Where did November Go? Lost in the woods

Hello again. I almost forgot I had this blog it has been so long since I last posted. Chances are if I have almost forgot it, there is no one left reading it. But I will continue to post in the chance someone stumbles back here and for my own records of my doings.
So last I posted I was about to go to the Galiuro Wilderness in Coronado National Forest for 5 weeks. It was an epic project to say the least and in one of the most remote/rugged places I have been. We left Flagstaff early on the morning of October 19th to drive down. It took about 7 hours to drive there with the last two hours on a dirt road into the middle of nowhere. We camped at the trailhead that night and the next morning packed up the mules with our food and supplies and started hiking in with loaded packs full of tools. We reached our home for the next 5 weeks after 7 hours of hiking.
Pictures from the hike in:
Crew Picture before the hike in

From Coronado BC project

starting the hike. The trail goes up and over the ridge in the background and then over one more ridge before dropping down to our campsite.

Clouds rolled in and it rained a bit on the hike

Letting the mules pass us

about halfway to the our camp



The work consisted of brushing a 16ish mile loop that had not been worked for over 10 years. While it sounded straight forward and the first week was, we soon found out this was going to be quite more difficult than we first thought. A majority of the trail was impassible and impossible to find, there was so much brush. Much of our time was simply spent trying to find where the "trail" went. What was supposed to be a brushing project to widen the trail corridor in fact turned out to be a building a brand new trail project. We met a few people who had been coming here for 30+ years and they had never heard of anyone going on these trails, which helps explain why they were in such disrepair.
Pictures of work:
Here is what the trail looked like before we came

One of the best sections of trail. Cutting down an overhanging limb

Finally my fingernail came off!



For the first 3 weeks we camped in the same spot and worked both directions of the loop from that location. However after this time the large amount of hiking meant diminishing returns on how much work we could get done everyday. So the fourth week we moved camp 5 miles further into the wilderness and worked from there for 6 days. After this point we moved back to our original campsite for the last week of work. We split our crew into two groups for the last week with one group hiking 10-14 miles round trip each day for work while the other group hiked 6-10 miles round trip each day. It was awesome to be able to hike so much and be paid for it, but over 100 miles of hiking in a week for me on top of work made me quite exhausted by the end of the project.
Our off days were spent in the backcountry and for me they often consisted of hiking ahead on our trail so I would know where it went on our work days. We also spent a lot of time reading, throwing the frisbee, making up games, and exploring the area, including mines, caves, and old mining cabins.
A fair amount of wildlife was seen including a bear, deer, wild turkeys, rattlesnakes, black widows and tarantulas. It was a beautiful area and we barely scratched the surface of places to explore.
More pictures




Cabin where a shooting took place in 1918 where 4 people died including 3 officers of the law. It lead to the largest manhunt in arizona history


Check out the whole album for more pictures

We hiked out on the Monday before Thanksgiving and drove back to Flagstaff the following day. I went down to Phoenix to visit family for Thanksgiving and had an awesome time.
Sunny and warm in Phoenix for Thanksgiving

Yummy food and drink after 5 weeks eating backcountry food


Snowy and Cold in Flagstaff after thanksgiving


I then returned to Flagstaff to find out I would be going to the Grand Canyon and leading 16 volunteers, 10 of which had never camped before. The night we got there it got down to -2 degrees Fahrenheit and the next day at work the high was 23 degrees. To say it was a shock for them is a huge understatement. But I was very proud of how they handled it and we got so much work do that we left two days early. Last night was my first time at the Green Room to get 25cent drinks in over 6 months. I was very careful not to overdo it. We ended up playing a bunch of pool and having a grand old time.
Sunset at the canyon


Today I finally had the chance to really get going on construction of my living quarters in my truck. It's coming along well and I have finished the majority of construction and now will focus on the details. Here are a couple pictures.



In other good news I have been a supervisor with ACE for over 6 months now so I finally have health insurance! That's all for now. I will be heading out to Lake Mead to do some fencing next week. The end of our season is rapidly approaching and everyone is getting excited for the end of season party on the 16th.

Back in Flagstaff and Leaving Just as Quickly

My last week of work in Tahoe consisted of tiding up a few things at the work-site and writing up a 40+ page end of season report.
We did get to use the highline on Monday though which was fun. Moving large rocks elevated 20+ft on a 200+ft long cable.
Here you can see us guiding the rock towards it's final resting place.

