, covering picnic tables, cars, and RVs with plastic and alerting everybody when we would be spraying around their homes, pets, campgrounds, visitor center... Maybe it doesn't sound that bad, but there was only one me (Cisco had the day off) with two spray rigs and 6 people that weren't always on the same page as me. Plus, I really don't like pesticides... But I busted my butt and got it done. My boss here on the East side also thanked me. It feels good to be appreciated! :)

The roads crews were diligently clearing the road and had it open to administrative travel - employees could go "over the top" on Trail Ridge Road from Grand Lake to Estes, a trip that is just over an hour or so, instead of having to go all the way around 3-4 hrs like I've had to do the past four weeks. On Monday, they led a media crew over the top, which was an absolute circus. A marmot had knawed his way into the middle of the road and kept popping his head out - which led to about 15 photographers, newscasters, and videographers lying on the ground, trying to find the perfect angle, snapping photos of the little guy. In the meantime, we just sat back and laughed at how ridiculous they looked! I took a few photos of how stupid they looked and will post them in the album. Eventually they let us go around... otherwise Idon't think we would have ever made it to Grand Lake!

Being on Trail Ridge Road before it is open to the public is surreal. There is less snow this year than in 2003 when I was up there last, but to know that I was the ONLY ONE on the top of that road, 11, 900-something ft. high, surrounded by barren tundra and sometimes wicked looking storm clouds... It was just breathtaking. It also made me a bit of a celebrity. On my way back on Thursday, I made it to the closed gate at Rainbow Curve, hopped out of the truck and unlocked the key. I had tourists taking my photo, in awe that somebody was coming down from that forbidden place above the gate! "Is the road opening? Are you opening it now? When will it be open?" I made a few people happy when I suggested that maybe, JUST MAYBE, the road would open this weekend.

Whadda ya know, the road opened Saturday morning! Joe came up to get the inaugural trip over the top of the Rockies, so once again I went from Estes to Grand Lake. He was happy just to drive my sweet little Toyota! On our way back, right by the continental divide where there was still plenty of snow and ice, we pulled up behind a few stopped cars, puzzled by what exactly we were looking at. Apparently there had just been a mini rock slide/avalanche, with a pile of rocks, a downed log and rushing water obstructing the road! We popped my truck into 4x4 and eased through the mess, but the cars were stuck. I'm not really sure where that water was coming from, it will be interesting to hear from my West side friends what happened. It was like a little river cutting through the snow and ice, straight down the hill and over the road. I did stop and report it so hopefully those people weren't stuck for too long... But it was pretty cool to see!

Trail Log Time: Bridal Veil Falls, 6.4 miles round trip. This was one of the first hikes I ever did in the park, while I was training for plant ID. I figured it would be a good one for Joe and I to do today - we hiked to a lake last time, a waterfall this time, and hope to do a peak next time. The hike itself is pretty but not very spectacular for a while, until you get deeper into the mountains and get into a more forested rocky area. Climb a few rock stairs and you reach the base of the falls, which is beautiful in itself... but I think it's much more rewarding to scramble up the steep slick rock to the top of the falls, where the water washes over the rock in a shallow ribbon - hence the name, "Bridal Veil". From there, we wanted to keep climbing higher so we climbed up to the top of a rock outcropping and realized we hadn't told anybody where we were, or when we left... a big no no! So from now on, I will always let somebody know where we are going. When I go solo, I usually leave either a note in my car or in my apartment saying where I was hiking, and what time I left. If I ever go missing, you'll know where to start looking!! :)

I've got a lot of random photos and some of the falls. Now, it's time for me to look for cabins or apartments that are affordable and MAYBE allow dogs. Yep, I feel ready to get a pupper if I can find the right housing! I am supposed to get a roommate - yes, a ROOM mate in a dinky apartment with twin beds in a small room, YUCK - and I just don't wanna do that anymore!

Enjoy the photos, and I'll try to call everybody back that I've been too busy to talk to!

New Truck!

Phew! Glad this week is over!

Not much time to update right now, but this was the pesticide spraying week at work. This is the first time I've had to relax all week. But...

I bought a truck!

1992 Toyota Pickup Extra cab 4x4 with a topper. High mileage but a great price and it's in GREAT shape!! Now I just have to sell the Focus. Anybody interested? Ha ha!

Next assignment: Find a new place to live. Easier said than done!

Anyway I'm just looking forward to some R & R this weekend. I love the west side... but I'm just soooo freaking tired!

Hiking Photos

These photos are from last weekend when Joe came up. And I thought the hike I picked out was going to be a challenge to him... Yeah right! He whooped me. I'd like to pretend it's because I was carrying the backpack. :)

Trail Log: Gem Lake (click for trail description), 3.6 miles round trip, 910 ft. elevation gain. Short but steep! This is what most of my photos are of in this album. Joe remembered his hiking boots this time and we got a late start on the trail. The weather was fantastic and the storm clouds hovered in the distance but never made it past the continental divide to ruin our hike! We went back to Lumpy Ridge, where we had found that dead elk the previous weekend. It was still there, and Joe took some great (nasty) photos - flies included! We looked like a couple of tourists taking photos of everything, to the point that I didn't know if we'd actually make it to the lake! But we did, just before the sun starting dropping the the weather cooled off.

After our hike, we went to Mary's Lake Lodge for dinner, which has a great reputation but I had never been there. We didn't sit in the really really expensive part, but the Tavern was more up my alley anyway. Fantastic food, live bluegrass music, and great views! Anybody that comes up here has to try it at least once.

Ok that's all for now, I know I haven't updated in forever but I have been working like crazy and still mostly living on the West Side, where I don't get on the computer much. The good news is we finished our slash clean-up at Green Mountain and I flagged those 1,000 trees - including pounding in sign posts - and we can now move on to more exciting things. Next week we supervise the pesticide contractors - not looking forward to it, we have to put plastic over all picnic tables, tent platforms, fire pits, etc - but our trivia team, formerly "The East Siders" now called "Good at Drinking, Bad at Trivia", is expecting a BIG WIN and I'm excited! Just kidding, we suck. :)

I'm still busy trying to find a truck, an apartment, and catching up on all the stuff I neglect while I am away from Estes. I've been on the computer at this coffee shop for breakfast AND lunch and still haven't finished everything I am working on!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LINDA! My sis is 23 today, and I wish I were there to take her out!! Miss you, Winny!

BTW, I am amazed that the radio is playing "Question" by the Old 97's. Suddenly, I like this station a whole lot more!

One more tidbit: One guy that works on the West side is in the Army and has men coming back from out East. He said that if I can get my motorcycle to them in Indiana, they'll ship it out here on their way to El Paso! SWEEEET! Now, if I only had an affordable way to get it to Indiana...!!