The Ultra Race, Sweet Smells, Campground Concert

Last Sunday (January 19) was an event in the park called the Ultra Race. Runners could choose to run 10K, 25K or 50K! Yikes, that's a lot of miles! Joan and I partners at the #6 aid station and had no idea what to expect. They gave us 10 little single serving sized bags of pretzels, huge bunches of bananas, body glide (sounds intriguing, huh?), water, electrolyte mix & pills, and all kinds of other stuff and all we had to do was cheer on the runners, dispense food, beverages, and first aid equipment as needed by the runners. It was great fun, but very cold early in the day. We were out in the desert by 7:30 a.m. the same time as the race started.

All the runners were especially grateful to use and almost everyone thanked us for being out there for them. Joan and I had some spare time at the beginning of the day so we took some photos of plants that she wanted to ID. When we were done in the late afternoon,  I left to go pick up Matt and Mike who were doing a patrol of some river area campsites and we bounced along the rough roads home.

Joan at our aid station, located 7.7 miles from the end of the race and 3.7 miles from the last aid station.

We need a little crescent moon over this doorway!

Joan hamming it up! Surprise!

One day last week I was on patrol on Old Ore Road. It was a great day, the air was still and the sun just warm enough to make for a pleasant day. The best part of the day was the flowers that were blooming. I enjoyed just standing at some of the campsites inhaling the sweet fragrance of the little white and lavender flowers (I think they might be in the mustard family) and listening to the buzzing of the bees.

On Wednesday afternoon I did mostly local patrols and cleaned up a little after a big group of high schoolers had been in the group campground and river access area. They actually did a very nice job so there was not much to clean up, but these ravens and a cardinal couple enjoyed a few crumbs from the picnic tables.

In the afternoon one of the camper couples gave a concert of their music in the campgrounds. About 45 people attended and it was the first concert from the stage on the back of their camper rig. They had it made specially for this stage in their lives and their goal is to travel and do little concerts like this.

Jane (our volunteer coordinator with the violin) joins Marilyn and ??? (darn my awful memory!) in concert.

This week ended with 61 mph winds and cold weather yet again! I was able to travel to Alpine to get a couple of supplies and enjoy a day of thrift store shopping. I just tried to upload a raven video, but have encountered an error. Oh well, that's it for now. Tonight I will watch a video with friends and start work again Sunday. Bye for now!