Here Comes The Fun

I had a little taste of what my weekend is going to hold for me.  The day started out slowly and I was able to finish up the updates to our emergency action plan.  It started to get a little more challenging when I got a call from one of the closing rangers who was sick.  I was already down a person for that shift so I had to call in another ranger and move some things around.  The next call was that a ranger at a distant property got his truck stuck in a big puddle hole and needed help.  My coworker went out to help him and take care of some other tasks that we had to do while he was out there.
Sometime after lunch, I ventured into the ranger station.  It was during the overlap period when the morning and evening ranger station attendant were both there.  I definitely see the need for the overlap.  One person was checking in campers and one person was at the register at the window taking entrance fees.  There was a line of cars out to the road.  The phone was ringing off the hook and people where coming in around the campers to ask questions.  I got a quick lesson on the register and helped out at the window for a little while.  The person who had been at the window was doing her best to help everyone else, the ringing phone, the community service workers who needed assignments and the people with questions.  It was chaos, but the visitors were happy and none of them had to wait very long.  The other rangers and I were spinning.
The afternoon continued that way.  When I was able to break free of the ranger station, another ranger and I were making frequent checks of the parking lot.  When the parking lot fills up, we have to start turning people away until some people leave.  It didn't get to that point today, but we are all fairly certain that it will tomorrow.  The weather will be sunny and in the mid 80's and its a holiday weekend.
In the late afternoon, I talked to one of the rangers who needed to check on some maintenance issues in one of the women's restrooms in the campground.  I went with him to make sure that no one was in there and to watch the door while he checked things out.  I saw these beautiful Oxalis flowers outside of the restroom while I stood guard.  Their leaves were like clovers, but they were giant!  The leaves were about the size of the palm of my hand.  They were well hidden in a woodsy area, I would have never spotted them if I hadn't just been standing around.


I walked down to the spring area at one point.  It was really quite busy.  There were too many people to speak to everyone that I passed, the way that I did at Troy.  I spoke to everyone that I made eye contact with and answered a few questions.  It was really busy around the spring, but I'm sure that it will be more-so tomorrow.  I am looking forward to seeing the park at its busiest, but I am a little apprehensive as well.  I think that everyone is trying to prepare me for the worst.  I hope that it won't be quite as bad as what they are telling me.


I think that the day went well today.  There were challenges and I think that they were handled well.  We'll see what tomorrow brings.

Thought of the Day #83
It is interesting to me how different holidays are between Wekiwa Springs and Troy Springs.  At Troy, most holidays were very quiet.  I guess people were at home spending time with their families.  Memorial Day, Labor Day, and the Fourth of July were busier than normal, but other holidays were quiet.  Usually the only visitors were people who just wanted to get out of the house for a little while.  They would walk around a little and then leave again.  I was surprised when everyone expected Easter weekend to be a busy weekend here at Wekiwa, and its proving to be quite busy.  I wonder if it is the demographic of people or that the visitors who came to Troy lived in rural areas and had plenty of room to do Easter Egg hunts as opposed to the urban and suburban dwellers that come to Wekiwa.