The Mercantile where I worked sold bear bells. Folks who’ve never hiked in bear country may have never seen these large jingle bells that attach to a backpack or a belt. They jingle as the hiker moves and are meant to warn bears of the human’s approach. In theory, the foreign sound tells a bear that a hiker is approaching so the bear can amble off and avoid a confrontation it probably doesn’t want any more than the human does.
Some experts don’t believe bear bells work. Some sources say hikers are better of talking or singing or clapping their hands when moving through ursine territory. However, since the store I worked in sold bear bells, I tried not to discourage customers from buying them. When customers straight out asked me if the things really worked, I told them I’d never used one (truth) and different people have different ideas about their effectiveness (also truth). I mentioned clapping and singing and talking as bear deterrents too.
The company that manufactures the bear bells takes precautions to cover their corporate ass. Upon the cardboard the bells are attached to for display are printed the words “Alerts bears of your presence and sometimes sounds can cause bears to run and hide.” I love the word “sometimes” in that statement. I can imagine the company lawyer saying, Add “sometimes” in there so we don’t get sued if a bear doesn’t run and hide when it hears the bell.
Each bell came in a little black mesh bag. A magnet is sewn into the bottom of the mesh bag. When the owner of the bell doesn’t want it jingle jangling, the magnet is placed at the bottom of the bell so the little metal ball inside that otherwise bounces around in there and makes noise is held in place and the bell is silenced.
One day a couple of young women in bikini tops and short shorts were browsing in the Mercantile. One of them saw the display of bear bells and decided to examine them carefully. She picked up one of the bells and gave it a little shake. The magnet must have been in the perfect position to hold the inner metal ball in place because the bell made not a sound. She held the bell up and said, Does this make a sound only bears can hear?
I suppose it’s a reasonable question if one encounters one’s first bear bell and it produces no noise.
Autie Em and I got into the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument with no admission fee because she flashed her America the Beautiful Senior Pass.
Last week I told you about all of the the America the Beautiful Annual Passes: the basic Pass available for $80, the FREE America the Beautiful Pass for active members of the military and their dependents, and the America the Beautiful Annual and Lifetime Senior Passes. According to the National Park Service, any of these passes
is your ticket to more than 2,000 federal recreation sites. Each pass covers entrance fees at national parks and national wildlife refuges as well as standard amenity fees (day use fees) at national forests and grasslands, and at lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management, Bureau of Reclamation and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. A pass covers entrance, standard amenity fees and day use fees for a driver and all passengers in a personal vehicle at per vehicle fee areas (or up to four adults at sites that charge per person). Children age 15 or under are admitted free.
Today I’ll tell you about other groups who can receive FREE America the Beautiful passes. Passes are available FREE to folks with disabilities, 4th graders, and federal volunteers.
Folks with disabilities who have the FREE America the Beautiful Access Pass can visit Canyonlands National Park without paying an admission fee.
A special America the Beautiful pass is available FREE to people with disabilities. According to the USGS Store, the Access Pass (formerly known as the Golden Access Passport) is
[a] free, lifetime pass – available to U.S. citizens or permanent residents of the United States that have been medically determined to have a permanent disability (does not have to be a 100% disability)…
A permanent disability is a permanent physical, mental, or sensory impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities, such as caring for oneself, performing manual tasks, walking, seeing, hearing, speaking, breathing, learning, and working.
The disability requirements for the Access Pass are not based on percentage of disability. To qualify for the Pass the disability must be permanent and limit one or more major life activities.
Orange Cliffs Overlook in the Island in the Sky District of Canyonlands National Park
You must submit appropriate documents toprove that you have a disability before you will be issued an access pass.
Some examples of acceptable documentation include: Statement by a licensed physician (Statement must include: that the individual has a PERMANENT disability, that it limits one or more aspects of their daily life, and the nature of those limitations.) ; Document issued by Federal agency such as the Veteran’s Administration, Social Security Disability Income, or Supplemental Security Income; Document issued by a State agency such as a vocational rehabilitation agency.
The pass program for folks with disabilities is operated by five Federal agencies that operate under different regulations and have different fees. This means the discount program for this pass is handled differently on different federal recreation lands. You can research the discount guidelines here.
According to the National Park Service,
Folks with the America the Beautiful Access Pass can often get a 50% discount on camping fees.
The Access Pass may provide a 50 percent discount on some amenity fees charged for facilities and services such as camping, swimming, boat launching, and specialized interpretive services.
The Access Pass generally does NOT cover or reduce special recreation permit fees or fees charged by concessioners.
It is important to remember that if there is a 50% discount on camping fees,
As I mentioned above, the America the Beautiful Access Pass was formerly known as the Golden Access Passport. Like the Golden Age Passport, Golden Access Passports are no longer sold. However, Golden Access Passports are lifetime passes and are still honored under the terms of the America the Beautiful Access Pass. If a Golden Access Passport wears out or is lost, the pass owner must resubmit acceptable documentation to prove disability.
