Hitch #1 – Eaten Alive

View from the Pacific Crest Trail in Castle Crags State Park.
Stepping stone project I worked on in Castle Crags.
Burney Falls
One women show on cross cutting. Just kidding, I had help.

So…

Apparently I am not very good at updating my blog. I would like to say that I will try better but I don’t think I can make or keep that promise J

The drive south to Lincoln, Oregon, our “home” for six weeks, started on Tuesday, May 31. Lincoln is located about 20 minutes east of Ashland, California, up a curvy, steep road. On our days off, Lincoln is “home.” Lincoln is a very small town or community. We have a little cabin to ourselves. Eight people, five beds. [insert fact about Lincoln]

My team will be working 10 day hitches with 4 days off. Here is how a typical hitch goes:

Day 1: Travel to campsite, set up campsite for week

Day 2 – 9: work on Pacific Crest Trail by where our campsite is

Day 10: Travel back to Lincoln, clean up

On Thursday, May 31, we traveled south to Shasta-Trinity’s Castle Crags State Park in California. The park is named for 6,000-feet tall glacier-polished crags. Castle Crags is located right off the I-5 corridor. Nothing better then being at camp, and hearing the traffic on the freeway or the trains in the middle of the night.

After we had set up camp, to our surprise, our first camp visitor stopped by, a cute bear cub. We kept our distance and let the cub meander by. Good thing, the state park provides bear boxes for food, etc.

The mosquitoes in this area were awful all day long and night. At one point, I had bumps all on my back and thought that I had some sort of rash or even Poison Oak.

Our first official day of work was on June 1. Our commute to work was about a 2 mile hike. Our first project included a couple of stream crossings and some other tread work. Lots of hauling of big rocks, setting big rocks, digging, etc. Somehow, I got put on a little project of my own, with a little help from Casey. I put stepping stones in a marshy area of the trail. It took me about two and a half days to complete but it was kind of nice to do something semi on my own on the first hitch.

On day 6 of hitch #1, we headed southeast to the Whitehorse Campground on the Plumas National Forest. Here we got cross-cut certified, did some brush clearing and a few drainage ditches. We got rained and snowed on. It was quite chilly at night so we had some big raging fires.

Song Quote: "Run through the river and into town, pretty little moon with it's head hung down, Chin Up, Cheer Up" Chin Up, Cheer Up – Ryan Adams