Strange Times/Are Here

We're slowly finding our groove at Pacific. It's a bit tricky to do for a couple of reasons. The first reason being that our schedule is never set in stone. We spent a couple of days this week simply waiting for our sponsor to figure out something for us to do. There have been a few paperwork mishaps that have prevented us from dividing straight into heavy project work, so those have been getting straightened out. The weather also plays a big part in what we can accomplish in a day. Monday and Tuesday were pretty awful this week, but I got to experience my first thunderstorm since leaving the east coast! I was beginning to think they didn't happen at all out here. I usually sleep through weather-related happenings at night, but some of the thunder we experienced this week was enough to wake me up around 1:30am. It was fantastic – I forgot how much I missed a good thunderstorm.

The second reason is because we're still settling in, really. We spent most of last weekend in Placerville, a town about 15 minutes away, because it's cute in a touristy kind of way so we explored the area and completely assaulted the Cozmic Cafe with our presence as we flocked towards an source for internet. Cozmic Cafe is a great place for internet though. Good coffee, the prices aren't bad, there's a bar and performance space upstairs that we haven't made use of yet and there's a MINE SHAFT ON THE FIRST FLOOR! You can't go too far into it, but the whole place was literally built off the end of this mine shaft. It's so cool that I'll forgive the proprietors for spelling “cosmic” with a “z”.

So since we weren't really around last weekend and the fact that food everywhere around us is expensive (everyone jacks up the prices for the tourists who invade this area during the summer) we're not on a real schedule yet in terms of buying food, doing laundry (there's only one machine here and it's not at all reliable) and even hanging out around the house. There's a TV, but it's covered in balloons right now (one of the employees at a grocery store we were scouting gave them to Josh, Jules, Jeff and I). As a result of our time in Placerville, the Morris House looks a little bit more like a home thanks to purchases that people have made.

The Happy New Year 2010 Bear and Wanda, the cat cookie jar. Wanda holds our laundry room key (attached to the safety glasses) and our snaps (kudos) to each other between team meetings.

 

And our team is still really great about trading off chores so there's not a lot of stress in that area. In fact, we have a dining room now! We've definitely taken advantage of that by having family-style dinners as often as time allows.

Our project work this week had its ups and downs. Monday and Tuesday were spent working at the fire cache in nearby Camino, CA. The team spent two days taking inventory of everything there – and there's a ton to count: fire hoses of varying materials, lengths and diameters; couplings; sleeping bags; nozzles; batteries; antennae; packs; cans of gasoline; sets of fire resistant clothing (Nomex); whistles; space blankets; Nalgene bottles; bottles of Gatorade; hand tools (shovels, rakes, McLeods, Pulaskis, etc.); rolls of caution (flagging) tape; fusees; driptorches; tents, and other fun/not as fun things. 

Ellen found some fashionable goggles!

 It was great getting to see the cache and learn exactly where some wildland firefighting resources come from. It was not as great to count over 200 of just one nozzle type by hand, and so on. But Tuesday afternoon found us one Nalgene, one whistle, and one carabiner richer thanks to Dave, the cache supervisor. We were also fortunate enough to listen to a presentation by a Forest Service Recruiter who gave us some tips on how to apply for a full-time position (or even seasonal job) with the wildland fire division of the USFS. Thanks, Pacific!

Wednesday and Thursday were spent in training, which was wonderful. The alternative would have been busywork, but our sponsor decided that our time would be better spent getting trained up before the refresher courses for the seasonals start in May. Wednesday was all classroom training for the S-212 course: Portable Pumps and Water Use. We learned the basics of how 2-stroke and 4-stroke portable pumps work and how to set up/use them in the field. There was a lot of new vocabulary involved, but it was a great review of some terminology we covered during fire training but haven't used since. Thursday was the Intro to Hydraulics section and the written final exam: both of them went just fine. 

Thursday afternoon involved driving out to Jenkinson Lake, which was only 5 or so miles west on Highway 50, towards Placerville. Pacific staff drove out with us and helped us actually set up and run the pumps we had learned about. 

Tucker messes around with the fog nozzle

Josh takes aim at mallards

  The field day concluded with our instructors running us through a "real" scenario in groups of 4. Both groups did quite well and everyone passed the practical portion of the class. So now, in addition to having my Basic 40, my S-211 (chainsaw certification) I also have my S-212 certification! I'm so glad that the Pacific staff chose to train us versus telling us to go paint a shed or something (which will happen in the coming weeks, we're told). It makes me feel more productive and more at-ease when I think about the approaching fire season.

This weekend is still pretty open in terms of plans, but we have some things on the horizon! I'm talking with someone from the South Lake Tahoe Department of Park and Recreation to see if we can do an Independent Service Project there. It would be ideal because then the whole team would have an excuse to use the van to get up to South Lake Tahoe and see some of the sights in addition to performing service. I'm also trying to think of if I want to take vacation time and where I'd go. Any suggestions? Send them my way!

Speaking of sending things my way, I have an address at Pacific that I'm allowed to use for the rest of the year! If you'd like it, get ahold of me somehow and I'll be glad to share it. This address will be much more reliable than my campus address because SPIKEmail, no matter how convenient, takes forever to get to us.

Cheers, everyone! 

Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger

It's official! We have arrived at the place where we'll spend the rest of our time in NCCC, the Pacific Ranger Station, working with the fine employees of the Eldorado National Forest.