There is no age requirement for the Access Pass. Even a child with a permanent disability can receive an America the Beautiful Access Pass.
The National Park Service says there are two ways a person can obtain an Access Pass. One can get the Pass
Note: The cost of obtaining an Access Pass through the mail is $10 for processing the application. (The pass is free.)
Fourth graders and their grownups can see the wonders of nature (like these giant sequoias) at national parks (like Sequoia National Park) without having to pay an entrance fee if they have their Annual 4th Grade Pass.
The Annual 4th Grade Pass is available for FREE to every
U.S. 4th grade student (including home-schooled and free-choice learners 10 years of age) with a printed voucher from the Every Kid Outdoors website. Students may not receive a pass without a valid voucher.
The get the voucher, 4th graders must complete a
web based activity on the Every Kid Outdoors website. [After a 4th grader completes the activity] they will be awarded their voucher package for printing. Once your 4th grader arrives at the participating Federal recreation site they may exchange their Every Kid Outdoors voucher for the Annual 4th grade Pass. A list of sites that issue passes is available. Please contact the Federal land you will be visiting in advance to ensure that they have the pass available.
The pass is valid for the duration of the 4th grade school year through the following summer (September – August).
Like the America the Beautiful Pass for active members of the military and their dependents, the Annual 4th Grade Pass
does not cover or provide a discount on expanded amenity fees such as camping, boat launch or interpretive fees.
Holders of most America the Beautiful Passes will receive free admission to White Sands National Monument. (The White Sands Fees & Passes page makes no mention of the Annual Military Pass or the Annual 4th Grade Pass.)
As I mentioned, a fourth grader must jump through a few hoops to get the FREE Annual 4th grade pass. Go to the Every Kid Outdoors website to learn about the hoops and do the jumping. Each 4th grader
[m]ust have a paper voucher printed from the Every Kid Outdoors website to obtain the Annual 4th Grade Pass. Digital versions of the voucher (such as [on] smart phones or tablets) will not be accepted.
The final free pass that allows access to federal recreations sites with no admission fee is the America the Beautiful Volunteer Pass.
A “Volunteer Pass” is an Annual Pass awarded to those individuals who volunteer 250 hours at one or more recreation sites managed by five Federal agencies as a way to say “thank you!”
Camp hosts can receive the America the Beautiful Volunteer pass after completing 250 service hours.
To find out about volunteer opportunities at federal recreation sites, visit volunteer.gov.
To earn the America the Beautiful Volunteer Pass, volunteers must get all volunteer activities pre-approved by a volunteer coordinator. Activities that are not pre-approved may not count toward the 250 hours needed to earn a Volunteer Pass. Volunteers must get their record of volunteer hours signed by applicable Volunteer Coordinator(s). The Federal Volunteer Coordinator/Manager who authorizes that a volunteer has accrued 250 hours will issue the Volunteer Pass.
[p]hoto identification may be required to verify ownership [of pass]. Passes are NON-REFUNDABLE, NON-TRANSFERABLE, and cannot be replaced if lost or stolen.
Hopefully the information I’ve provided today and last week will help you decide if you want to get an America the Beautiful federal recreation pass. If you already have one, would you suggest that others get one? Please leave your thoughts in the comments section below.
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Please note all information was correct to the best of my knowledge when this post was written. Blaize Sun is not responsible for changing prices or any other changes that may take place after this post was written. Use the information given here as the starting point of your own research. Blaize Sun is not responsible for you. Only you are responsible for you.
Here is some of the art Nolagirl and I encountered at the 2017 Grand Avenue Festival in Phoenix, AZ.
Nolagirl and I were at the Grand Avenue Festival in November
of 2017. As we walked down the avenue looking at public art and popping into
galleries to see the cool pieces on display, we came across a Little Free
Library (LFL).
If you don’t already know from reading my blog or from your own experience, Wikipedia says,
Like other public book exchanges, a passerby can take a book to read or leave one for someone else to find. The [Little Free Library] organization relies on volunteer “stewards” to construct, install, and maintain book exchange boxes. For a book exchange box to be registered, and legally use the Little Free Library brand name, stewards must purchase a finished book exchange, a kit or, for a DIY project, a charter sign,[23] which contains the “Little Free Library” text and official charter number.[24][25]
The addition of one letter can change a Little Free Library into a Little Freek Library
The LFL we encountered on Grand Avenue was not your everyday
Little Free Library, not at all! It was a Little FREEK [sic] Library. Someone
came along and with one letter changed this registered Little Free Library
(charter #5315) into a Little Freek Library.
