Fulltiming Road Runners

For his own reasons, Russ quit his job yesterday as Campground Manager at South Fork Campground.  Thom & I, and Mari at Willows campground are doing the work of managing the campground.  Thom was there until after 8 p.m. last night cleaning bathrooms, and both of us have put in well over 10 hours/day for both yesterday and today.  Mari is helping us out with the closing of gates at night and has offered to do whatever we ask of her until we have new managers in there.  We think we have someone who can be in this coming Friday.  It would  be heaven to have only 1 week of covering the South Fork campground.

Thom & I are both worn out from working both campgrounds,  I worry about him and he worries about me.  We’re not getting any younger, ya know! lol

Right now, we have tremendous campground managers in our canyon campgrounds.  Everyone is doing a great job!  We’re hoping the new managers at South Fork can carry forth the reputation of the rest of us.

I’m extremely tired tonight from all the changes, and am saying g’nite and sweet dreams.

Love ya’ll and appreciate ya’ll!

Stay healthy ‘n happy.

Toodles!

Things are going good.  It’s been basically calm in spite of being more than half full.  Thom & I went back down to ABC Mandarin Chinese restaurant for dinner.  Mari was gonna go with us, but she forgot so lost out.  Neener, neener.

The welcome is for a friend I met a coupla years back in an online photography group.  We got to meet him down in Quartzsite.  I think it was something like 3 years ago.  He lives in Quartzsite year round and survives the summers.  He just registered as a User on this blog.  I’m so super happy to see him here.  Please know Lee, I’m so unbelievably pleased to see you around.  I promise to send you an email within a day.  We will be back in Quartzsite this winter around the end of September.  I’ll send you the particulars.

It’s odd to think we’ll be leaving here in 7 to 9 weeks.  It’s time to really get busy sorting things and throwing away, storing, etc.

I got some pics today of a butterfly.  I need to identify it before sharing it.  It’s either a Weidermeyer’s Admiral or a Morning Cloak.

Ya’ll stay healthy ‘n happy.

OH!  PS…  We put new tires on our pickup… 19.5″ 16 ply, 4 drivers, 2 steers on Monday.  YIKES!  They constitute big bucks, but were very much needed.

Again… ya’ll stay helathy ‘n happy.

Tah!

We’ve had a full campground from Wednesday last week until yesterday… nearly emptied out yesterday and today we are over half full again.  Today was our “day off” so we went down to Ogden to do some WalMart shopping (I really hate that store but can’t pass up those prices.), and then to Harmon’s for grocery shopping.

We left here about 12:30 - 1:00 p.m. and were home by 3:20.  I got out of the car, went inside to dump my purse and grab my deep clipboard and hopped in the golf cart to go around to sign up campers that had come in.  Of course the campers don’t understand that the campground managers have to buy groceries in order to survive up here, and were grumpy as hell that the campsite they moved into hadn’t been cleaned yet… the users left sometime between 9:00 p.m. last night and 12:00 noon today, and many of them left a mess.

I’ve really enjoyed watching the kids play and talking to them.  They are so curious and interested in life around them.  They seem to appreciate knowing that that round ball of flowers (called milkweed) attracts one of the most beautiful butterflies and that if they keep their eyes on those flowers, they will see these large, lovely Monarch butterflies.  The kids love sharing their sightings of bunnies, chipmunks, wood chucks, & snakes with me.  It’s really very interesting to hear their theories of why the critters are where they are and what they eat and how they live.  It’s amazing the way these children’s minds work.  Some are in fantasy world and some are in reality and knowledge.  Wherever they are, I love all the stories!

We’re still getting our “filthy” campers.  The Upper Meadows campground had a camper in one of their sites dump a “port-a-potty” in the campsite, rather than find a dump-site to dump it in.  I took pictures and when I get the name and license number from the camp manager, I will report it all to our Forest Service Enforcement Officer.

This last weekend we had several campers in here with large dogs.  I take the golf cart on the walking path along the river to pick up trash that is dropped along the path.  This weekend I found large dog poo on the path in several places.  I  can’t believe people will let their dogs do that and NOT pick up after them.  Where ARE their heads?  I won’t say where I think they are!

We’re halfway thru this stint in the Canyon, and I’m ready to head for Quartzsite.  Of course, it will be quite warm there right now, and probably even when we get there, but I’m tired and ready for a day or two or even 5 off.  I’m not getting to see my son, his wife, and my grandson near as much as I thought I would, so leaving here won’t be as hurtful as I thought it might, knowing we won’t be back next year.

With any luck I’ll be able to post some photos soon.

Ya’ll stay healthy & happy!

Toodles.

