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Published: April 28th 2015
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April 21-23 TOO MUCH TIME ON MY HANDS
The last couple of days I have been hanging out a little bit with my neighbor, Martha. Originally from Michigan, she and her husband are full timers, having sold their house, living out of their fifth wheel with their 2 dogs. They are avid wildlife watchers, and appear to see so many things that I cannot… L I have to say I feel a bit like a fish out of water around here. We are the newbies, everyone has been here before, they know the park, all the names of the different valleys and mountains, and places in the river, they know each other…. It is definitely a club! Everyone is super nice and welcoming, but I just don’t quite feel at ease yet I guess. There is so much to learn!
I have learned that the park has a figure 8 shaped main loop to take you around the park. There are 5 entrances into the park, north, northeast, west, south, and east. The road from each entrance leads to the main loop. There are other side roads and whatnot, but it appears at the end
of the day, everything leads back to the main loop. I guess that means there are no shortcuts to get places during tourist season. The only entrance to the park that is open to the public at this time is the north entrance….maybe the west, but I’m not sure. I haven’t been there. Many roads are still closed, but are starting to open, some of them early, because of the mild winter, I think most snow removal has been done. The roads that are closed to the public aren’t necessarily closed to employees, as everyone has the code to the lock on the barricades. Pretty cool, huh?
This place is virtually empty. 90% of the people here are employees of the National Park Service, the Yellowstone Association, Delaware North (they operate some stores I think), and Xanterra (who we work for). There are some tourists here, but very few. And, not all the employees are here yet. They arrive weekly til like the middle of June. It is pretty cool that it is so empty, and kind of sad to think that come summer the roads will be packed, along with all the information centers and major attractions. We plan to hit major things like Old Faithful and stuff very early before the summer rush! And then, on our time off venture outside the park to surrounding areas that may not be quite as croweded.
Another cool thing about being here now is watching the change from winter to spring. There is still snow and ice, but it is melting and makes for a beautiful landscape with snow covered mountains, and partially frozen lakes and rivers. It is also time for the bears to come out of hibernation with their cubs. I haven’t seen any more bears since that first day, but other people have, including cubs. Martha saw them. She sees everything! I’m always like, “where?” I did however, see a wolf with Martha the other day. It wasn’t a “where?” moment. I saw it first! That’s because it was trotting alongside the road on my side of the car. But I couldn’t take get a picture. Couldn’t find it on my view screen. Martha found it on her camera, while driving, and texted me the pics. LOL, I am so inept! Jack is the same way, always telling me to look at something that I can’t see… it must be a gift! Buffalo –oops, bison- are everywhere. You can’t go anywhere without stepping in bison poop. There was bison poop to step over immediately outside the laundry room door. I have yet to see a bison in our campground (apparently, according to Jack, it is known as the Lerv, that is, the Lake employee RV lot), but poop is everywhere!
The greatest fascination for the employees is a drowned bison carcass in the river. We check on it every day to see what is eating it. The other night Jack and I saw a bald eagle eating it. Someone reported that they saw a bear on it the other evening. Everyone is looking at it and talking about it.
I had a bit of a rough day on Monday. I was just a little lonely and homesick and stranded, and feeling sorry for myself. I prayed about it for a while and repented of my self pity and fear. Then God sent a dear friend with a word for me through a text message. She just said that not all the Israelites left Egypt with Moses, and to think about that, they were afraid to go and preferred to stay in bondage. I didn’t know that, but I did know that even the ones that left whined and moaned about their hardship on the way to the promised land and wanted to return to Egypt. Not saying that my life was like bondage in Egypt, or that my hardship on my journey is any more difficult than a few moments of self pity, but still, the message resonated with me and was quite helpful. God is so good! There is that providence thing again!
Jack and I ventured out the east entrance to the park one evening and went to Cody, WY, which is probably the closest town with a Walmart, or restaurants, other services. It was 27 miles from the Lerv to the gate, then 51(?) miles to Cody. We saw some magnificent scenery, the mountains were different than the ones we have been looking at all week. They were rugged, looked right out of a western movie or something. We passed through this valley where we saw quite literally, thousands of deer. There are a lot of hay fields in the area, and the deer, elk, and big horn sheep frequent them. We saw many elk and sheep, but there were 100 or more deer in each field, both sides of the road, for miles. I have never seen anything like it. It appears that Cody has rodeos frequently in the summer, so I want to make sure to get there for a rodeo! It seems that fresh fruits and vegetables are going to be a rare commodity. Walmart had a pitiful produce section.
Martha and I, and some of the other wives I imagine, have to make the 2 hour trek up north to Mammoth for training on Friday. Funny thing. Remember early on when I flunked the typing test for the registration job? They called before we left and asked if I would be interested in cross training as a GSA, that my scores were “ok”. I agreed, but really think I would prefer to keep my cashier job now and not actually be a GSA. They didn’t offer me a GSA job, they just asked if I wanted to train for it just in case. They changed Martha’s job to GSA, so she must have been closer to passing the test than me! I guess I will just do whatever job they give me. I am glad to go to training on Friday, otherwise I would be here doing nothing for another week! Jack should get his permanent schedule sometime later this week, so we will know our days off. He works a regular shift, whereas my shifts may vary, or even be split, at least we are SUPPOSED TO HAVE 2 consecutive days off together every week. I am looking forward to having a schedule and a routine. Also looking forward to getting to the stores in Gardiner to get our bear spray so we can walk some of the trails, send some mail, and buy some coupons for the EDR (employee dining room).
Please BEAR (LOL) with me as I figure out how to use my cell phone as a hotspot, and my wifi camera and computer/tablet all together to get pictures on here. I am just not savvy enough with to understand it all, I am trying!
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