Well, the past two weeks have been absolutely crazy! We have been living in a classroom for 8 hours a day... I have not missed being in a class at all. We finished our S-130, S-190, and S-212 classes. Meaning, we now have our Red Cards for Wildland firefighters!!! We can work for the US Forest Service as Type 2 Hand Crews during fire season. We also received our A Sawyer certification. Meaning we can operate chain saws as long as there is a B Sawyer supervising. It is hard to believe that the first time I have ever touched a chain saw was on Thursday, and now I am certified to use them all the time for the next 3 years if I so choose. Though my body tells another story! Lifting those things for 8 hours a day is crazy. They way about 25-30 lbs and you are basically supporting them off of one arm.
For our certification, we had to successfully "fell" (or cut down) two trees, as well as limb them and buck them. Which is harder than it sounds. :) The way they teach you is to do a face cut (aka a horizontal cut into the tree the way you want it to fall) and then a 45 degree sloping cut to meet that (a diagonal cut that meets with the other side) that way you have something that looks like a mouth on the tree to help lay it where you want it to go. Then you have to put a back cut in there about 2 inches above your face cut. ... Let's just say it is a lot to think about under pressure.. as well as making sure that the tree doesn't fall early, nor will it land on anyone.
Ren, Megan, Jeremy and I went to explore the Garden of the Gods last weekend.... It was so beautiful. I have never seen anything close to it... well maybe Red Rocks in Denver, but this was everywhere. We had fun climbing up rocks and exploring around. Meg and I had an even better time watching all the puppies go exploring the Garden too. The views were so beautiful. It amazes me that places like that really exist. I could probably go back every weekend and not get sick of it.
That is about all for now... I will try to update soon about my first week of real work!
I miss you all..
<3
Kris
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