Catching up...

November 13, 2011 Lake Mead National Recreation Area.


We moved to the Volunteer Park last Monday which is about a mile north of Lake Mead RV Village. It's a nice secluded park with currently only 5 RV volunteers and about 24 sites. 

Our site 22 

Our views are of a large butte out our door side and the rugged terrain out our back window. 

View out the back window

We have a concrete door side slab and the rest of the site is crushed granite lined with poplar trees on a drip system. Our Verizon MiFi signal and phone reception is weak probably due to the large bluff on our west side. 


We worked just over 20 hrs. last week learning how to use the large handheld GPS and navigating through the park on some of the "back country" roads. After the first day of orientation, we rode with Kelly one of the Resource Management term employees of the National Park Service (NPS).  She drove us out into the park along some rough roads in a unmarked NPS GMC Sierra 4x4 extended cab truck, as we looked for "disturbances". 

Joyce and Kelly plotting a "disturbance".

Disturbances are basically any vehicle tracks off the approved road, litter, barrier or sign damage. Having discovered some vehicle track "disturbances", we plotted them on the GPS and then attempted to obliterate the tracks by racking them out. Most of the ones we discovered were old or from vehicles turning around. The data is later downloaded from the GPS for various reporting indices.


The third day, I drove. Kelly again came along with Joyce and I. We did the same routine only driving on different back country roads. The driving on most of these roads is very rough and bumpy, forcing us to go very slow. It seems most of the roads we drove lead no where and dead end or take you to the edge of a bluff. The scenery on some of the roads is spectacular.

On others, not so much... picture driving on a bleak rock littered terrain with only small Creosote bushes scattered randomly about. 


The two days out in the field were each in excess of 8 hrs. and perhaps a bit too long for us and our dogs Maggie and Rico back at the RV. I know Joyce didn't enjoy the long days bouncing along in the truck. Hopefully when we are out on our own we can shorten the days to an average of 6 hrs. and 3 days a week. Our obligation is for 32 hrs. a week combined between Joyce and I. This week we will continue our orientation training by riding along with our counterparts Mike and Barb whom volunteered in this position over the past two years and whom are parked next to us in the campground. 


Our friends Paul and Paula are still in the park staying at Lake Mead RV Village. We've enjoyed their company on a couple of excursions to the Las Vegas Strip. On Joyce's birthday we enjoyed a buffet at the M Casino and walked through several Casinos on the strip. Last night we enjoyed a meal at a Mexican restaurant and then drove along the strip to the Fremont Street District where we enjoyed some live music and spectacular overhead (as in on the ceiling) music videos.

Fremont Street District is a "must see" when in Vegas. 
We will keep you posted on our volunteer 'job' here at Lake Mead N.R.A.