I’m sure guilty this time!  Sorry.  I know ya’ll’re tired of hearing “we’re busy, busy, busy”, but that’s the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.  To point out just how busy — my son, Mike, Tiff and Coen; and Tiff’s family, were at Russ’s campground for several days and I only got to spend about 2 hours total with them.  We did have hotdogs ‘n hamburgers with them Saturday night, but being the weekend it was pretty much an eat-n-run thing.  We were supposed to have steak dinner with them on Sunday night, but had to cancel because one of my manager’s didn’t get the paperwork in to me until after 3:30 p.m., when it’s due by 12 noon. I hope ‘n pray they will be able to come up again for a night or two, and stay in our campground.

The rest of this week is going to be hell on wheels, so I thought I better get a blog posted or ya’ll’re gonna think we dropped off the face of the earth.  Friday is Pioneer Day (Utah state holiday), making the weekend a 3-day weekend.  We’re half full already, the favorite sites have been gone since Sunday and are taken until next Sunday.  Tomorrow, we’ll have people come in looking for a good shady site and be angry because we don’t have MORE perfect sites, we’ll get called names, etc.  In these situations, I just hand them a business card with the home office’s phone number and tell them to call that number and tell them their woes.

Yesterday, the first people I came in contact with called me a fat assed bitch, ‘n a lazy bitch ‘n told me if I’d get off my fat ass, out of the cart ‘n do some real work, the place wouldn’t be such a pig sty.  Needless to say, our bosses tell us ours is the best kept campground in the canyon.  They just wanted to vent because I was charging them the day use fee of $8 instead of $5 for picnicking… they didn’t bring a picnic, just beer, pop and lots of tubes to float down the river on.  That constitutes plans to stay the day and play in our campground (which they did), not spend a couple of hours picnicking.  I should have kicked their arses out of here, but I chuckled when they were calling me names, etc. and took their money and told them to have a fun day.  Silly me!

Mari & Russ have both been able to take time to go tubing down the river.  I swear I’m going to do it before the season ends!  I also want to find time to “wet a line” before we go.  I think that’ll probably be in late August, early September.   Have I mentioned we have 14″ Browns, good sized rainbows, tiger (cutthroat/rainbow hybrid), cutthroat, whites, & Kokanee salmon in our river?

Sunday we went to Monte Cristo to pick up the money and paperwork.  While there I was able to get shots of some of the wild flowers that we don’t get here, or are later blooming than here because of the 4,000 foot higher elevation (we’re at 5200 and they’re at almost 9000).

This first one is a pic of the Mountain Bluebells which are dying back down here.

As we were driving up to Monte Cristo campground we ran through a bunch of butterflies.  I’m thinking they were a migration.  They looked black while flying.  When we got to Monte we saw several on the ground and I was able to get shots of their real colors.  This is a shot of the underside of their wings, which is why they looked black.  They are the California Tortoiseshell butterfly.

This is the topside of the California Tortoiseshell Butterfly’s wing.

There was quite a bit of the Norrow Leaf Penstemon up there.  Beautiful bunches of very blue flowers.

This is a shot of a meadow up there in the campground.  It has the Penstemon in front and the orange/yellow in the field to the back is the Arrow Leaf Balsam Root flower.  The white in front of the Penstemon is Jabob’s Ladder with maybe a bit of Wild Carrot mixed in.

I got a few pics in the last couple of days, but haven’t had the chance to look at them yet.  I’ll share if they are worthwhile.

Ya’ll stay healthy ‘n happy!

Tah!

Today was my birthday.  Last night Thom, Mari and I went out to dinner in Roy at the ABC Mandarin Chinese restaurant for my birthday dinner… YUMMMM.  This is a restaurant well worth visiting if you are  in the area.  Roy is a little bit south of Ogden.

With Russ being gone, both Mari and Thom and I are spending extra time signing up new campers, cleaning bathrooms, and posting reservation sites.  He has no idea how much he owes us!  I’ve no doubt he’s willing to payback, he just doesn’t have any idea what he owes Mari, Thom and I.  Don’t worry… we’ll let him know.  hehehe

We have a lot more campers in here than we expected to have by now… and they expect us to chase them down to make them pay.  To be honest, I’m tired of this game!

Again, no pics.  Sorry.  Just don’t have time to get them loaded to the blog.  One day, I’ll have time to share all I want to.

Ya’ll stay healthy and happy!

Tah!

…picking up and we really wish it wouldn’t.  Last year we were busy at this time, but Monday through Wednesday the campgrounds were almost empty.  Yesterday (Sunday) most of our campers left and there were only 1 or 2 sites occupied.  Today (Monday) we are half full already.  AND, we are kept running keeping up with those coming in to just picnic.  On Friday night I tell myself I’ll be just fine if I can make it through Sunday afternoon, then I’ll have a couple of days of relaxing and catch-up.  It’s not happening this year.  Not even in the other campgrounds.

