The Shutdown Chronicles

The refuge has been shutdown since December 23rd and so has the Speedy Journal...mostly from a lack of enthusiasm. It has been tough to be out here twiddling our thumbs as they won't let us do anything outside of the volunteer compound except wander the refuge. We cannot help out the few "essential staff" nor can we use government vehicles to get around the refuge. This is a real disadvantage to us as we are limited on which roads we can take Speedy, which is virtually none...anyone have an idle Jeep available?

Although we have not been able to do our volunteer projects, we haven't been entirely idle. We have taken a trip, done some extra birding, made more trips than usual to Tucson and had a bit of on refuge excitement. A hopefully short summary follows (yeah, right!):

For us the shutdown began on Christmas Eve, but there was still a Christmas Eve party at the Outpost Community Center with the rest of the volunteers, hosted by Josh, our volunteer coordinator and his wife, Felica. Lots of food and conversation.

We started Christmas day with a pancake breakfast in Speedy and went birding on the refuge.

Tuesday was a "fun" trip to Tucson. On Christmas Eve, my iPad's home button stopped working, making rather difficult to use, as it is the control for getting back to the page where one opens apps. We decided to go into the Apple Store in Tucson to try to get it fixed. Being the day after Christmas, the store opened an hour early at 9am and we were there just after opening hoping to beat the crowds...not quite. It was a four hour wait to get an appointment at the Genius bar to have them look at the iPad. We went off to do our weekly grocery shopping elsewhere in Tucson, returning after lunch.

Coincidently, I bought the iPad at this same Apple Store almost exactly three years ago, when my previous refurbished iPad totally died...will I be back in three more years? They took a look at it and then told us that they don't actually repair iPads anymore, but I could replace it with an identical one for only $299 or upgrade to the latest model for $599. I took the $299 (actually $317 with tax) option.

Before I took the new one, they asked if I'd backed up the old one. I thought I had the night before, but, as I realized later, had only synced the account, mail and contact data. This became apparent when I restored my synchronized data to the new iPad, all of the configuration information was there, but none of my 100+ apps. At first, we thought that we could use the store's high speed broadband wifi network to quickly reload the largest apps, but after a couple of hours we gave up, realizing that the overcrowded store full of people coming in to get their brand new Apple products activated meant the network was quite slow. We went back to the refuge and spent the next several days slowly restoring the new iPad.

Aside from the iPad, a highlight of the day was stopping at the new Nico's Taco Shop just outside of Three Points on the way home. Their food was surprisingly good.

On Thursday, it was time to go birding again. We went over to Arivaca with Susy and Jess and roamed Arivaca Cienaga, Honnas Pond and Arivaca Creek. We didn't see anything new, but it was a good day, complet with a stop at the Gitana Cantina in Arivaca for burgers. They make a very tasty Green Chile Cheeseburger.

Saturday was the Buenos Aires Christmas Bird Count. We teamed up with Rob and Rita again, as we did three years ago. Due to the shutdown, we couldn't use our refuge truck and Rob and Rita came out to the Outpost to pick us up in their Toyota Forerunner. We had a different sector of the refuge this time, mostly open grassland in the center of the refuge. While we saw about 30 species overall for the day, it was mostly sparrows, lots and lots of Vesper Sparrows and White-crowned Sparrows. If it had just been Ellen and I, it probably would have been ten species, but Rob is an excellent birder and got us on birds we wouldn't have seen otherwise.

On Sunday, it was off to California. Our old friends, Bob and Nancy, have a home in Huntington Beach that Bob inherited from his parents. They live in Hull and up until recently, we have often spent New Year's Eve with them and a group of local friends. This year-end, almost all of us were away from Massachusetts.

They came out to see us at the refuge to see us the last time we winter volunteered here and had repeatedly invited us to visit them in California. With no expected end to the shutdown until well after the new year (if we'd known how long it was going to last we might have stayed in California longer), we gave them a call and they were really happy to be able to spend another New Year's Eve together with us...and us with them.

The Southern California coast is a bit too far for us to drive in a single day and we didn't get an exceptionally early start. We decided to take the southern route via I-8 through Yuma to San Diego, then up the coast to Huntington Beach. We hoped to get just past Yuma, AZ and then stop for the night. From the map it loked like there were a few RV parks on the west side of town, but somehow we missed the west side of town and found ourselves entering California. After having to give up our clementines and apples at the California Agricultural inspection station, we continued on through the desert until dark finally finding an open park in El Centro. Even though we had gained an hour going into the next Time Zone, it seems all the parks in El Centro closed early. It took us three tries to find an open office which was at the city RV Resort on Sunbeam Lake.

We made it to Bob and Nancy's before lunch time on New Year's Eve. After lunch we took our first of two long bird walks at the Bolsa Chica Ecological Reserve, which is just down the street from their house. It is a big restored wetland just behind Bolsa Chica State Beach and is teeming with waterfowl, gulls, shorebirds and others in the uplands above the pools. We had two life birds on this walk, the California Towhee and the Western Gull.

