If you’ve ever camped at Lake Chelan State Park, you know how busy it can get. Summer weekends fill fast. Campgrounds feel packed. The lake is constant motion.

What most visitors never see is what it takes to keep a park like this running when it’s full.

“During peak season, Lake Chelan State Park can host close to a thousand campers every single night.”

During peak season, Lake Chelan State Park can host close to a thousand campers every single night. Behind the scenes, that responsibility falls on one park manager.

Listen to the episode here:

In this episode of the Exploring Washington State Podcast, I sit down with Brian Frahm, the park manager at Lake Chelan State Park, to talk about what actually goes into operating one of Washington’s busiest state parks. Brian oversees daily operations, seasonal staff, visitor safety, and law enforcement across the entire park — work that most people never think about while setting up a tent or launching a boat.

“Most people experience the park for a weekend. Managing it is a full-time, year-round responsibility.”

Our conversation pulls back the curtain on what park operations really look like.

Brian shares how quickly the calm of spring turns into full-scale summer chaos, what happens when the park reaches capacity, and why seasonal staffing creates challenges most visitors never see. We talk about wildlife encounters, emergency situations, and the planning that starts months before peak season arrives.

“The quiet of spring disappears fast once summer hits.”

One of the most compelling parts of the conversation is Brian’s perspective on raising a family inside a state park. While summers are intense and demanding, the shoulder seasons and winter months reveal a quieter side of Lake Chelan — one that feels completely different from the crowded summer experience.

“The shoulder seasons are when Lake Chelan really shows its character.”

This episode offers a rare behind-the-scenes look at the people and systems that make Washington’s state parks work. It’s a reminder that these places don’t just happen — they’re carefully managed by people who care deeply about public lands and visitor safety.

If you spend time outdoors in Washington, this conversation will give you a new appreciation for what goes into keeping places like Lake Chelan State Park open, safe, and welcoming — even on the busiest nights of the year.

Brian Frahm Lake Chelan State Park Ranger Episode Transcript

Welcome to the Exploring Washington State Podcast. My name is Scott Cowan and I’m the host of the show. Each episode I have a conversation with an interesting guest who is living in or from Washington state. These are casual conversations with real and interesting people. I think you’re going to like the show. So let’s jump right in with today’s guest. All right, everyone, I am sitting down and Brian Fromm is standing up.

Scott Cowan [00:00:29]:

And Brian is The Park Ranger 3 for the Central Lakes assistant area. Which sounds really impressive, Brian, but we’re sitting here at Lake Chelan State park, which is not your home park, but it’s where I met you.

Brian Frahm [00:00:45]:

Right? Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:00:46]:

Okay. So, Brian, welcome.

Brian Frahm [00:00:47]:

Thank you.

Scott Cowan [00:00:49]:

Brian, What’s Park Ranger 3 mean?

Brian Frahm [00:00:52]:

It’s the assistant area manager. If you’re familiar with our parks, we’re separated out into areas and that specific position is in charge of daily operations. And is the lead law enforcement for the area guidance on, you know, what, what enforcement actions are going to be taken throughout, throughout the summer looking at those types of things.

Scott Cowan [00:01:17]:

Okay, so why don’t you tell us what parks those are that you’re overseeing?

Brian Frahm [00:01:21]:

Sure, yeah. So I have Lake Chelan where we’re at, of course, but then have Alta lake, Bridgeport and 25 Mile Creek State parks.

Scott Cowan [00:01:28]:

So all fairly close.

Brian Frahm [00:01:30]:

Yeah. A little over an hour to Bridgeport, depending on how you go and in.

Scott Cowan [00:01:37]:

Your day to day routine. And he’s giving me a funny look like there is no daily day routine.

Brian Frahm [00:01:43]:

You know this.

Scott Cowan [00:01:44]:

But how often do you visit each of these four parks?

Brian Frahm [00:01:51]:

Yeah, sure, I, I try to get to each park. I mean, there’s. So there’s four parks, five work days. I try to get once a week. Sometimes I get to multiples.

Scott Cowan [00:02:02]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:02:03]:

In a week.

Scott Cowan [00:02:03]:

So like, like for those people that don’t know, 25 mile is what, eight miles from here?

Brian Frahm [00:02:09]:

Maybe nine and a half.

Scott Cowan [00:02:10]:

Yeah, nine and a half. Alta and Bridgeport are probably 15 miles.

Brian Frahm [00:02:15]:

Maybe I can tell you by the minutes is about 40 minutes to Alta Lake and then you’re about. Right. About an hour over to Bridgeport.

Scott Cowan [00:02:21]:

Yeah. So. Yeah. Okay. All right. So I don’t know where this is going to go now. I’m going. Are we going to talk about four parks? We can talk about this park.

Scott Cowan [00:02:30]:

But let’s talk about you for a second as we’re standing or you’re standing. I’m sitting. It’s November 2025. Every time I’ve come to this park, you’ve been out blowing leaves. So I think you’re really a landscaper disguised As a park ranger. Okay, but when you were growing up, did you think you’re gonna be a park ranger?

Brian Frahm [00:02:51]:

No, I didn’t think I was gonna be a park ranger. It wasn’t. I. I fell into it. It’s not that I wasn’t in parks. I’m an Eagle Scout. Ice. My scout group was active outdoors.

Brian Frahm [00:03:05]:

We were in national parks. We were in the state parks. My eagle Scout project was in a state park. My dad had a friend who was a park ranger. That’s how I got access to the park to do my Eagle Scout project. But no, it was not. I enjoyed the outdoors. I wanted to do something that would allow me to be in the outdoors, but I didn’t know.

Brian Frahm [00:03:27]:

I didn’t really know what I was doing. I didn’t know what I was gonna do, so.

Scott Cowan [00:03:31]:

And you didn’t grow up in Washington. You grew up in Colorado, correct?

Brian Frahm [00:03:33]:

Yep. Okay.

Scott Cowan [00:03:36]:

Where’d you go to college?

Brian Frahm [00:03:37]:

Colorado State University, Pueblo.

Scott Cowan [00:03:39]:

And what’d you go to college for?

Brian Frahm [00:03:41]:

I went to be an accountant.

Scott Cowan [00:03:42]:

So you wanted to be an outdoor accountant?

Brian Frahm [00:03:44]:

Well, I figured if I could make good money, I could be a weekend warrior and I could do and. Not that accounts don’t work year round. Right. There is a season for that, and I was kind of hoping maybe. So then I just hit the season, and I can kind of have a lot of money, have the toys, do the fun stuff, and then come back and do the thing and earn some more kind of thing.

Scott Cowan [00:04:08]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:04:08]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:04:09]:

Graduate degree in accounting.

Brian Frahm [00:04:11]:

No.

Scott Cowan [00:04:12]:

Okay, so like a lot of us, you started with accounting, and what. What did you end up with?