Russ took 2 days off so he could visit a friend.  We’re not happy he took 2 days when he told us before it would be just 1 day.  That’s putting a burden on Mari, who is covering for him and us, who have to cover all issues.

This evening Thom got a fire going so he could roast hotdogs for his dinner.  I was sitting at the picnic table cracking crab for my dinner (he doesn’t like crab), and the sound of the fire crackling seemed to make my muscles unwind and I started to feel very relaxed.  Isn’t it wonderful what a campfire can do.

Today was our day off.  Again we had about 3 hrs to ourselves.  We went down for a bit of shopping.  Coen had his 15 mo. checkup at the Dr. so we weren’t able to visit with Mike, Tiff and Coen.  They’ll be up camping next week at Russ’s campground so we’ll get to see them then.  We’ll go over for dinner a couple of times.  I wish they’d come here, but this is really a lousy campground for enjoying wading in the river and having space to play games, etc.

Looks like I’m rambling again, so I’ll say good night and hope to get those pics posted soon.

Ya’ll stay healthy ‘n happy!

Toodles.

The weekend is upon us again.  The campground filled up yesterday, and the last of the 3 group sites filled up today.

The people in the group sites made their reservations nearly a year ago.  The people and vehicle limits back then were different than they are now, so I find myself having to allow more vehicles than the rules state because the campers show me printouts of their reservations made a year ago which state they are allowed 20 vehicles, etc.  It’s not an issue to me… this way I don’t have to run around collecting extra vehicle fees.  One of the groups checked in yesterday, to leave tomorrow.  We’ve had a running battle over their use of electricity.  The electricity is there, but they are not allowed to use it.  The reservations web site clearly states it’s a non-electric group site.  I made a couple of concessions to the use of electricity - CPAP machines, but that’s it.  At least twice, when I went around there on rounds, I had to tell them to pull the plug because they were using air compressors to fill tubes and air mattresses, etc.  This same group (a family reunion) had people who would pack a picnic lunch, walk down into the individual family campground area and take over a bench on the river for hours.  I had to chase them out both yesterday and today.  They paid for the group site area and our individual family campers paid for the individual campsite area.  The group people had no right to take over the individual area.

I have some pics to share, but it’s now 11:30 p.m. and the cops are just leaving (drunk 24 y/o man threating 14 y/o boys).

This season in the canyon campgrounds has been worse than last year.  I wonder if it’s a case of everyone being uptight because of the state of the economy and when they get up here they are looking for an escape and go too far?  I had a guy literally yelling at me tonight because he thought we were over-charging him.  I couldn’t get him to listen to me  so finally drove the golf cart away in the middle of his yelling.  Thom tried explaining things to him and the guy still went into a yelling fit… with his 30 year old son joining in.

I’m so glad we have an equal share of very nice people in here to take away the nasty taste from the  problem people.

Hopefully I’ll be able to share happy, fun thoughts and a few photos tomorrow or Sunday.  We have a bunch of people leaving tomorrow, so we need to go around and clean behind them.  With luck we won’t have new campers come in behind them.  There’s a chance of rain tomorrow and Sunday, so maybe the one nighter campers will stay away.

I’m rambling again.  G’nite.

Ya’ll stay healthy ‘n happy.

Tah!

This week has been busier than Meadows was last year, but it’s more relaxed, like it was last year.  The frantic partying of the 4th of July is over and it’s a week away from the partying of Utah’s Pioneer Day (July 24th).  I’m enjoying it.  We’ve a few return campers who already know what we tolerate and what we don’t.  They are all “good campers”, so that’s that many less annoying campers.

Since I couldn’t find time to go shopping in Ogden, I decided to take 10 minutes to tour the river path.  Here are 3 pics I got down there.

This is the Utah Aster.  It is almost done blooming so the color is faded, but it’s still pretty.

And this is a thistle I’ve not seen before.  I’ve seen the white thistle and the purple thistle, but not the 2-tone thistle.

This is a Cabbage White Butterfly showing yellow I’ve not seen in them before.  I wonder if the Vetch is one of their host plants because they were flocking to the Vetch and not the Queen Anne’s Lace or any other flowers.  The flower it’s on is the Vetch.  I so enjoyed my moments with the flowers and butterflies and not a human in site!

Ya’ll stay healthy ‘n happy.

Toodles.

Same ol’ stuff goin’ on.  it’s quieter since the 4th is over, but we still have campers in here doing their thing.

