The way I see it, if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain

It's been a LONG time since I've blogged- I skipped a whole project round! I've decided to make more of an effort not only for my mother who has been requesting updates but also so that I have a record of my experiences to look back on.

Although I'm currently at 6,000 feet in the mountains of the San Bernadino National Forest, I spent March and April in a much different environment working for Oregon State Parks. We traveled to a new park almost every week and did work including removal of invasive species, trail building and maintenance, and planting of native species as part of a stream bed restoration project. Our time there included a lot of long rainy days and some interesting living arrangements (a mouse in our house, tent camping, and spending 2 weeks on the floor in a warehouse are the highlights). It was definitely a struggle at times but I loved getting the opportunity to connect with and appreciate a beautiful part of the country that I may have otherwise never seen. Whenever the rain cleared up it was absolutely gorgeous! We could see Mt. Hood in the distance at several parks and there were rivers and streams running through lush forests of ferns and douglas fir. I also got the chance to visit Portland a couple of times and realized what a great city it is. I could definitely see myself living there at some point in my life.

Here are some photos to wrap up my quick summary of the past 2 months of my life:

All the rain made this jacket an essential part of my uniform. Here I am raking out an area at Champoeg State Park

We came back from work one day to a collapsed tent...

Building a trail at Stub Stewart State Park

 

 

Laying out flag lines for our large-scale planting project at Elijah Bristow State Park

Planting Cottonwood trees with a 3rd grader from a local school

Pulling invasive Scotch Broom with my teammate Clarissa

Pulling invasive species takes a lot out of you! Resting a a big pile of Scotch Broom

Wading in the creek at Milo McIver State Park with teammate Elizabeth

The team standing on "steps" we made through a muddy section of a previously closed trail at Milo McIver

We visited Silver Falls, a beautiful park with 10 waterfalls

We got the chance to relax at Oregon Brewfest, a festival at the Oregon Gardens with tastings of craft and microbrews

I promise I'll be back soon with an update on what I'm doing now and my life/future... It's all very exciting!