Another fall trip in the books, This was a really fun year as we accomplished several items on our “bucket” list.
Each year we put together a list of things we would like to do in the future. It might be a new museum we haven’t visited or an old town site someone heard about. We are open to just about any adventure which can be reached by 4x4 vehicle or even, dare I say the word, “walking”.
Jeff, one of the Desert Balloon Recovery Crew (DBRC) was contacted by a British film crew who is filming episodes in National Parks for British Television. They found our DBRC Facebook page, contacted Jeff, and to make a long story short, filmed our group in camp with all our balloons hanging up and also spent one afternoon chasing down balloons in Greenwater in Death Valley.
Now, before we all get swelled heads, let me tell you, filming is HARD work. Its a lot of waiting for everyone to be ready, many, many retakes to get it right, and just plain hanging around.. For instance, the wind is blowing,(wait), there’s a loud truck going by, (wait), a jet is flying over, (wait), someone stumbled over their lines, mispronounced words, etc, etc. Do it over, Do it over.
Do I expect we will all be video stars after this? Doubtful. It may all end up on the cutting room floor when all is said and done. The finished product will air in Britain in the Spring and be available on US TV sometime by July. It is a two part series on Death Valley and will probably be on one of the streaming channels here. We are to be notified when it will be available.
And who says the desert is dull!!
I mentioned in my last blog a YouTuber named Wonderhussy (Sarah Jane) who also picks up Mylar balloons just as our Desert Balloon Recovery Crew does. We have used her videos to visit some interesting places in the desert.
My son Tim has been in contact with a fellow who purchased 4 Gold mines in the Tecopa, CA area. We drove to the road off which one of the mines is located and while looking for a GeoCache, Chris came down to see what we were doing. Tim introduced himself so it was all good. In the conversation Chris mentioned he had a Uhaul truck to unload. With nothing else important to do we offered to help. He also mentioned that Wonderhussy was supposed to come by and help him.
About the time we finished unloading, she did drive up, so we spent some time introducing ourselves. We complimented her on her YouTube channel and explained what the DBRC was all about. After a few photos, we all left and as we drove down the road we found a balloon. Sarah Jane had looked us up on FaceBook so she knew we were legitimate and was impressed by our finding that balloon. She invited us to a potluck that night in Tecopa for the new Fire Chief. We had other plans however.
We later visited the Shoshone Museum and the person there said we should have come to the potluck as there was lots of food left over. We decided that next year we will go to the potluck as we now know lots of people in Tecopa.
We spent a week dry camping on BLM property outside of Tecopa which allows us to drive to the hot pools for a soak at night. Heavenly!
After Tecopa we drove to the Longstreet Casino which is North of Death Valley Junction for one night so we could go to Beatty the next day for Beatty Days. They have a parade, car show, chili cook off, and food vendors. We have been going for years.
Coming back from Beatty we drove the rigs to Furnace Creek in Death Valley for our 2 week stay.
We did one killer hike which has been on our list for many years. Seven of us hiked 10.8 miles round trip to a rock alignment site which is actually 3 separate rock alignments. It was an uphill walk in a rocky desert wash. I had been to it years ago, when I was much younger. The trip took its toll on me as I stumbled my way back with Tim’s help and my legs and hips all wobbly. But I made it!
By the way, last year we collected 119 balloons. We thought this number might be hard to beat this year as we had a slow start to our collecting, however, by the time we left for home we had collected 129 balloons. Most of our finds are as we drive down a dirt road, not the highway. All of those finds are within 100 to 200 feet of the road on either side. Just imagine how many more balloons there are out there.