Today was our “day off”.  We went down to Ogden around 12:30 P.M. and went to CostCo.  We decided we didn’t want to try to do Harmon’s shopping too and possibly not have room for the cold stuff in the cold bag. n We’ll go back down canyon tomorrow to finish our shopping.

I’m really tired of getting people in here thinking that because their Dad paid for camping in here, they can come in, pass 3 different signs stating that any use in the campground requires a fee, take parking space, visit Dad/Mom,  who’re camping in here, ‘n not have to pay for parking in here.

We have created signs explaining exactly what they can and can’t do and they still say they never knew what was required.

We do our best and beyond that, we get by.

Things have slowed down some, but are still busy.

Will share more later.

Ya’ll stay healthy ‘n happy!

Tah!

It’s the 4th of July evening.  The campground is no longer full, but only 3 sites open.  We don’t expect to be full again until next weekend.  It’s been a wild and crazy week so far.  The campground was full by Wednesday evening, two sites emptied on Thursday, but were filled almost before the sites were emptied.  Again, a site or two emptied on Friday, and again they were filled within 1/2 hr of being emptied.

The 4th of July is a a big family day and the majority of our campers are family groups.  All of our double sites and the triple are family groups… that means they are being occupied by several more people than they are designed for.   We are allowed to have more people if they pay for extra vehicles ($6.00/car/night).  We’ve taken in $276 in extra vehicle fees this week.

It’s been busy with people tubing the river, both our campers, and those from other campgrounds, getting out of the river and being picked up in our campground.

We’ve sure been fraught with “issues” this week.  Meadows had someone spin wheels in the road and dig a tire trench about 1-1/2″ deep.  They also had someone chipping the concrete pad with a splitting maul, axe, or hammer.  I had to take pics of both incidences to send in to the USFS Enforcement Officer.

I also got a call today from the Meadows’ Manager wanting me to come observe a situation and mitigate it.  We had an Hispanic family (they have LARGE families) in a single campsite in his campground.  There were about 7 tents, several cars parked outside the campground, and people everywhere.  They even set up chairs alongside the road, as if they were waiting for a parade.  Young children and toddlers were running everywhere and a gazillion adults ignoring the children.  Each single site fee covers up to 8 people and 1 car.  When Tracy (Meadows’ manager) and I counted people, I came up with 38 and he came up with at least 40.   When I walked up to the site, I immediately said I needed a person who could speak English well.  We’ve learned that many Hispanic groups like this will let a non-English speaking person do the talking so we get frustrated and make lots of concessions.  After discussing the issue I finally told them that we are supposed to charge $1 per person over 8 so they would have to pay $30 to cover their “party”.  They said most of them were going home today and I told them they still had to pay the extra person fee for the day and they could have no more than 20 people staying overnight.  Luckily a site across from them opened up this evening and they moved a few of their tents, and several people into that site, paid for the site and, hopefully, lessened the damage the huge number of people were doing to the plant life in there.  I surprised myself with being able to be firm, fair, and more or less keep the campers happy.

Heck!  I think everyone should experience hosting a campground like these in the canyon at least once!  Ya got campers that want free camping, free picnic space, free access to the river (they have that, but not within our campgrounds), and tubers that leave mud in the bathrooms, use a whole roll of toilet paper to dry off with and leave it on the floor of the bathroom.  Ya also got birds of all kinds, cute critters, beautiful fairytale trees, ‘n the occasional darling little boy or girl.

Because a lot of our campers are going down to watch fireworks tonight, we’ve told them all how to get into the campground after 10 p.m.   It’ll be a late night for us tonight and tomorrow is “money day” for me.  I collect the daily fee reports and money from my managers, verify their numbers & dollars, and work up my Weekly Activity Report for the Canyon.

My son, his wife, Tiffany, and my grandson, Coen are coming up tomorrow night also.  Tiff is cooking dinner for us.  Of course, I’ll help her… if my act of being all worn out and useless doesn’t work.  I think Russ will be here too.  I hope things at his campground slow down enough for him to get away for a couple of hours.

Monday is supposed to be our day off.  We may postpone it until Tuesday since Mike ‘n Tiff are coming here tomorrow and the main reason we take Mondays is to visit them on his day off.  This last week, we’ve had a total of 3-1/2 hours for our “day off”, and those 3-1/2 hours were split between 2 days.  This week I hope both of us can take a whole day, but I, personally, definitely will be taking the majority of a day.  I’ve been meaning, since we got up here, to get to the library to check out books by Jack Whyte.  It’s been 2 months to the day and I’ve not done it yet.

Okay ya’ll.  I’m really tired.  My 2 brain cells quit working altogether, and I think it’s time for me to get off the computer and rest my mind and 2 brain cells.

Ya’ll stay healthy ‘n happy.

Thank you for reading our blog.

Tah!