Dave and I spent the weekend at Pinnacles National Monument. The park recently acquired a large parcel of new land and this land includes the old campground that used to be just outside the East entrance. The land needs a lot work since it has missed out on the preservation done within the park, and we were happy to be a part of a volunteer crew that contributed a few hours to the park through a Geocaching CITO event.

There were two tasks that our group contributed to: the first was to pull out invasive horehound plants from the old ranch lands that are now part of the park. Thousands of plants were cleaned out by the crew – great job! The second task was to build a fence and work on trail re-vegitation in the campground. There was a big open meadow that had been stomped down by people over the years. We built a rustic wooden fence around it while others mulched up the old trails to prepare for re-vegitation. It was hard but fun work. It was quite interesting to learn about the park’s expansion, and also get some education about the park’s condor program (we watched them soaring far above us near a roost on a ridge).

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