Keeping Busy
June 30, 2014 11:08 am Leave your thoughts
Hey guys, sorry I’ve been a little behind on the blog posts lately but as per usual it’s easy to stay busy around here. These past few weeks have been all about new experiences for me. I went in my first helicopter ride; unfortunately I was way too excited about the whole situation and it never even cross my mind to take any pictures, my bad. I also saw my first bear on one of the logging roads, which I was stoked for! I believe since then I’ve seen at least ten more, luckily all from my truck. I have only seen one grizzly bear, she had two playful cubs that were surprisingly not scared of the truck at all. We also had one of the craziest weather days so far in Grande Prairie, it was cycling between sunshine, snow, hail and rain all day. My friends could not believe when I told them it was snowing in June. My next new experience was travelling to Jasper and seeing the mountains for the first time. Absolutely breathtaking.
Here’s my first mountain picture at Maligne Lake!
Weyerhaeuser also gave Jesse and I a side project from working with the tree planters. We’ve been quadding the road distances and recording the kilometers along with any large crossings over creeks, pipeline’s, etc. We then pass this information onto our road reclaimers. Basically any road that runs through a cut block has to be reclaimed and then planted afterwards. A big hoe comes into the block and pulls the side berms into the center, along with any stumps or sticks within. This is why we need to ensure the tree planters do not plant trees within 2 meters of the road or all those little seedlings will simply get ripped out and buried by the hoe. But all in all a very fun job. One day I swear it was more like winching down the road instead of driving, those roads can get ridiculously muddy.
One of the less muddy logging roads.
Weyerhaeuser also received four new crews to help out with the summer tree plant. Previously we only had three so now I have a lot more names to learn and even more trees to check. Seven crews consisting of about 85 people all in different cut blocks makes it a tad tricky to keep up!
Finally I made my first trip to the Edmonton mall, which is ginormous! My roommate goes to school at U of A so she told me all about it but seeing it was completely different. It literally has everything: ice rinks, water parks, rollercoasters, arcades, bungee jumping, a seal and sea lion show, the list goes on and on! Definitely did not have the time to see and do everything but I’m sure I’ll be up there again this summer, along with Jasper.
Cheers, Brooke