I know I’ve said in the past that anyone who would steal or vandalize a Little Free Library has problems
and needs prayers, but I’m not upset that someone with a Sharpie turned a
Little Free Library into a Little Freek Library. In fact, I think it’s
hilarious. I guess I’m a hypocrite. Oh well.
This “vandalizing” doesn’t upset me because I don’t think this “vandalizing” hurts anyone. It’s not like the “vandal” wrote anything vulgar or offensive on the LFL. There’s no hate speech here, no drawings of Nazi swastikas, no racism or misogyny, just the request to “celebrate freakier neighborhoods.” I just can’t argue with that. I think freakier neighborhoods (and freakier neighbors, for that matter) do need to be celebrated, especially in places like Phoenix that can seem very mainstream and somewhat boring (at least to me).
This LFL needs some good books in it.
There were only a couple of books in the Little Freek
Library, and they seemed old and in poor condition. I wished I had a few books
with me to contribute to this LFL. It really needed some book love.
Unfortunately, I didn’t get to revisit this LFL before I left town.
I’ve visited Little Free Libraries in Los Gatos, CA; Santa Fe and Taos, NM; Flagstaff and Mesa, AZ; and others in Phoenix too, but this was my first Little Freek Library. I was pretty excited to have stumbled across. Let your freek flag fly, Little Free Library on Grand Avenue. Let your freek flag fly.
In recognition of this popular food, today I’ll tell you a little story about a sandwich. It’s kind of a gross story which also involves pit toilets. Don’t say I didn’t warn you…
I’ve heard it said that humans can grow accustomed to anything. Anything? Well, probably most things, including the gross and the stinky.
This photo shows an actual pit toilet.
When I worked on the mountain, pit toilets at the very busy trailhead and the campground next to it had to be pumped several times between the middle of May and the middle of October. The truck that came up to pump the toilets was the same kind that removes the waste from porta-potties. A long, flexible hose was dropped down into the chamber (also referred to the pit or the vault) below the seat. A pump on the truck sucked up all the waste materials from inside the chamber and deposited everything into a big holding tank mounted on the truck. When the tank was full, the truck went down the mountain to deposit the waste I-don’t-know-where.
Even keeping the lid down couldn’t control the bad smell after the pit toilets were pumped.
The pumping process stirred up all the decaying waste material and created a HORRIBLE smell. If you’ve never encountered a large concentration of decaying human waste, let me tell you, it smells really bad. It stinks to high heaven. To put it simply, it smells like death, and death does not smell one bit pretty.
I wouldn’t say I grew immune to the stench of toilets being pumped, but at least after the first couple of times I encountered the process, I knew what to expect. As GI Joe taught us, knowing is half the battle.
Most of the visitors to the trailhead and campground were city folks; many of them had never encountered a toilet that didn’t immediately flush their waste away. On a regular day, the smell from the pit toilets was often enough to make them mighty uncomfortable. When the city folks were present for the pumping or its immediate aftermath, they were quite surprised and quite disgusted and quite unhappy.They had no idea shit and piss could smell so nasty.
One day the pump truck came up the mountain. We could practically smell it before we saw it.
This is the building in the middle of the parking lot that housed the pit toilets.
Here we go, I thought. I knew the visitors were going to be melodramatically grossed out, and I was sure to hear complaints.
The pump truck went down to the middle of the parking lot where the two pit toilets were located. I couldn’t see the two men at work, but I could hear the pump and smell the funk. Yes, as always, the churned up human waste smelled horrific.
Finally the pump was switched off and the quietude of nature prevailed. I knew the stench would settle, but at the moment the entire parking lot was enveloped in an awful aroma.
The truck came around the curve leading to the parking lot’s exit, and the driver stopped it near me. Groan. The driver hopped out with clipboard in hand and asked me to sign the form stating he and his partner had been there and done the job. I agreed, wanting the reeking truck away from me as soon as possible.
My favorite sign explaining how to use a pit toilet.
Just before I signed the form, I glanced over at the truck. What I saw gave credence to the idea that humans can grow accustomed to anything. The other pump truck worker, a young guy probably in his early 20s, was sitting in the passenger seat munching a sandwich.
The tourists were reeling, practically dry heaving and passing out, and this guy was sitting in the stink truck, nonchalantly having lunch. I wondered if he had no sense of smell or had simply become so accustomed to the stench that it was basically background noise–or perhaps more accurately, background stink. In any case, he seemed to be enjoying his sandwich, not at all bothered by the odor that was causing the rest of us so much grief.
The Mercantile where I worked sold bear bells. Folks who’ve never hiked in bear country may have never seen these large jingle bells that attach to a backpack or a belt. They jingle as the hiker moves and are meant to warn bears of the human’s approach. In theory, the foreign sound tells a bear that a hiker is approaching so the bear can amble off and avoid a confrontation it probably doesn’t want any more than the human does.