After dinner, we took out Bob's small sailboat and motored through the canals of Huntington Beach to see the incredible display of Christmas lights on the canal-side homes. As in Massachusetts, many of the homes have been super-sized in the recent past, so no expense was spared with some of these lighting displays.

We came back to the dock in plenty of time to watch the ball drop in Times Square. Since we are all easterners, we declared it 2019, had a toast and didn't have to stay up until midnight local time. Bob and Nancy insisted that we spend the night in their guest room and we had a big bed and our own bathroom for the first time in nearly two months.

On New Year's Day, we made another trip to Bolsa Chica and then went over to downtown Huntington Beach, a few miles south of Bolsa Chica Beach. We wandered out onto the long pier, watched the surfers (Huntington Beach is officially "Surf City"), and wandered the main street surf shops.

In the evening, we headed north to Sunset Beach, the next town up, to take them out to dinner, not realizing that many restaurants were not open on New Year's Day. We ended up at our third choice, the Beechwood BBQ. The waiters were friendly, the food was good and the craft beer list was strange, but Ellen and Bob ended up with a decent red ale.

It was time to head back on January 2nd. We were still hoping the shutdown would end this week. We decided to take the more northern route back, using I-10 and stopping at Quartzite. The other volunteers here kept telling us we had to stop in Quatrzite, a famous (infamous?) winter RVing site. It is well known for the several BLM long-tern visitor areas where folks can park their RV for the winter for less than $200 for the season. It is also well-known for its large rock and mineral show in January (a prelude to the even larger one in Tucson in February).

It takes a long time to get from Huntington Beach, through the LA suburbs, to I-10 and by the time we got to Quartzite, almost on the Arizona border, it was getting late. We didn't want to try to find a free spot in the desert at one of the BLM areas and had been told that inexpensive RV parks could be found in town. The first one we tried was too grim to even enquire at, so we found another online that wasn't far away and was only $25 a night.

We headed over and it was your usual gravel parking lot in the desert with amenities and hook-ups. We got almost signed in when they told us it would be $50 for the night. It was, after all, January, their high season month. I said that the web site said $25 with no mention of high season pricing, but it was getting dark and we didn't want to go searching again like in El Centro, so we paid up and settled in.

We left pretty early the next morning, and made it back to the refuge by late afternoon, after a grocery stop on the way.

After a day off, we, along with Jess and Susy, joined the Audubon Bird walk, led by Rob, at the Arivaca Cienaga. They used to do this walk almost every week, but with the lack of water at the Cienaga over the past couple of years, they have cut back to one a month.

After the walk, we went off to an area outside of Arivaca where Susy had birded for the Christmas Bird Count. She had seen a large flock Western Bluebirds in the area that day. Rob followed us over there as well. We found the bluebirds, hundreds of them. It was quite the sight. We continued a ways further in to Fraguita Spring where there was a windmill and an old mine site before heading back to Arivaca for another lunch at the Cantina.

The fun continued on Monday the 7th with no end to the shutdown in sight. We decided to go on the Tuesday morning birdwalk at Tubac. This is a small town off of I-19 midway between Tucson and Nogales, south of the Amado exit we take on the way back to the refuge from Green Valley. The Tuesday walk starts at 7:30am and is nearly a two hour drive from the refuge, so we decided to combine a Monday shopping trip to Tucson with an overnight stay in Tubac, then go birding on Tuesday morning.

We drove into town on Monday morning to the usual set of stores. Ellen also wanted to get a haircut as she hadn't had one since leaving Cohasset—she definitely didn't want my barber, but the Supercuts next to Fry's was a (sort of) known entity as she used them when we were here before.

After the shopping,trimming and lunching, we drove down I-19 to Tubac. As it was still early in the day, we stopped at the Tubac Presidio State Museum. Tubac is one of the earliest Spanish settlements in Arizona, but over time was eclipsed by Tucson and faded to a small town, but the history in the museum was intertesting.

After the museum, we drive over to the nearby De Anza Trail parking lot. We had boondocked here before and knew it was a litte-known quiet spot for the night. We settled in, had dinner and had an undisturbed night.

 On Tuesday morning we stopped at the Tubac Deli for breakfast, then joined Rob and 30 other people for the weekly Tubac birdwalk. This was an enormous group. Even the walk leader was surprised as he'd had no more than a half-dozen people earlier in the season. But the holidays were over and all the residents were back and the snowbirds had returned. It was a noisy but pleasant walk with the highlight being our first Vermillion Flycatcher of the year.

On Wednesday, we went back over to Arivaca with Jess and Susy to meet Rob and Reta and another couple who are friends of Rob's to take another look at the bluebirds and explore that area a bit more. We did find the bluebirds again and went down a couple of new roads, but the birding was a bit slim. It was another good lunch at the cantina, though.

Things got rather interesting on Friday. I noticed a puddle around the waste pipe next to Speedy. This is where we dump our holding tanks and it was fine on Monday when we last used it.

I unscrewed the cover and gray water came pouring out. This was not good. I quickly screwed the cover back on. The septic system that serves the RV pad was backing up and our site is at the lowest point before the tank and it was overflowing at our pipe.