Brian Frahm [00:04:19]:

So I have a degree in outdoor recreation and leadership. And. Yeah, it’s a. It’s a bit of a twist. I was doing the business program at the school and I went to. At the time, it was University of Southern Colorado. They’ve changed name since they had the Hassan School of Business. It was really good school, pretty new.

Brian Frahm [00:04:37]:

Was really looking to try to get, you know, pushing people through and get them out in the real world. Right. Like, make a name. And I was like, I’m going to be one of those people. But I ran into this. This gentleman. His name is Jsar, and he was the director of our experiential learning center, which is an outdoor program. And he saw my love for the outdoors, and he said, you know, you can have.

Brian Frahm [00:04:58]:

You can. There’s jobs you can do. Like, there’s a job. There’s all kinds of jobs you can do and be on the outdoors.

Scott Cowan [00:05:05]:

Did he tell you about the Vow of poverty that you were going to.

Brian Frahm [00:05:09]:

Have to say no.

Scott Cowan [00:05:11]:

That was.

Brian Frahm [00:05:12]:

That was a little hidden secret.

Scott Cowan [00:05:13]:

Little later.

Brian Frahm [00:05:16]:

You got to have the hook. Right. You gotta get the.

Scott Cowan [00:05:18]:

You’re in.

Brian Frahm [00:05:18]:

And you’re like, oh, oh, yeah, I’m in.

Scott Cowan [00:05:20]:

Okay. Sold.

Brian Frahm [00:05:22]:

All right.

Scott Cowan [00:05:25]:

So you graduated from college in Colorado. Right out of college. What’d you do?

Brian Frahm [00:05:30]:

All kinds of things. So I worked for Radio Shack. I was. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:05:36]:

I’m noticing a trend that. There is no trend.

Brian Frahm [00:05:38]:

There is no trend.

Scott Cowan [00:05:38]:

Yeah.

Brian Frahm [00:05:39]:

And I mean, I don’t know. The first time I only had one job was when I became a park ranger.

Scott Cowan [00:05:45]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:05:45]:

I’ve always worked multiple jobs, so, you know, I worked at Radio Shack. I was working to be a region manager for Radio Shack. I was night stalking at a box store at that time. And then during the summers, I was taking off and I was working at youth camps in Estes Park, Colorado, and I was kind of all over the place. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:06:07]:

Radio Shack.

Brian Frahm [00:06:08]:

Haven’t heard that in a long time. Yeah. The Tandy Corp. Wow. But I can say anything about it because no one can track it back. I could. I could have said I was a region manager and no one would know.

Scott Cowan [00:06:15]:

No. I remember those days.

Brian Frahm [00:06:18]:

Going to Tandy.

Scott Cowan [00:06:20]:

Well, Tandy. Around here. It was Tandy Leather. They had, like, these leather stores, but. But they kept the Tandy brand kind of hidden from Radio Shack, if you will.

Brian Frahm [00:06:28]:

Yep.

Scott Cowan [00:06:28]:

Anyway, we could go down that rabbit hole of how people were buying capacitors and weird little things off the shelf.

Brian Frahm [00:06:33]:

The greatest.

Scott Cowan [00:06:34]:

Yeah.

Brian Frahm [00:06:35]:

Education you got from AND one. And I. And I owe some of that to Radio Shack. They. The training that you got to be an employee there really fed my. My Jack of all trades. Okay. Because I really loved learning all that little stuff and all those little things.

Brian Frahm [00:06:52]:

I like doing things with my hands. I mean, that’s what you saw me doing.

Scott Cowan [00:06:55]:

So did you. Were you ever a nerd with a soldering iron and did you ever, like, start building this type of stuff or.

Brian Frahm [00:07:03]:

Not so much that I used to build stereo systems in cars. So I installed. Listen to that car boom down the road. That was you. Yeah, that was totally me.

Scott Cowan [00:07:12]:

And you identify that. That was a rockford such and such. Okay. Gotcha.

Brian Frahm [00:07:17]:

All right. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:07:18]:

So you’re still in Colorado, but we’re sitting in Washington. So how long have you been in Washington?

Brian Frahm [00:07:23]:

2006.

Scott Cowan [00:07:24]:

Okay. And what brought you out here?

Brian Frahm [00:07:29]:

My wife was gonna go to school in Cheney, Eastern Washington University. And so I came along. I didn’t have nothing.

Scott Cowan [00:07:40]:

So were you married at that time, yeah. Okay, so you’re married to your wife at that time? O. Yeah. Kind of had to go, didn’t you?

Brian Frahm [00:07:46]:

Yeah. Okay.

Scott Cowan [00:07:47]:

Anyway. Sorry, but to Cheney. So you came out to Cheney area?

Brian Frahm [00:07:51]:

Spokane. Yeah, we ended up in Spokane.

Scott Cowan [00:07:52]:

Spokane. All right. And she went to Eastern. Just out of curiosity, what’d she. What would she go?

Brian Frahm [00:07:57]:

Occupational therapy.

Scott Cowan [00:07:57]:

Occupational therapy. Okay. All right. When did you start working for the Washington State Parks Department?

Brian Frahm [00:08:04]:

2006.

Scott Cowan [00:08:05]:

So when you first got out here. Okay, what was your first job here?

Brian Frahm [00:08:08]:

I was a park. Aiden.

Scott Cowan [00:08:10]:

Okay, so humor me.

Brian Frahm [00:08:13]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:08:15]:

Because there’s this hierarchy. Okay. And for what park were you at first as a park?

Brian Frahm [00:08:22]:

I was at Riverside State park, actually. At the bowl and Pitcher. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:08:25]:

Okay, you’re at bowling. Pitcher. Beautiful.

Brian Frahm [00:08:26]:

Yes.

Scott Cowan [00:08:27]:

Beautiful place.

Brian Frahm [00:08:27]:

Yep.

Scott Cowan [00:08:27]:

Okay, as a parkade, what did they have you do? What was your duties?

Brian Frahm [00:08:33]:

A lot of janitorial, mostly. I did a lot of leaf blowing, which was mostly needles there.

Scott Cowan [00:08:38]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:08:39]:

Raking campsites that year, you know, picking up garbages. We would take. You know, we had. We had a bunch of dumpsters, or we had only one dumpster, but a lot of garbage cans. So it was a lot of physical labor to actually, like, take the. The garbage from each one of those and put them in, you know, up into the dumpster. We had a recycling program up there, so we spent some time there. We didn’t have the Discover Pass at the time, so our booth wasn’t as busy.

Brian Frahm [00:09:04]:

And we spent a lot of our spare time splitting wood income for the park because trees. Right. And we got to do something with that. So we buck them and split them, and we’d actually split and wrap wood so we could resell it later. So we did some of that to help with some of the income for the park.

Scott Cowan [00:09:19]:

Okay, interesting. So I’m noticing this Jack of all Trades thing. Okay, so you. I have lots of questions, but how long were you a parkade?

