Category Archives: State Parks

Our last days at Fort Flagler State Park…

Posted on Friday May 23rd, 2014 by | 1 comment

Well, until we go back at least.

This should have been written on or prior to April 29, 2014, but well I got lazy and busy with moving our box with wheels to another island.

We had been doing a lot of cleanup of fallen branches as well as cleaning the upper camp ground in the last few months of our stay at Fort Flagler that we once again had a very large pile of brush to burn and the head Ranger gave us the honor of burning the pile before we left, so that is what we did.

I was out there for the better part of 8 hours, making sure it was burning in a safe manner as well as making sure I burned as much of it as I could. There was still a few stumps from the last burn pile that had not burned completely as well as huge chunks of cement from past dumps that kept getting dug up, which caused one end of the burn pile to not burn at all.

Once I figured out what the problem was, I spent a hour or so with the tractor building a road to the problem area and pushing the wood debris further away from the chunks of cement that was preventing a proper fire to burn.

While doing this I had a feeling I was being watched and sure enough, I saw the coyote watching me from about 50 yards away. He was there on and off throughout the day, it was a really nice, sunny and warm day with light winds, perfect for a large fire as well as napping in the sun which is what the coyote was mostly doing.

Here are the pictures, just a month later.

 

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Posted in cat's... both live and dead..., State Parks, what hell kind of animals are we seeing?, what the hell kind of pictures are these?, where the hell are we?

“Here is your sign”

Posted on Saturday May 17th, 2014 by | 1 comment

Bill Engvall said it best, we need to give a sign to stupid humans when they are being stupid.

Tonight Pauline and I and a Ranger were in the booth checking in campers, selling firewood, etc when a young woman came to the window and was asking how much the firewood was, Pauline told her “$6 a bundle” which brought immediate attitude from this young woman as she blurts out “You’re going to do everything you can to take my money!”

The Ranger, in a very polite and professional way, explained to her why the cost is so high which is due to the State has cut back State Parks budget’s so drastically, the Park system is dying.

Her reply to the Ranger…

“Well, maybe if they fired people like you, firewood would be cheaper.”

You could have heard a pin drop in that booth.

I was about to say something, when I realized there is NOTHING I could say at this time and moment that won’t come out in a “I’LL KILL YOU IN YOUR SLEEP!” tone so I just walked out of the booth.

To his credit, the Ranger was still polite and professional and told her “They do and have fired people like me, many of who are my friends.” which made the young girl realize, what a crap thing she just said.

She apologized and said she didn’t mean it that way and tried to joke it off, but come on, that is the shittiest things I have ever witnessed regarding a Park Ranger.

I have been to 39 States, visiting countless State and National Parks and always try to talk to a Ranger regarding the local Park or area, and I have never once got an attitude or anything from a Ranger except a polite and professional encounter.

I can not think of a time when I did not enjoy talking to a Ranger. They are paid like shit, treated even worse, and yet, still go on do everything they can to make sure their Park is as perfect as it can be.

Respect the Rangers.

 

 

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Posted in National Park Service, National Parks, State Parks, what the hell are we thinking?

I was part of a “Officer Involved Shooting”…

Posted on Thursday May 8th, 2014 by | 1 comment

Unfortunately.

About 2 days ago a visitor reported to us that they had seen a deer on the trail that had a badly broken leg and that was looking “bad”. I called the Ranger on duty and he went looking for the deer but did not find it.

Around 5pm today, I went on a round to see if we had any campers, and on my first path, I saw a deer standing near a camp site but did not think much of it as I drove away, but something about it made me rethink what I saw, so I did a loop around and spotted the deer once again and waited…

Yep. I found the deer.

The leg was useless. She did not look like she was in pain, but she did look bad. I called the Ranger on duty and told him I would keep an eye on her until they arrived in 20 minutes or so. I also called Pauline to tell her to put dinner on hold. I was going to be a while.

About 5 minutes after that, the deer started to walk away, slowly, I was no threat… I thought I should go on the other side of the loop to keep her “contained” but of course, I lost contact with her and spent the next 20 minutes looking all over the loop of the campground as well as about a 200 yard radius with a bagillion places to hide.

