The summer after my freshman year of college came earlier than I expected; the school year flew by. Fortunately, I had a job ready when I got back home: a job at the local state park. Indian Creek Recreation Area is close to my house and I work there full time. I’m sure many people are wondering how it is like to work at a park. I can help shed some insight on the matter.

My main job at the park is mowing the vast amounts of lawns that the park owns. I mow the grass on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, unless it rains on those days. On Mondays and Fridays I normally do odd jobs around the park. Some of these include washing vehicles, moving railroad ties and cleaning bathrooms. But I would say that most of the time, I am on a lawn mower.

One of the best parts about working at the park is that, when you get to know everyone there and work with them, you start to feel a sort of comradery towards everyone there. One could relate it to a family feeling. Another great part about working there is, for the most part, you can take days off whenever you need to. It really is nice that the staff there are understanding of your needs to take certain days off for any amount of reasons.

With any job comes the negatives of working at the park. For one, you are outside mostly. And they do not supply any kind of sunscreen, so you can get easily sun burned due to this fact. However, this is an easy fix by either wearing sunscreen or a long sleeved shirt. Another negative is the fact that I have to wake up at six so I can get ready and drive to work so I can be there by seven. The reason I have to get to work so early is because it gets so hot during the summer, so if we get there in the early hours of morning, we can leave in the early afternoon, when it is less hot. So while I can see the reason as to why the park does this, I still feel the effects of less sleep .

The last positive thing I am going to talk about in this article is payment. While I am not at liberty to state some facts about this, I can state that I get paid once every two weeks and I get paid over minimum wage, which is very nice.

In conclusion, working at Indian Creek Recreational Area has definitely been an experience for me, and I am sure that it will continue to be an experience as summer goes on. I do enjoy working at the park and I also assume that others who work at the park do as well. So, if you aren’t sure whether you should take that park job, I say give it a chance. It might surprise you how much you enjoy being outside and working on the park, making the camping experience all the better for campers there.