Brian Frahm [00:09:30]:

So I did three year. Well, two years as a parkade. My second year, I came back, they actually had what they called as a CRS Parkade. Um, and that. Literally sitting in a contact station, registering campers, doing the Discover Path stuff. I didn’t do much. There was a bathroom in there, so I took care of that one. Occasionally, I took care of the campground and campground bathrooms.

Brian Frahm [00:09:49]:

And there wasn’t someone there or someone called in sick or something, but really my job was to sit in the booth.

Scott Cowan [00:09:53]:

So you graduated up, if you will.

Brian Frahm [00:09:56]:

It was not nearly as good, was.

Scott Cowan [00:09:58]:

It a lateral move?

Brian Frahm [00:09:59]:

Well, you’re literally like Sitting in a booth all day long, if someone who likes to be outdoors like that’s drive you crazy.

Scott Cowan [00:10:06]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:10:07]:

A lot of customer service, which is great. That’s, I mean, Radio Shack, let’s talk customer service. Right? So yeah, there was a lot of customer, but the, the third year I came back as, as a senior park aid and was interviewing for park ranger positions at that point.

Scott Cowan [00:10:25]:

So are these parkade positions seasonal work? Are they year round or does it depend on the park?

Brian Frahm [00:10:31]:

Well, yeah, it really does depend on the park. East side of the state, most of our campgrounds, most of our day use areas, our usage decreases drastically because of the temperatures. And depending on where your location is, you’ve got a Mount Spokane where it actually increases or you know, Lake Wenatchee or an Easton. Right, those, they all bump up a little bit. But you know, you’re looking at like this park, Alta Lake, Bridgeport, Curlew, you know, Lewis and Clark, some of these east, they, it’s going to die off because there’s, there’s nothing, there’s not a recreational opportunity that people are coming for, in particular for.

Scott Cowan [00:11:03]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:11:03]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:11:03]:

All right, so then you, you, you interviewed to be a park ranger. We know that that turned out successful for you.

Brian Frahm [00:11:10]:

Yeah, yeah. After getting laid off and coming back. And laid off came back. It was, it was the, it was the 2000, it was the great recession. Okay, yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:11:17]:

So you became a park ranger. Now that’s full time. Right. When you hit, when you hit the level of park ranger.

Brian Frahm [00:11:22]:

Park ranger two.

Scott Cowan [00:11:24]:

Park ranger two, yeah. Okay, so did you, did you become what, park ranger one or no?

Brian Frahm [00:11:33]:

Well, yes and no. It’s changed a little bit. So Park Ranger 1 used to be a park ranger in training. Okay. And that was while you were waiting to get through the police academy or the park academy at the time.

Scott Cowan [00:11:43]:

So. All right, so for clarity, park rangers, when you have a job title, your sleeve says park ranger.

Brian Frahm [00:11:51]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:11:52]:

Somebody else who walks by might say.

Brian Frahm [00:11:53]:

Parkade or they’re gonna be dressed pretty differently. But you might have someone that says interpreter.

Scott Cowan [00:11:59]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:11:59]:

Look very similar.

Scott Cowan [00:12:01]:

But you as a park ranger, you’ve gone through Washington State Patrol training.

Brian Frahm [00:12:05]:

I went through the law enforcement training. State patrol is different than our, than the basic law enforcement training.

Scott Cowan [00:12:09]:

Okay, so you went through law enforcement training.

Brian Frahm [00:12:11]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:12:12]:

How long did that take?

Brian Frahm [00:12:13]:

It’s 18 weeks.

Scott Cowan [00:12:14]:

18 weeks?

Brian Frahm [00:12:15]:

Yep.

Scott Cowan [00:12:15]:

Okay, so you are a authorized and licensed law officer of the state. Of the state. And I’m not gonna make a joke about you’re the sheriff walking around, but not. I am. Yeah. All right. So 18 weeks.

Brian Frahm [00:12:31]:

You.

Scott Cowan [00:12:31]:

You complete that training, we could probably spend a whole episode talking about what?

Brian Frahm [00:12:35]:

That. Oh, yeah, well, I’m a trainer, so.

Scott Cowan [00:12:37]:

Yeah. Okay. So we could completely talk about all that’d be kind of fun, but maybe another time. Yeah. And then where were you first assigned as a park ranger?

Brian Frahm [00:12:44]:

Riverside State Park Ranger.

Scott Cowan [00:12:45]:

Riverside State Park Ranger. Okay. And how long as a park ranger were you there?

Brian Frahm [00:12:52]:

I left in 2018.

Scott Cowan [00:12:56]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:12:56]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:12:57]:

And then you went to Lake Chelan.

Brian Frahm [00:12:59]:

Well, yeah. Lake Chelan State Park.

Scott Cowan [00:13:00]:

Did you. So, okay, now, you oversee these other parks. So when you first came here, were you just assigned to Lake Chelan or did you come here in the capacity to oversee the other parks?

Brian Frahm [00:13:11]:

Also kind of a blurry subject, that one. So at the time we were. They were split still. There was a. There was a manager here at Lake Chelan, 25 Mile Creek State Park. Okay. There was another manager who had Alta Lake and Bridgeport.

Scott Cowan [00:13:22]:

Got it.

Brian Frahm [00:13:24]:

They were kind of waiting. They were going to. They needed to combine the area. Right. To make an area. And so they were. They wait for attrition for that. They’re not going to be like, hey, you don’t have a job anymore.

Brian Frahm [00:13:33]:

Someone else in. Right. So they’re waiting for some attrition. He retired out, and that’s where I came in. And then that also gave us some. Because we now have this money from another manager, we were able to actually use that quite well. And we have some maintenance staff from that. We’ve got some additional rangers from that.

Brian Frahm [00:13:50]:

All kinds of stuff. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:13:52]:

All right.

Brian Frahm [00:13:55]:

All right.

Scott Cowan [00:13:55]:

To kind of recap so I can formulate. So in a perfect world, I’m making air quotes. You like to visit each of your parks once a week at least. Yeah, at least once a week. Now, if there was a situation, sure. Let’s say Bridgeport. There’s park ranger there, though. Correct.

Scott Cowan [00:14:16]:

Is there park ranger at Bridgeport there?

Brian Frahm [00:14:19]:

So all of our parks have a park ranger assigned to them.

Scott Cowan [00:14:23]:

So.

Brian Frahm [00:14:24]:

But they could be a ranger one. So depending on the incident. Okay. They may or may not be able to respond. Some of them may be reserve and observe and report kind of thing. And wait for us.

Scott Cowan [00:14:35]:

All right, so let’s say there’s an incident that is an unfortunate incident. What, you know, whatever unruly guest who’s, you know, threatening people loudly and verbally.

Brian Frahm [00:14:47]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:14:48]:

Do they call you and bring you over? Do you have to, like, get in your truck and. And drive to. We’ll say pick on Bridgeport. It’s gonna be. Bridgeport’s gonna be the trouble.

Brian Frahm [00:14:57]:

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:14:58]:

But do you. I mean, are you doing that or at what level do you get called back into these parks?

