When asked to describe our first hitch in one word, the first word that came to my mind was ‘eventful.’ We started the hitch with 7 crew members (and even had an 8th person when Adrienne, our project liaison, joined us for the first few days) and ended with 5. Josh broke his finger on the second day so he was the first crew member down. He was a real trooper though because he didn’t even complain about the pain. His finger was getting worse rather quickly so Adrienne brought him back to Missoula when she returned on the fourth day. A couple days later, Robyn also had to return to Missoula. Besides losing a couple crew members for the last days of this hitch, we also had a few tool difficulties and unclear specifications about the trail until we talked to Tim, our Forest Service sponsor. Most of this was resolved by the end of the hitch, however, and we were still able to get some quality work accomplished.
Even though we had all of these hardships, our team morale stayed high throughout the hitch. Nobody complained about the difficulties we experienced. One large reason for this high morale was that our location couldn’t have been better- Fish Creek Trail No. 2240 in Clearwater National Forest in Idaho. Fish Creek, a raging river, ran along the entire length of the trail that we worked on throughout the course of the hitch. It was so peaceful to fall asleep to the sound of the rushing water.
We have only been immersed in the woods for 9 days so far, but I think each of us was feeling incredibly comfortable there. After a brief break in town, we will be ready to return to the natural areas of Idaho to work on more trail. We can only hope that our future hitches will run more smoothly than the first. Even if they don’t, we will still have fun along the way.
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