I left Wednesday after work to start the drive to Flagstaff in my new truck. The first 3 hours were very slow going getting out of Tahoe as I only covered 150 miles during that time. But things picked up and I made it to 30 miles outside of Barstow around 2am and slept for a few hours in the truck before making it the rest of the way to Flagstaff.
The sunrise in the desert was quite something on Thursday morning

Since getting back to Flagstaff I have been visiting as many of my friends from here as possible before I leave.
Speaking of leaving, I will be heading out of Flagstaff tomorrow at 7am to head to the Galiruo Wilderness in Coronado National Forest. I had never heard of this place before Friday, but the more I read, the more excited I am to go there.
Here is a link to some info about the place.


Besides the remoteness and ruggedness of the area I am excited because we will be staying at the Power's Cabin. It is a historical cabin from the early 1900's that was made famous by a large gunfight that took place there which led to the largest manhunt in Arizona history.
Additionally the highest mountain in the area had a B-24 bomber from World War 2 crash there so I hope to check out the wreckage while I am there.
Overall it should be an awesome project in an incredible place. I am stoked to be out there for 5 weeks straight.
I will be returning to civilization on November 24th and will be spending a relaxing Thanksgiving here in Flagstaff at which point you can expect a detailed blog post and many pictures.
Until then....

My First Vehicle- About time?

Well, it finally happened. After much talk for the last couple years about getting a car I did it. Today I bought a 95 Ford F150 4x4 Supercab. I had about given up on finding what I was looking for this summer. But in a chance encounter at the forest service end of season party I met a guy who just bought a new car and was looking to get rid of his old truck. Test drove it Friday. Thought about it Saturday and bought it today. It's a beast of a truck and is sure to be a blast to travel and live in the next couple years. It's got a brand new speaker system and a camper-shell on the 6.5ft bed as well as two fuel tanks.
So I am heading back to Flagstaff mid week to get it registered and whatnot. Sadly this means I won't be able to go home or see people in Davis or elsewhere.



Just a start, the bed will get spruced up quite a bit more after my backcountry project.

Yup, two fuel tanks

Hardly Strictly Summer is Coming to an End

Already one week longer that planned in Tahoe and I have one more week to go. But I am hardly complaining as this has been a strictly awesome Summer. Last weekend was insanely awesome at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival in San Francisco. Over 100+ bands over 3 days on 6 stages with 700,000+ people and all for free. Some of the music highlights that I saw were T-bone Burnett, Gillian Welch, Jackie Green, Peter Himmelman, Steve Earle, Robert Earle Keen, and Umphrey's McGee. Sadly I had to leave before the end and missed some of the bands I would have most liked to see.
It was great to see the new dwellings of Kaitlin and Tyler as well. Both live within blocks of GGP and I thank them for letting me stay at their places. Here are some pictures from the festival as well as a couple videos.

Arriving

Video from Rooster Stage watching Steve Earle


walking down to Banjo stage for Gillian Welch

360 degree view of Banjo Stage waiting for Gillian Welch


Crowd at Towers stage watching Jackie Gree





As far as work is concerned, my crew has finished all the work that was scheduled for us at Cold Creek as of last Wednesday. Now we will spend our final week finishing up some loose ends that the forest service crew was unable to complete. I will also have to do my final end of project report to submit to the forest service. Some pictures of our completed work.









The weather wrecked havoc on us for the past week as well. It rained everyday since last Saturday through Wednesday. Tuesday was the worst. When we started our hike to our worksite it was 42 degrees and raining. About 10 minutes into our hike it was colder and hailing. 10 minutes after that it was sleeting and when we got to our worksite it was a combo of those as well as snowing. We were working right at the snowline. It was a blizzard at our highest work spot, but 100 ft in elevation lower it was raining. And in between it was everything. We worked until 9:30 when the forest service told us to pack up and go home as it was too dangerous.

Winter is coming!


I'll probably post once more from Tahoe and a final time from Flagstaff before heading into the backcountry for 5 weeks. I'm working on getting off up here on Wednesday so I can road-trip back through California to see people on my way. Stay tuned for that.