Brian Frahm [00:15:03]:

Yeah. So, yes, I would be called for that. But again, depending on the level of that, say. I don’t know, say it’s someone they’ve talked to multiple times for. They’re not paying their fees. Right. But they’re camping there. They’re just not paying.

Brian Frahm [00:15:17]:

They’re not causing a problem, whatever.

Scott Cowan [00:15:19]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:15:20]:

But we still need to get payment from them. That person can’t. Has no enforcement action necessarily, except for trying to educate this person, which is really what we want to do in. That’s really in base even. I’m gonna go in there and try to educate people.

Scott Cowan [00:15:34]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:15:35]:

But, yeah, I might. I might get called over for something. Like, if it was someone, like, threatening people, it’s gonna be a bigger call. I will be called for that. But I. I’m an hour. Right. Even if I’m right.

Brian Frahm [00:15:45]:

Driving, like, code or something, which, again. Well, that’s. There’s some caveats that. Right. It might make more sense for a county officer or, like, someone to show up.

Scott Cowan [00:15:56]:

County offers. County officers do have authority, then.

Brian Frahm [00:16:01]:

Oh, yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:16:01]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:16:01]:

Yep.

Scott Cowan [00:16:02]:

Do you have to invite them on or can they. I guess. I mean. So I’m just looking around the park here, and there’s this camper over there. And they look kind of shifty. No, they don’t. And next to them is this really, really nice Mercedes Sprinter that’s, you know, $300,000. And they’re from Kirkland.

Scott Cowan [00:16:23]:

And they’re. They’re being annoyed if they call. If those people. I’m making all this up. If they called 911, go to chelan County Sheriff, would the sheriff respond to that, or would they ping you and say you deal with it?

Brian Frahm [00:16:38]:

The easy answer is yes. Okay. Because they’ll put a radio call out for that. Okay. And they’ll also. So if I’m on the radio, I’ll hear that. I’ll be like, hey, I’m here. I’ll take care of this and call off whatever.

Brian Frahm [00:16:51]:

Or, hey, standby. I’ll let you know if I need someone else. Whatever.

Scott Cowan [00:16:54]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:16:56]:

But they also have my cell phone number. And so if I didn’t answer that and they knew that it was coming here, they have. We have multiple rangers on a list, and they’ll kind of call down that list.

Scott Cowan [00:17:03]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:17:03]:

They’re not waiting. They’re not waiting for one of us to answer that phone to potentially send an officer, if that makes sense.

Scott Cowan [00:17:09]:

Yeah. I was just Always a little curious about whether these parks were. I mean, we say state Washington and Chelan county does. Okay. So I was just. That was curious. Thank you for that.

Brian Frahm [00:17:20]:

I mean, State Patrol could show up, too.

Scott Cowan [00:17:21]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:17:21]:

But it just doesn’t. I mean, 97, they’re not on 971 much. Right. So.

Scott Cowan [00:17:26]:

Yeah, they’re always on 97.

Brian Frahm [00:17:27]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:17:27]:

Trust me, I know they’re on 97. Yes. Oh, do I know. Okay, well, let’s talk about this part.

Brian Frahm [00:17:37]:

Sure.

Scott Cowan [00:17:38]:

During summer, it’s never very busy here. Right?

Brian Frahm [00:17:42]:

Right. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:17:43]:

It’s standing room. I mean, it’s close to full capacity every night, right?

Brian Frahm [00:17:48]:

Yeah, yeah, it really is.

Scott Cowan [00:17:49]:

And you mentioned something in passing. I think you tried to slip it past me. And what he was. We have a thousand people a day here.

Brian Frahm [00:17:58]:

A night.

Scott Cowan [00:17:58]:

A night. Yeah. And I kind of did a double take. So when does that. I’ll call it peak. When does that. When does. What is the peak season here?

Brian Frahm [00:18:12]:

September 15th. We closed on half the campground.

Scott Cowan [00:18:15]:

Okay. Because when do you open it up again?

Brian Frahm [00:18:20]:

So it’s a little bit on the weather, but really around April 15th is when we really need to.

Scott Cowan [00:18:25]:

And when does it start? Really ran. I know. Weather. But when did. Probably June 15th. Are you firing on all cylinders here?

Brian Frahm [00:18:32]:

Yeah. So I always like it. Memorial Day is really great for us. Most of our staff is on at that point, and they get this, like, window into the world of what this park is going to, the chaos that’s going to happen here.

Scott Cowan [00:18:42]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:18:42]:

And they go, oh, wow. Okay. Because literally the day before that, Thursday, it’s peaceful.

Scott Cowan [00:18:49]:

Sleepy.

Brian Frahm [00:18:49]:

It’s pretty peaceful. We’re busy. Nicely busy. Right. But that Memorial Day weekend, it’s. I don’t. It’s not even standing room only because we. We are literally turning people around.

Scott Cowan [00:19:01]:

So with the. The retail comparison of this being somebody starting at Radio Shack back in the day on Black Friday. Yeah, yeah.

Brian Frahm [00:19:09]:

Every weekend is Black Friday here.

Scott Cowan [00:19:10]:

Welcome. Okay, so how many camp spots are here?

Brian Frahm [00:19:14]:

There is now 134.

Scott Cowan [00:19:16]:

And you have a thousand people a night.

Brian Frahm [00:19:19]:

Roughly. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:19:20]:

So how do you.

Brian Frahm [00:19:21]:

So we get. We have hiker biker spots that we have that we fill on a regular.

Scott Cowan [00:19:24]:

Base, and that doesn’t count to the 134. Correct. Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:19:27]:

Yeah. Because they’re separate. So state parks, if you come in on a, you know, if you’re biking through somewhere, right. We’re not going to be like, hey, we don’t have room for you. You got to move on. It’s not really safe for that, so most parks will have a place to put someone who’s on a pedal bike.

Scott Cowan [00:19:41]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:19:42]:

Some parks are close to hiking through trails.

Scott Cowan [00:19:45]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:19:46]:

And so they have, we call them hiker, biker because there’s places where it may make sense that it might be a hiker vers a biker. So a lot of, a lot of state parks will actually have those. So we, we, we fill those on a regular basis.

Scott Cowan [00:19:57]:

All right.

Brian Frahm [00:19:58]:

Here.

Scott Cowan [00:19:58]:

So weekends, thousand people a night. How’s the, how’s the weekdays? During the summer do you drop down to like 700 a night?

Brian Frahm [00:20:06]:

Yeah, we, we probably, yeah, we’re probably closer to seven to 800 a night. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:20:13]:

Okay. How about Alta Lake? That has, Does Elta have more spots, camping spots?

Brian Frahm [00:20:19]:

It doesn’t. It has 124. So it’s 10 less.

Scott Cowan [00:20:22]:

Okay. And are they about the same? Are they 900 people a night?

Brian Frahm [00:20:25]:

They’re pretty, I mean, yeah, they’re similar. When you look at they. It’s changed. They, they are more full now in the more recent years than in years past. But yeah, they’re pretty, pretty full.