The Ranger showed up with a guy from the DNR (I think) as well as a Washington State Trooper which was a good thing, as he has a 12 gauge and not just his side arm.

The 4 of us started to search for the deer when I recalled what Tom Selleck said in the “Jessie Stone” made for TV movies that Pauline and I just finished re-watching a few days ago…

“Always go back to the beginning.”

So once again, I started where I last saw the deer, but this time, I fallowed the exact path I saw her take and about a minute later, I spotted her. Not 20 yards from where I lost her. She was really blending into the bush.

I called the Ranger and the Trooper did what he had to do.

There is a county road that goes though the park, its a straight away, so there are always speeders. I lost count how many cars I have seen pass others at a high rate right of speed in front of the park entrance, so there is a high chance she was hit by a car which injured her badly enough that something had to be done.

blah…

 

 

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Posted in State Parks, what hell kind of animals are we seeing?, what the hell are we seeing?, where the hell are we volunteering?

Settling In

Posted on Sunday May 4th, 2014 by | 1 comment

It has been an off week. We have gone from volunteering at Ft Flagler State Park to South Whidbey State Park. Ended up spending last week getting ready for that and getting settled in that the off week has been affecting our dinner planning….been totally weak on it. Doing much better for this week.

So we are getting settled in and trying to learn our new duties and get a routine. It is different from what we were doing, but that is a good thing. I like it when we expand our horizons and learn new things. It comes in handy for the future.

At Ft Flagler, we were spent a lot of time cleaning up after wind storms and other jobs around the park. It was cool. We’ve missed doing yard work since we’ve moved to the Oregon in ’07. You get a good satisfaction when you get something cleaned up, because you get a result.

Here, we’ll be doing clean up after campers and doing more hosting duties. We’ve been learning the WA State program, Camis, for processing state fees, making sure that we are seen and are there for the visitors. We came over at a good time, it is letting us learn our new duties before the busy season hits. And we’ll be attacking some of the winter cleanup to get it ready for the busy season.

It is cozy here. When we got to Fl Flagler it was this huge open space….kind of freaky. But got use to it and was great for the satellite and sunlight. Got here and got the tree cover we love, that is what we’ve always looked for when we got tent camping…but not good for the satellite.

Still no satellite in our rig. =( BUT we have set it up in the garage by the office….so we didn’t miss our Pacer’s playoffs and Games of Thrones. =) We are going to get some more cable and see if we can get a signal. We are happy we at least have another option if we can’t do it in our home.

Next week, we’ll going to be get ourselves on to the some of the trails. Looking forward to that. =)

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Posted in State Parks, what the hell are we doing?

Not happy at all…

Posted on Friday May 2nd, 2014 by | Comments Off on Not happy at all…

We still get zero reception on the dish. We already missed one Indiana Pacer playoff game (Pacers won) and numerous NHL playoff game 7’s that went into overtime as well as the other NBA playoffs.

We want to sit in our chairs, watch our tv, drink our booze, eat our food and just BE HOME while not going to bars or pubs or friends or where ever else we could go to watch the games.

Last month we had a RV park 8′ from our dish, completely blocking the dish, but when we looked, we went from 92% signal strength down to 91% which shocked me, I was always told you had to have a clean direct line to the sky.

We do not have that here due to both trees and a large bathroom. But we have moved the dish as far as our 150′ of coax cable will allow. I have been careful to avoid large trees and tried to get a direct clear line as I could, but still, nothing.

I would think we would at lest get 10-20% which would be enough to let us know, this will not work here. But we have Rangers telling us, yes it will work here, the other camp host have done it.

The other camp host are the ones I must ask about this.

The other camp host was suppose to be here yesterday… And today I asked if they had a new ETA only to be told “Maybe this weekend or maybe later this week”…

Game 7 is Saturday night.

Again, I want to be in my chair, screaming at my tv, drinking my booze, eating my food and beating my cat while I watch My Indiana Pacers…

FRUSTRATED.

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Posted in State Parks, what the hell are we thinking?, where the hell are we volunteering?