Oh yeah, the salmon are running

Winding Down by Turning Things Up

Bluegrass Concert Friday night in Berkeley. Stanford Invitational Saturday morning. Marie Graduation Party Saturday night to Sunday morning. Rope Swing and Zip line in an alpine lake Sunday evening. A great weekend to say the least. But I will say a bit more.
It was awesome to be back at Stanford and watch the guys beat all the Big West teams. Especially nice to see Thig back up there and running strong. I'm looking forward to watching the rest of the season. Opened my first beer at 3:50pm on Saturday afternoon. Finished my last brew around 3:50am Sunday morning. An incredible 12 hours filled that gap.
Finally Ben and I stopped by Long Lake near donner summit to hit up a zip line/rope swing. Can't wait to go back.
Some Pictures







A fun weekend was then followed by a good week of work. We had a minor delay in that a large boulder was in the way of our trail. But gave me the opportunity to teach my crew how to use a pionjar and feathers/wedges to split rocks.
Pictures


drilling holes in rock with pionjar

hammering in feathers and wedges to split rock

rock is split

switchback is coming along. one more week to finish up

Now I am in San Francisco attending 3 days of Hardly Strictly Bluegrass at Golden Gate Park. Day one I saw T Bone Burnett which rocked and now I am about to head to Kaitlin's for a house warming shindig. Should be a great time!

Injuries, Wildlife, and end of summer fun

This past week has been a rough one on my crew and myself as far as injuries are concerned. Monday saw one of my volunteers drop a 200lb+ rock on his foot. We had to take him to the ER right away in fear of a broken foot. Luckily it was not broken, but did tear a bunch of tendons and ligaments in his foot and calf. Tuesday saw an intern cut her finger open on a sharp rock. On Wednesday I smashed my finger between two rocks. Don't think it's broken, but will probably lose the nail.

And Thursday another intern pulled/strained a muscle in her shoulder while moving a rock. The commonality between all the incidents was they all occurred in the first 15 min of the day. We will have to go back to the drawing board to make sure we don't suffer any further setbacks.
However, we still got some good work done this week, including finishing the lower half of a switchback on a mountain bike trail. We moved some gigantic rocks for this wall.

This is a more advanced level mountain bike trail which gave me a lot of freedom to make my switchback challenging. Because we are right by a creek I chose to make the trail so there is no dirt on this section of the switchback to avoid erosion and make the trail a bit more difficult/fun. So cyclists will ride down the stones we have placed in the wall. We now have to construct a retaining wall for the upper portion of the switchback.


We have also seen quite a bit of wildlife this week. On Monday we saw a coyote near our worksite.

Then on my way to the coffee shop this morning I came across some bears wandering around the neighborhood.

From September and Cold Creek

And now with the summer winding down everyone is trying to make the most of our time left here. Thursday night we all went to a pool hall where I went undefeated. No surprise. Friday night they have $15 all you can drink wine tasting and hors d'oeuvres at stateline. Spent most of the day yesterday at the lake and last night a great funk/rock band was playing at the local brewery. I may be coming down to the bay area the next two weekends as well. Head for the Hills is playing at the Ashkenaz in Berkely Friday and then a graduation party saturday. The following weekend is the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival in San Francisco with three days of free music in Golden Gate Park. Then I will be pretty much done up here in Tahoe and will be looking forward to 10 days off work.

One Month to Go in Tahoe

We have four more weeks of scheduled work up here in Tahoe. I say "scheduled" because there is a chance that we will keep one crew up here til October 15th, but that is highly weather dependent. However I do know that I will not be up here that long. I will either be leaving on October 2nd or October 8th. This all depends on if I do a Zion Fencing project at the start of October or if I do one more week up in Tahoe.
This past week of work my crew finished up everything on Mt. Tallac by Tuesday which meant we moved over to the Cold Creek worksite on Wednesday and started a re-route of a mountain bike trail. This coming week will continue work on this same trail and start doing some more rock work projects.
Here is a picture of the tree stump from hell. It took 6 hours to get this out. We broke a shovel and an axe and it finally took a chainsaw and grip-hoist to get it out.

Labor day weekend up here in Tahoe was crazy. TONS of tourists. So I tried to avoid as much of them as possible. However one of the highlights included seeing Machete on opening night down at Stateline. An awesome movie to say the least.

I also had a lot of free time around camp so I got to make a few rock structures including this one here:

And today we moved camp for our last time. This final month should be very enjoyable as the tourists are gone until winter time leaving all of Lake Tahoe to us to enjoy. Additionally the weather is finally cooling off making work more enjoyable as well as life in general(for me at least). It will be a high of 61 degrees up here Wed and Thursday!
That is all for now...