Scott Cowan [00:20:41]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:20:41]:

And Bridgeport is kind of our sleeper. Regularly has what will have a spot or really available. But it’s 36 spots. Right.

Scott Cowan [00:20:52]:

Is that all? Yeah, because when I drove through there, it seemed. I’m not, I’m not, I don’t, it’s not that I’m quite. Yeah, no, you’re wrong. But it’s like really, I would have guessed more. Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:21:02]:

And then what about 25 mile also 36 spots. Okay. It is, it is more full now. When I got here, there were 64 and we half the amount of spots there.

Scott Cowan [00:21:14]:

Why?

Brian Frahm [00:21:15]:

The biggest complex complaint was I couldn’t find my spot. It’s too loud. The people were camping right on top of me. Okay. All of those things that we don’t want in state parks.

Scott Cowan [00:21:25]:

Okay. Do you need to check that? He’s pulling out multiple phones here, folks.

Brian Frahm [00:21:29]:

It’s just, it’s an Amber Alert that went out.

Scott Cowan [00:21:32]:

So. Okay, are we.

Brian Frahm [00:21:33]:

Yeah, we’re good.

Scott Cowan [00:21:34]:

We’ll keep moving forward. All right. All these parks, how far out are people reserving? Okay. The look on his face with this one, this one, this one, I think I heard him. How far out are people reserving here?

Brian Frahm [00:21:47]:

It’s nine months in advance.

Scott Cowan [00:21:49]:

It’s crazy.

Brian Frahm [00:21:50]:

Yeah. And the, you know, so example, 4th of July, October 4th, you got to have your reservation by October 4th for the 4th of July. And that whole week I got on at seven o’ clock in the morning and they were all full already. And I don’t know. I mean, because. So it’s. It’s the start of your trip. Right.

Brian Frahm [00:22:10]:

So if you waited till. If you’re. If you wanted to come on July 4th.

Scott Cowan [00:22:14]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:22:15]:

But everyone else here was coming on the 2nd or the 3rd, and we’re staying for five days.

Scott Cowan [00:22:19]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:22:20]:

They’re all they’re going to be because they were able. October 1st or 2nd, they were able to make that reservation.

Scott Cowan [00:22:25]:

Jump. Jump you in the line, if you will. I see your point. How many days can I reserve when I’m online?

Brian Frahm [00:22:33]:

You can reserve for 10.

Scott Cowan [00:22:35]:

10.

Brian Frahm [00:22:35]:

And you can only stay in state parks for 10 days. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:22:38]:

And why is that?

Brian Frahm [00:22:39]:

Well, it’s give people the opportunity to come to the parks. Right. It’s also prevent people from living in the parks.

Scott Cowan [00:22:45]:

So could I stay 10 days here and then go 10 days up at 25 mile?

Brian Frahm [00:22:50]:

You could. You will get to a limit. And that whack just changed. I’m sorry, I’m not gonna be able to quote it, but there is a limit to how many days you can stay in state parks.

Scott Cowan [00:22:58]:

Oh, there is. So there is. There is a whack.

Brian Frahm [00:23:01]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:23:01]:

Interesting. Didn’t know about that. Okay, interesting. Okay. So people are booking and I’ve heard the nine months complaint, we’ll call it that. I think people, because like, to me, I go, I don’t know what I’m doing July 4th in October. Yeah. So to me, it would be.

Scott Cowan [00:23:17]:

I would be frustrated. But that’s. I see. But I think that’s maybe the most common complaint I hear from visitors to the park is. Or not this park, but state park.

Brian Frahm [00:23:28]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:23:29]:

Is. It’s so hard to get a spot sometimes. But what I’m learning is I’m talking to more and more people that work in the parks. You just said Bridgeport’s a sleeper. There are other parks and we’re not going to talk about them today, but there are other parks that are available to people. They might not be on the lake here, like Lake Chelan, but that doesn’t mean that they’re not really an enjoyable place to spend some time. Right. Okay.

Scott Cowan [00:23:56]:

All right. Well, we have gone way off. We’re just. We’ve gone way off. And that’s what you’re here for.

Brian Frahm [00:24:05]:

You’re here to anchor. Anchor us back in.

Scott Cowan [00:24:08]:

Well, let’s talk your entire career. I’m gonna. I’m gonna. You kind of know this question’s coming.

Brian Frahm [00:24:14]:

Yep.

Scott Cowan [00:24:14]:

But I’m gonna throw you under the bus and broaden it your entire career from Being a parkade to today. You got any interesting stories about your experiences at the park? You mentioned something that happened here.

Brian Frahm [00:24:31]:

Yeah, yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:24:32]:

But do you have any, like, at any of the other parks? I mean.

Brian Frahm [00:24:34]:

Oh, we could do a whole podcast on.

Scott Cowan [00:24:38]:

So give me an example. Give me an example of something that happened or that you experienced while you were at Riverside.

Brian Frahm [00:24:44]:

Oh, well, probably the one that I’m most well known for. There’s actually a YouTube so happy where William Farrell. Right? The happy song.

Scott Cowan [00:24:59]:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, right.

Brian Frahm [00:25:01]:

He came out. What was that?

Scott Cowan [00:25:04]:

Thanks for putting that back in my ear.

Brian Frahm [00:25:05]:

Yeah, yeah, you’re welcome.

Scott Cowan [00:25:06]:

Thanks a lot.

Brian Frahm [00:25:07]:

There’s actually a YouTube video of myself and my other. My fellow park rangers at Riverside. The foundation there, our friends group, which we could do a whole thing on friends groups too, because I think they’re so important and do such great things. They were looking to try to get some grant money and Farrell was willing to pay some money to different people who were able to get so many views for their dancing videos on YouTube.

Scott Cowan [00:25:36]:

But what.

Brian Frahm [00:25:36]:

I don’t know all the ins and outs of it, but they basically said, hey, you guys need to go out and. And with this film crew from the foundation, and you guys are gonna go dance to this. This.

Scott Cowan [00:25:48]:

And this is on YouTube.

Brian Frahm [00:25:49]:

Yes, on YouTube.

Scott Cowan [00:25:50]:

Well, it’ll be attached to the show. Thanks for sharing that one.

Brian Frahm [00:25:52]:

14, 000 acres of happy is what it is.

Scott Cowan [00:25:54]:

Oh, my gosh.

Brian Frahm [00:25:55]:

All right, all right.

Scott Cowan [00:25:56]:

So how about here or at Alta or Bridgeport or 25 Mile? Anything? Any.

Brian Frahm [00:26:03]:

Yeah, you know, it was just a couple years ago. So we do get snow here, but we do have a restroom that remains open. The campground remains open, and so we have to clear it with snow. I don’t remember. It may have been a January or February. There really wasn’t anybody here, but I was out chipping the ice away from the walk path.

Scott Cowan [00:26:22]:

Leaf boy, man. That’s what you told. Let’s be honest.

