Hitch 10

Blythe………. The Final Frontier

We are the voyagers of Starship, Maggie (the Dodge)

It’s 10 month mission to explore strange new wilderness’, to seek our new life and endangered species

To boldly conserve where no man (or woman) has conserved before.

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The planning for our voyage back out to the galaxy of Blythe went perfectly and the crew was
assembled and in the dodge before it was even 12:00. We were able to make it to the wilderness
outpost, that was the Midland LTVA , before it was too dark and we were able to set the white tent up
and have Chinese food ready in the wok before anyone was too tired. We were all excited about the
idea of working in a different area the next day and where all able to go to sleep with dreams of the new
work sites dancing through our heads.

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The team was up and ready to start work well before 7:40 and we set off to work on our new
job sites. Our first project was a cut through in the road that was created as a short cut for the drivers
but it was located next to a prehistoric pathway. So we had to close the road and we were surprised
when we were able to close the sight before lunch. We fired up the Trimble and closed out the job
sight, and then got moving too our second job site of the day. It was a small hill climb compared to the
previous hitch and we were able to finish it before the end of the day. For the first time in a while we
were able to close out two job sites in one day. Sadly on the drive back we got a look at our first job
sight in a different light and decided that we would get back to work on that tomorrow.

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We got back to the prehistoric pathway first thing in the morning and got to work. We had to get to
work on the middle berm so that the road wasn’t too defined and visible from the road. It took a little
longer than we accepted and we weren’t done until right before lunch. Once we got to look at it from
the road we were all very pleased and went down the road to our final job sight in the area. The job
site was at the end of the road and we were supposed to disguise the entrance to the wash and build a
turnaround area for people. It was a fun job site and we were able to plant a dead tree in the middle of
the entrance and roll some large boulders into the way.

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We went back down to the same area and had a really simple hill climb with a lot of growth already on
it. We just did some rock work and finished early and decided that for the rest of the day we would put
in a sign and do some OFFROAD VEHICLE TRAINING. During the training we drove up and down a hill
climb section of the legal road and had a lot of fun in the sand.

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We had to finish off our biggest incursion of the year, our arch enemy, the All-corps project. We still had
to do some color matching on the largest one of the hill climbs and we had to close site a. We started
raking in the morning and did some vertical mulch before lunch and then for the rest of the day we
decided it would be fun to carry 50lbs rock bags up and down a steep hill. To our surprise at the end of
the day we had color matched to the top of the giant hill but because of the bad sunlight we were not
able to spot and we all knew we had to return

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We returned the next morning thirsty for a victory against the giant hill climb. We exploded out of
the car and immediately everyone started there 10 minute stretch and then we had a safety check to
bring up safety concerns. Then we all got to work on the hill and started covering the bear (arrrrgg)
spots. We were able to finish our work for the day early and had lunch alongside a diversion dam in the
Colorado. It was a beautiful day outside and it seamed perfect for a swim, so we did and enjoyed every
second of it (except for the first few seconds, they where cold)

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After a day in the river we were somewhat reluctant to get to work but thanks to some miracle we were
all ready to work when we got to our work sight which was a little hard to find partly because we had
no map and it was also just hard to see. We got started and did some rock work and than before you
knew it there was no trace of human disturbance and we were already firing the Trimble up. After that
we had to drive to the other side of the mountain and put two 8ft tall street signs into the desert and
headed into town for a feast at Lalos.

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We woke up and heard from the higher ups in the BLM (that’s Jen!) about what we were going to do
for the rest of our hitch. We learned in the form of Trimble points and bad directions and we drove up
into the sand dunes of blithe. We had to play around in the sand before we could even work and we
rolled down the dunes until the work sights had been Trimble. Then we went and got the tools and food
from the truck and carried all of our gear to the work sight and started planting some sotes (That Larrea
tridentate).We were having a fun day of work and at the end of it we got a visit from our local ranger
Javi and he showed us how to drive through the dunes and down into the work site.

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We got to go back to the sand dune and we were able to work with some thrill crafters as they drove
around us and we pick axed away into the sand. We were able to take the heat from the sun and we
were able to have some good talks in the shade of the truck.

-Michael