Before I continue I must register my frustration with how the name of our forest is spelled. My current location is outside of Pollock Pines, CA which is in El Dorado County. There is also the town of El Dorado nearby. The Eldorado National Forest, however, is all one word and not two. So if you're like me and notice discrepancies like that, now you know that Eldorado pertains the forest and El Dorado is the county or town (or, you know, the fabled City of Gold). It still bothers me every time I see signs for the forest.

The compound isn't all that big. There's an administrative building/visitor center, a specialty office building (which is shaped like a large trailer), a few barracks for the seasonal workers, and a building that houses a gym, a small garage-like meeting room/workout area, and a work room.

Our housing, however, is far better than the barracks. We live in the Milton Morris house which is an historical place or somesuch. It's the oldest building on the compound, which is kind of neat, but luckily it's mostly up-to-date in terms of amenities. No internet, but we do have a propane fireplace! There's also plenty of room for the eight of us to spread out. Yes, eight. Sadly, we lost a team member due to injury.

The three girls share one of the bedrooms that's off the living room and two guys share another. Two other guys share the space that connects the living room with the rest of the house. The kitchen is sizeable and the table seats everyone, which has lead to many family-style dinners already. Lastly, Jeff has his man-cave in the back of the house off the kitchen. We also have access to the shed that's attached to the house. This is where we store the chainsaws that have been assigned to us for the round, our extra gear, and some other things that have been left by previous teams.

In the driveway you'll notice the 15-passenger van that gets issued to every team. You can also see the chase truck that was given to our team for the round. We're strangely excited to have the truck even though it mostly just sits in the driveway.

You can also kind of glimpse the two bags we were issued. The green bag is a fire pack which we will have to wear if we ever get called to go on a fire. In those we store water, files for our hand tools, extra batteries, an extra shirt, and all of our personal protective equipment (PPE). Our PPE list includes smoke goggles, alternate eye protection, ear protection, gloves and our hardhats. We also keep space blankets and our fire shelters in the green packs. Everyone on a fire carries their fire shelter with them but it is only under the most desperate circumstances that they are deployed. Many of our instructors during our two weeks of fire training in January have never had to use them, so here's hoping that mine will stay safely tucked in my pack until I hand it back at the end of July.

The red bags stay packed at all times in case we are called out on a fire. The red bags contain extra clothes (including our fire resistant Nomex outfits and extra socks/underwear/undershirts), toiletries, an extra mess kit, and other supplies that would be helpful if we were to suddenly find ourselves in the woods for two weeks fighting a fire. These red bags are typically collected by a ground crew and dropped by helicopter if the firefighters find it unfeasible to hike back to where they were originally stored.

But it's March and fire season is at least two months away. It can get up to 60 degrees in the afternoon here on the compound, but there's still some snow on the ground here and it gets pretty chilly at night. It also happens to be gorgeous here! Our cabin is located on the road to the heliport which means a couple of things:

1. We will always know when a helicopter and its crew arrives/departs
2. We have access to a spectacular view

The mountains in the back are a part of the Crystal Range, which we got to see a little bit closer when we drove around to potential project sites on Wednesday.

Speaking of project work, our schedule currently rocks socks. The team works 4, 10-hour days and then has three-day weekends. It's amazing. Unfortunately, this schedule only lasts until May 9^th, which is the first day that the seasonal employees show up and start their refresher training in preparation for fire season. Starting May 9^th we'll switch to a typical work schedule of 5, 8-hour days, and we will have a 2-hour travel restriction. The Forest Service wants to make sure that we stay close to the compound in case we are called out on a fire. The chances of this actually happening remain to be seen, but we'll know more about the season as it approaches.

Until May 9^th, however, the team will be looking to travel a bit and take advantage of our three days weekends. Not to mention we also have a “spring break” (aka a four day weekend) at the end of April to think about. I'm hoping to get to the coast at some point, but there's a bunch to see out where we are – Lake Tahoe and Desolation Wilderness being just two destinations I'd like to see before I leave.

This weekend, however, was mostly spent in the town of Placerville. Placerville (formerly, and proudly, called Hangtown due to the number of hangings the town carried out) has a decent amount to do. It's a cute little place that really embraces its gold rush past. The facades on the buildings and the close set-up of the shops really make it feel like a mining town. It's a bit kitschy, but it's a nice place to stroll around. Not to mention that there's live music everywhere, apparently. Well done, Placerville.

We don't really know quite what to expect in the coming weeks. The team will be passed around a bit between supervisors working in various departments within the Forest Service. This means that we are (supposedly) guaranteed to have a variety of projects to work on before fire season starts up. I really hope that we do, just because that means more learning and more travel around the forest! We've already learned the basics of radio communications, seen the main dispatch center in Camino, the fire lookout station on Big Hill and a couple of other sites we could be working near. I'm excited to see how the various departments all fit together (or if they in fact fit together at all).

We do know that we'll be doing some of the hardest work we've ever done in order to prepare for fire season. We conduct our physical training sessions (5 days per week for at least an hour each session) with the Forest Service now, and they're hardcore. Our first day here our supervisor of the week, Fred, took us on a run called Old Dirty Bastard. It was only five miles, but the first half was all uphill. For those of you keeping score at home, Sacramento is flatter than the SU quad. I thought I was going to collapse at various points going up the hill, but I finished the run surprisingly strong. And just to show the hill that it couldn't keep me down, I ran it again on Saturday morning. Owned!

To everyone who might at some point read this, odds are I miss you and would love to hear how you're doing! Hope all is well.

Cheers, friends and family!