Brian Frahm [00:26:25]:

I’m over here at this bathroom over here, the Little Bear Trail, which is a wonderful trail. The people who designed it, the rangers who were involved in that, did an amazing job. If you haven’t been on it, I recommend it. But I’m over there. The trail goes just to the side of the bathroom there. And I was scraping and I’m crunching this ice and I’m getting off the sidewalk and I just. I don’t know why, but I like the hair kind of stood up on my neck. And so I looked up and there is.

Brian Frahm [00:26:51]:

And I know because I Was close enough. A mountain lion tomcat that probably within 15ft of me.

Scott Cowan [00:27:00]:

That’s way too close.

Brian Frahm [00:27:01]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:27:03]:

Oh, so what we’re. Obviously, we know you successfully. You removed yourself from the situation. But what. What happened?

Brian Frahm [00:27:10]:

So really I was like, I’m trapped in a corner because I’m in a partition. Right. So I was like, well, I’ll just step into this bathroom and wait for it to leave. So I back into the bathroom, and once I get in there, I realized I can’t see out of the bathroom. So I don’t ever know where this thing has gone.

Scott Cowan [00:27:28]:

Sorry. Yeah.

Brian Frahm [00:27:30]:

So, you know, I just. I kind of peek my way out and I just start, like, kind of peeking around the corners and looking in the trees. And I kept looking and kind of got myself out into the open space. So I wasn’t trapped, you know, in the corner anymore. And then went back to where I’d seen it. Just because I’m curious. Looked at the footprints and I could see where it went. And follow the footprints up the hill a little ways.

Brian Frahm [00:27:53]:

Just because I’m curious.

Scott Cowan [00:27:55]:

The story we’re telling ourselves is it was just afraid of you as you were of it.

Brian Frahm [00:27:58]:

Yeah, it’s exactly right. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:28:00]:

You mentioned another story about a boat. Yeah.

Brian Frahm [00:28:05]:

Yeah. So it was last year, and I was working night shift. I was just on my nighttime rounds and heard this pop. And it kind of sounded like fireworks. Gosh. I think it was mid August. But it doesn’t mean that people aren’t shooting fireworks around. We have the orchards also that shoot off things occasionally scare, you know, birds away.

Brian Frahm [00:28:26]:

So I didn’t pay it. It was a little different, but I didn’t really pay a lot of attention to it. Cause it just didn’t sound. It wasn’t like it was a gunshot or something. So it wasn’t overly worried. I was like, if they’re fireworks, we’re gonna get another one soon. But then all of a sudden, I heard this bang. And I was like, that is not a firework.

Brian Frahm [00:28:43]:

And the radio exploded. I had a parkade down here. And he’s like, there’s a boat burning my phone. The concessionaire is calling me. I have campers running over there waving their arms. And there’s like this. People are, like, streaming out of their campsites and heading down towards the day use area. And it was lucky.

Brian Frahm [00:29:02]:

Where was a boat? All five occupants were able to get off the boat and uninjured.

Scott Cowan [00:29:07]:

Do we know why it blew up? Yeah.

Brian Frahm [00:29:09]:

So if you have a boat, you need to make sure that you’re, it was a, the fuel tank is down underneath. Right. Blowers that suck the fumes because they’re heavy right out of the bottom of the boat.

Scott Cowan [00:29:22]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:29:22]:

So that they don’t, they don’t have.

Scott Cowan [00:29:24]:

So, so the boat doesn’t blow up.

Brian Frahm [00:29:26]:

Yeah, so the boat doesn’t blow up. And during ignition, either the fans weren’t blowing again at that point. They’re not going to know, or they started too quick and didn’t allow for them to blow a little bit. But they’d been sitting for some time out in the sun.

Scott Cowan [00:29:39]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:29:40]:

You know, so the heat, the gas, you know, was, was slowly vaporizing into that, into that lower, lower of the lower part of the boat, basically. And it was to the ignition and then it, yeah, it lit the, lit the fumes on fire.

Scott Cowan [00:29:52]:

All right, I’ll let you get off track. Right. I, I, it’s my responsibility. You moved out here because your wife went to school in Cheney.

Brian Frahm [00:30:04]:

Yep.

Scott Cowan [00:30:06]:

What, besides needing a job? That’s the, that’s the simple answer. You can’t, I’m not going to let you just say, oh, I need a job. Yeah. But what made you decide to apply to work in the state parks?

Brian Frahm [00:30:19]:

Yeah, so I actually had, when I was in Esses Park, I was working for a camp up there and they had a national park ranger, name was Barry Sweet. He would come in and give talks to the kids because we were, the camp would do five day backpacks through the national park. And so part of their thing was let’s have him make connection with, you know, the staff out there.

Scott Cowan [00:30:39]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:30:40]:

And this, he just did a wonderful job. And I seen him a couple times and we started talking and again, I was trying to get on as a director at a park somewhere. That one would have been great wherever. But things weren’t working out and so I’m putting feelers out. I was like, hey man, you know what? This is my background. Would I be able to get into something like that? He’s like, probably not in Colorado right away. A lot of people come to Colorado. A lot of people come to Rocky Mountain national park after having been a ranger for a while.

Brian Frahm [00:31:06]:

My recommendation is to go somewhere else and do this, blah, blah. So my wife and I are working at the camp camp. And he comes in again. I said, hey, we’re moving to Washington. That, you know, it was really nice to meet you. Thank you for all. He’s like, hey, my old partner, his name is Jack Hart. He is one of the hiring managers at in Washington State Parks Let me.

Brian Frahm [00:31:31]:

Let me give him your information and you guys can touch base.

Scott Cowan [00:31:34]:

There you go.

Brian Frahm [00:31:35]:

So it was kind of one of those, like, hey, you’re moving out there. We like you. And let me see if I can. If I can. If I can get.

Scott Cowan [00:31:42]:

The rest is history.

Brian Frahm [00:31:42]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:31:43]:

And you’ve worked your way here.

Brian Frahm [00:31:44]:

Yeah, yeah. All right.

Scott Cowan [00:31:47]:

Let’S talk about your career for just a second and then we’ll. So, park ranger three. I know there’s a park ranger four.

Brian Frahm [00:31:53]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:31:57]:

Putting you on the spot. I’m going to let you say you don’t want to answer this question. Do you want to be a Park Ranger 4? Yeah. Okay. You want to be. So listen, hiring manager, Washington State Parks. Listen here. No, I’m just kidding.

Scott Cowan [00:32:07]:

Kidding. What’s it take? What’s the requirements? Is there an educational requirement to be a park ranger? For what do you have to do? What’s the state looking for that next level of ranger? Do you know?

Brian Frahm [00:32:22]:

Yeah, sure. Well, as you get higher in, Becomes managerial, becomes administrative. Not entirely. You know, occasionally used to, you know, your time outside ends up kind of getting less. Yeah. Dwindling. Um, and so really, you know, looking at what kind of soft skills you’re. You have looking at.

