park manager Gabe

Monday,  I met the park manager , Gabe.  He is a good looking young professional, and he was so kind! He said that he likes to give  his volunteers a few days to get settled into the life of the park before putting them to work.
So I relaxed and fixed up my yard with the dog fence and rugs, dog beds, and lawn chairs.  I also took the time to go throughout the park learning the whereabouts of the toilets, the water faucets, the numbers of the sites, etc.  I also took the opportunity to get my dogs used to the routes we would take on their exercise runs.

One day I went to Deming and got some groceries. Twenty seven miles isn't really very far, but I was spoiled by being at Quartzsite AZ with town just over the hill!

Today I worked all day in the visitor center, and learned the ropes of that job. Lois, one of the other volunteers showed me everything.  She's a good instructor. I learned a lot of the answers that I will have to know as time goes by.  I learned how to start the movie about the park, where the different literature is kept, where the cleaning supplies are, and how to get the statistics kept for the park. There is an envelope with our days worth of change, which has to be accounted for, how to work the cash register, how to make paid tickets, etc.

Many of the visitors wanted information about mammals, birds, rocks, reptiles, etc, and I had to learn what to say to them.

One thing I learned is that Gabe is a very well rounded and hard working guy. Then the toilets don't work, he fixes them.  When the water system is down, he fixes it.  He picks up the garbage bags at the campsites, retrieves the pay envelopes from the self-pay tubes, reconciles the cash register from the visitor center, makes sure that the visitor center volunteer has a supply of caqsh to use for maqking change, cleans the vault toilets, places toilet paper in vault toilets, cleans the showers, etc.  He is on call for any law enforcement needs that occur in the park, and he is in charge of first aid for the visitors who injure themselves trying to climb the rocks at the park.  He has only one paid employee!