I consulted with Dave, the maintenance volunteer, who has the most experience at the refuge and we gave Stan, the refuge manager and the only staff member working to ask if we could get a cleanout snake from the shop and try to clear the blockage. This was quickly okayed. We drove over to the shop to pick up a humongous device with a 100 foot spring snake (the wire diameter was about an inch) and a big motor.

Dave, Bruce and I worked most of the day trying to unblock the clog with no success. We finally called Stan back and he managed to convince the regional office that this was an emergency. He was able call in a septic company to find and pump he tanks...but they wouldn't be here until Monday morning.

Fortunately, the trailers, including the Community Center, are on a separate system, so the bathroom, shower and laundry was still available and all of the volunteer RVs were able to just use their holding tanks until Monday, so all we could do was wait.

Sunday was my birthday, so we decided to go hunting for a life bird. A White-throated Thrush was being seen in Madera Canyon, over by Green Valley. This is a Central American bird that usually comes no farther north than the middle of Mexico. This was he first sighting in Arizona and only the second sighting in the US. We made a before sunrise start as we have to take the Arivaca Road through Arivaca and over to I-19. By the time we arrived, the parking lot near where the bird has been seen was already almost full, but we found a spot for Speedy.

As we climbed the trail, there were a stream of birders coming down. It was pretty easy to find the spot as there were at least twenty people there...as was the thrush. It was a little shy, but would pop up often enough to get a good look at a pretty rare bird for the US. He seemed to be in the company of a Hermit Thrush and it was interesting to compare the two.

Then we were off to Tucson to celebrate. We celebrated by shopping, lunching at St. Mary's Mexican Food (where I was supposed to have Tre Leches Cake but they were all out) and birding at Sweetwater Wetlands. It was actually a nice day.

On Monday, the septic truck showed up bright and early. We had an early warning from Ellen who saw it coming in the drive as she was out on her morning walk. (One advantage of the shutdown is Ellen can get in morning walks on a regular basis).

The immediate problem was finding the septic tank. With the shutdown, there was no one available who had any idea if there was any documentation as to its location. We knew from our digging around the drains the approximate direction of the drain lines and we could see the inspection vents at the end of the leaching field. The septic company guy was quite experienced and was able to locate it fairly quickly with a water jet probe.

Unfortunately, it was under the gravel pad between the recycling building and the propane filling station, very hard digging and three feet down. After struggling with hand shovels
for a while, Stan agreed to let Dave bring over the big frontend loader from the maintenance yard as he was qualified to use it. It wasn't the ideal machine, but the small backhoe was in the middle of being repaired when the shutdown started.

Once he came back with that, we wer able to expose the covers and find out what was wrong.

It turned out to be a large plastic RV dump hose connector that someone had dropped into the septic system at some time in the past. It had eventually worked its way down to the tank and had gotten wedged at the end of the input pipe. Then it filled up with solid stuff and blocked the line completely. While tanks were fairly full, it was the blockage that had backed up the system. Once removed, large volumes of water came rushing out.

It didn't take long to pump the tank and get it sealed back up and we were back to normal. Since the refuge had paid for a full tank, we decided to look for the other septic system which was on the other side of the compound. There were lots of vent stacks out there but it was unclear where the tank might be. The septic guy probed around for quite a while in areas where he thought were possible places.

Meanwhile Bruce and I looked out at the line of leaching field vents and figured that the most probable place was on a line perpendicular to the line of vent in the middle of the line. I figured it wasn't in the road and was just about where I was standing. I said probe here and he hit the cover about a foot down. Dave brought over the loader and scraped away exposing the covers of a much larger tank.

The septic guy looked in and probed around and commented that we were very lucky. This tank was only about a week from overflowing. The tank was so big that he was only able to pump out about half the tank before filling his truck. We surmised that it had never been pumped before. Isn't shutdown life fun?

Our friends Alan and Ruth arrived yesterday. They live up in Bedford, but we met them on our first trip to the Everglades and have intersected with them on several trips since as they have been camping out in their VW campervan. Alan is a really good birder and introduced us to eBird. He is also a long-time local volunteer at the Great Meadows NWR in Concord. While corresponding with them last year, they mentioned that they were coming out to the Southwest to visit their daughter who lives up near Phoenix. We told him that we would be out here at the refuge and he seemed interested in visiting and even volunteering.

We gave him the number for Josh and he called and it was agreed that they could volunteer for a few weeks as they don't really need a site and hookups and all that. They expected to arrive just after the new year, but delayed it because of the shutdown, even though Josh said they could come anyway. We knew they were staying at a pricy state park and suggested they come down anyway, and they did.

At the moment we have very close neighbors as there was room next to Speedy, but they will be off to San Diego to a conference over the weekend, returning around the 24th. It is nice to see them and Alan is quite impressed with the refuge so far.

We certainly hope the shutdown will be over sometime soon as we are a bit tired of not knowing what is next.  We would rather be working. At least we are not in the same boat as the staff who aren't being paid, whether or not they are working. At the moment, our thought is to give it until the end of the month and if there is no resolution by then we may have to consider leaving and working our way back home. With only Speedy as a vehicle, it is easier for us to travel from place to place than to get around the roads of the refuge.