Brian Frahm [00:32:50]:

Do you understand? Can you take a team, right. Group of people who. A majority of our team is seasonal. We have nine. We have nine year round in our area. So for all four parks, nine individuals who are on year round.

Scott Cowan [00:33:06]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:33:06]:

So the rest of those are all seasonal.

Scott Cowan [00:33:09]:

And let me ask you this. Four parks during the busy season, because it’s all the same busy season. How many people are working in those four parks?

Brian Frahm [00:33:18]:

All together?

Scott Cowan [00:33:19]:

Yeah, all together.

Brian Frahm [00:33:21]:

I think we have 36. 36.

Scott Cowan [00:33:24]:

So that’s a big. A big jump.

Brian Frahm [00:33:27]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:33:29]:

Not that you’re gonna know the answer to this question, but how many of them come back for more than a season?

Brian Frahm [00:33:35]:

It varies. Every year it varies. Right.

Scott Cowan [00:33:40]:

But let me ask you this. From 24 to 25 for this year, how many. How many came back for the 25 season? Approximately.

Brian Frahm [00:33:49]:

Yeah, yeah. So I think we had six who started the year coming back from us. We ended up taking a couple from another area who. They wanted to have an experience at a different park area. So that’s why they weren’t bad there and they were welcome back, but they were like, I want to see something else. Right.

Scott Cowan [00:34:08]:

I was on the west side of the state. I want to come and check out Central Washington. Okay, cool. All right. So if you became a Park Ranger 4, how many do you oversee more parks? At that point, I mean, you’re overseeing. You got four. Now, does a park ranger four oversee four of you, let’s say, or no.

Brian Frahm [00:34:33]:

So, like, my boss and our area’s. All areas are set up a little bit differently. The hierarchies can change. That’s what the forest get an opportunity to do. They can kind of change that a little bit. Okay. They can guide that how they want. That’s part of that moving that team forward.

Scott Cowan [00:34:45]:

Gotcha.

Brian Frahm [00:34:47]:

But my boss oversees the same parks, but she additionally has all of our maintenance stuff. So I oversee, like, daily operations, our seasonal park aids, and our rangers. Okay. We also have a whole maintenance wing, and we have an administrative portion, and she oversees that as well. So she’s got budgets. She’s got the whole. The whole thing in there, whereas the budgets. It’s not that I don’t know that I don’t care because I actually.

Brian Frahm [00:35:14]:

I’m kind of a geek when it comes to those things, but it’s not part of my daily thing that I do.

Scott Cowan [00:35:20]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:35:21]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:35:21]:

And where is she based out of?

Brian Frahm [00:35:23]:

Alta Lake.

Scott Cowan [00:35:23]:

Oh, she’s out of Alta.

Brian Frahm [00:35:24]:

Yeah. That’s the headquarters for the Central Lakes area.

Scott Cowan [00:35:26]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:35:27]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:35:27]:

All right. Very cool. You live here in Lake Chelan. And I’m just pointing randomly. Like I keep, you know, this is not visual by pointing. You have a family?

Brian Frahm [00:35:38]:

Yes.

Scott Cowan [00:35:39]:

You have kids?

Brian Frahm [00:35:40]:

Yes, I do.

Scott Cowan [00:35:41]:

And they live next to this really beautiful park.

Brian Frahm [00:35:43]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:35:44]:

Don’t tell me they’re inside playing video games right now.

Brian Frahm [00:35:46]:

Well, they’re at school right now.

Scott Cowan [00:35:47]:

Okay. But when they come home, they’re not.

Brian Frahm [00:35:50]:

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:35:53]:

Do they like living here?

Brian Frahm [00:35:54]:

Yeah, they. They’ll season with it when there’s a thousand people here. And we have, you know, in this green grassy space, we’ll have 10 to 12 volleyball courts set up that people have brought. There’s not a lot of place that they’re not, like, coming out to the play structure where they have, you know, 30 other kids playing. So there’s a little bit of that. We’ll go down and swim occasionally at the beach, but a lot of times during the summer, we actually end up going into town or somewhere else to kind of recreate. But yeah, the shoulder seasons, the winter, when it’s not busy, one of the roadways usually ends up becoming our. Our.

Brian Frahm [00:36:30]:

Our sled area. And we just, like, sled down through the day use area. It’s.

Scott Cowan [00:36:33]:

It’s.

Brian Frahm [00:36:33]:

It’s great time.

Scott Cowan [00:36:34]:

That’s pretty cool.

Brian Frahm [00:36:35]:

All right.

Scott Cowan [00:36:36]:

And so they do, overall, they kind of.

Brian Frahm [00:36:38]:

Oh, yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:36:38]:

Appreciate It.

Brian Frahm [00:36:39]:

Yeah. Y.

Scott Cowan [00:36:40]:

Okay. Yeah.

Brian Frahm [00:36:42]:

20 was great. 127 acres of nothing.

Scott Cowan [00:36:46]:

Silence. Yeah. So if we put your kids on the spot, where would they want you.

Brian Frahm [00:36:50]:

To be a park ranger at, do you think?

Scott Cowan [00:36:52]:

Oh.

Brian Frahm [00:36:54]:

They like sameness. So they would say here, probably. Yeah. I don’t. And all their friends are here, so they would probably still end up saying. Yeah, I don’t know that they would.

Scott Cowan [00:37:05]:

What about your wife? Does she like. Does she like the central Washington? I mean, to me, what little I’ve been in Colorado, this seems similar enough to what I’ve seen in Colorado. Yeah. So it’s not like you were in Death Valley.

Brian Frahm [00:37:18]:

Right.

Scott Cowan [00:37:19]:

So does she like being here?

Brian Frahm [00:37:21]:

Yeah. Washington as a whole is a darker state, and she likes sunshine. So if she had, I mean, we’d probably be in Arizona or somewhere more south. She likes the warmth and the sunshine, and Washington doesn’t. Even though we’re on the east side, the sunny state.

Scott Cowan [00:37:41]:

Yeah, it’s a little. It’s a little. Let’s be honest, it’s a little dreary today.

Brian Frahm [00:37:44]:

Okay. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:37:45]:

Yeah. All right. I’m going to ask you to draw from the four parks this question. What do you see visitors consistently forget to bring. That they should be bringing? Do people like, is there a consistent thing like, oh, I forgot my tent? I mean, that would be really bad. But, you know, is it. Is there. Is there, in your opinion, are there things that people should bring with them to enhance their.

Scott Cowan [00:38:13]:

Their stay at one of these parks?

Brian Frahm [00:38:16]:

Yeah, you know, because we’re in central Washington, that we’re in a high fire area, and our fire. Our fire bands are. Seem to be coming earlier and earlier and longer. Yeah. And I think the thing that people miss is, is the fire pits. And we allow propane through most of those fire bands. If it’s extreme, we don’t. There’s no flames.

Brian Frahm [00:38:38]:

Right. But we allow those as propane fire pits.

