Day 1: Western Hardrock Watershed Team

Today was my first training session with the Western Hardrock Watershed Team.

The WHWT is a coalition of community watershed groups that work to improve watershed health in the Hardrock mining region. Hardrock mines extract hard minerals, including gold, silver, zinc, copper, nickel and lead, and have are located throughout Colorado and her neighboring states. Because of the environmental degradation caused by mining throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, water regulation in this region is challenging and must work to balance historic and cultural values with watershed and community health.

So what does this have to do with me? The Western Hardrock Watershed Team helps place AmeriCorps VISTA volunteers with these local watershed organizations. They support the organizations as they work to obtain their VISTA volunteers, help them create appropriate goals, etc. and also support me as I have questions and concerns throughout the year.

Here are my 2 favorite experiences from the day:
1) After missing the entrance of the building where we were meeting, I had to turn around in a Hooters parking lot. And, as it turns out, the fastest way from my house to work every day will be to turn around in said Hooters parking lot. Awesome.

2) The girl from WHWT who was leading our session told me that in her two years of working with VISTA and the WHWT she had never heard of anyone else who was able to do a long move by themselves. Most other people, she told me, drove out with their stuff packed in a car and lived in housing offered by their organization. I, on the other hand, flew out, picked up my car here, shipped my stuff and found housing without the help of my organization. It's interesting to learn that not many people move out alone and, while I thought that I just didn't know anyone who had a similar experience, perhaps my move was not as typical as I thought.