Scott Cowan [00:38:41]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:38:42]:

And I think that. And I don’t want to take away from our concessions. Our concessions have an opportunity to do that, but they don’t have a, you know, 134 fire pits that they can offer. Right. So, yeah, you know, a good investment in a nice propane fire pit. And I know marshmallows aren’t quite the same over the propane, but there’s ways to do it. Take a waffle cone and you strub it with marshmallows and a little bit of chocolate in there. You wrap it in aluminum foil and you take your hamburger tongs or your, you know, the tong.

Brian Frahm [00:39:10]:

And you just kind of rotate it on actually, the. And then you pull it out. You actually have a waffle cone with melted marshmallow and chocolate in there. It’s a good way to go.

Scott Cowan [00:39:20]:

All right. I never, ever heard of that. All right. You said concessions. Yeah. When. When do the concessions open? They’re not. They’re not running right now, but so typically, when do they open?

Brian Frahm [00:39:36]:

So Memorial Day. They’re supposed to be open from Memorial Day to Labor Day, Memorial Day to Labor Day.

Scott Cowan [00:39:40]:

Okay. And at your concessions here, what do they carry typically?

Brian Frahm [00:39:47]:

So this one here will have, you know, sodas, they make coffees, they have ice cream. It’s actually called paninis in the park is what the concessionaire is calling themselves. And so they’re. Pesto is really good if you haven’t had it, that they’re. Yeah. So if you come get the turkey pesto panini, it’s really good. Not that the other ones are bad, but that one is my favorite. And I’m starting to think, you know, sodas, they have some candies, but they also have inflatables.

Brian Frahm [00:40:20]:

So they do. You know, they have, like, the inner tube inflatables for the swim beach down here and some things like that. Nothing. I don’t think they have anything that. That’s big, but they’ll have some of those smaller ones and a little air compressor out there that you can blow them up with and things like that.

Scott Cowan [00:40:34]:

Do. Does 25 mile have a concession?

Brian Frahm [00:40:37]:

They do, yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:40:38]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:40:39]:

He offers quite a bit more. He actually has a liquor license up there. And because it’s the last stop before they can get up to the forest service docks and up to Stahekan, which is the small town at the end of the lake. There we are the last stop. So he actually offers gas. You can buy a loaf of bread. You can buy eggs from him.

Scott Cowan [00:40:55]:

Really?

Brian Frahm [00:40:56]:

Yeah. He has some beer that you can buy from him. But sodas, coffees, same other stuff. But we don’t have, like, a swim beach there, so it doesn’t do a lot of that. But you can rent paddle boards. But if you’re not familiar with this lake, they’re. They’re completely different air. Like, they’re the same lake, but they’re different lakes.

Scott Cowan [00:41:15]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:41:16]:

You get up for 25 Mile Creek, and you can have huge crests. We have a seawall in front of our marina up there because the waves just get ginormous. We just don’t see that. That down here as much.

Scott Cowan [00:41:26]:

What about Alta and Bridgeport do they have concessions?

Brian Frahm [00:41:28]:

Yeah. So Alta Lake has a concession similar. They have a little walk in area where you can get ice cream. Again, some of those other things right at their swim beach. Firewood. At both, actually, all of them. They do firewood, ice, those types of stuff. Trying to think if there’s something special specifically.

Brian Frahm [00:41:45]:

Oh, he does like. He does like little pizzas at his. So you can get a little pizza at that one. Bridgeport is the only one we don’t have a concession at. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:41:54]:

You know, that’s. Bridgeport’s got a great view of Columbia. Yes, it really does have a great view of Columbia. And now I know Alta Lake’s right next to the golf course.

Brian Frahm [00:42:03]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:42:04]:

But if you’re a golfer and I’m not. But Bridgeport’s so close to Gamble Sands.

Brian Frahm [00:42:09]:

Yes.

Scott Cowan [00:42:09]:

Have you seen Gamble Sands?

Brian Frahm [00:42:11]:

I have, yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:42:12]:

Are you a golfer?

Brian Frahm [00:42:12]:

I am not a golfer, but you gotta go. You gotta at least go through it. Because everyone talks about it.

Scott Cowan [00:42:17]:

It’s out of this world. I mean, it doesn’t belong there. And I mean that in a good way. Like, I’m not saying it doesn’t belong there. Like they should take it out. No. It’s unearthly looking.

Brian Frahm [00:42:29]:

Yes. Just almost like an oasis.

Scott Cowan [00:42:31]:

And.

Brian Frahm [00:42:31]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:42:32]:

And it’s so like if. Okay, I don’t camp very much, I don’t golf, but if I were, I would combine Bridgeport and Gamble Sands.

Brian Frahm [00:42:42]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:42:42]:

That would be 15 minutes, probably from point A to point B, if you will. Yeah. Okay, let’s. I’d like to. How many people? So you get a thousand people a night here annually. What’s the approximate visitor count for this park?

Brian Frahm [00:43:01]:

Well, so I was trying to find some good numbers on that one and I’m not sure. So we use a car counter at the entrance. Right. Which is magnetically based as a car drives by. It says, hey, I think there’s a car here. So we have that. But then also in our computer system, if everyone’s doing it right, we’re going. How many people are in your party? Oh, there’s eight.

Brian Frahm [00:43:23]:

And we put that number in. Right. Some people it just says like two.

Scott Cowan [00:43:25]:

Right. And there’s 12, but yeah, right.

Brian Frahm [00:43:27]:

Which.

Scott Cowan [00:43:28]:

Because I think they have to pay more for the camp spot. If they say they have eight. Yeah, yeah.

Brian Frahm [00:43:32]:

So, so roughly, like here we’re looking at about 300,000 approximately for the.

Scott Cowan [00:43:38]:

And do you have the numbers for the other three?

Brian Frahm [00:43:40]:

Yeah. So Alta Lake, we’re just shy of 200,000. Bridgeport is 100,000. And then 25 Mile Creek says 85,000. That one’s off. I know. Because our car counter wasn’t working up there for some time. It’s right, whatever.

Brian Frahm [00:43:54]:

So that one, that one’s a little lower than the normal, but yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:43:58]:

Going back to when you’re at Riverside, what do you think Riverside would have been?

Brian Frahm [00:44:01]:

Oh, millions. Oh, it was really? Yeah. I mean, well.

Scott Cowan [00:44:04]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:44:05]:

And that one’s. That one’s so hard to count. There’s so many trail, there’s so many accesses into that park. There’s a roadway that runs through the middle of it. Right, Aubrey. All white. And so to get the council on that one is kind of a nightmare. But it’s an urban interface park.

Brian Frahm [00:44:20]:

So not only do you have those people, but the Centennial Trail runs through town all the way to Idaho and you have all those people who access the park that way. So yeah, it’s very busy.

Scott Cowan [00:44:33]:

Ada accessible.

Brian Frahm [00:44:36]:

Some, yes. If you’re familiar with what’s. We really are State parks is really trying to do some things to make everything we’re doing more accessible. Interpretive programs that have both auditory and visual explanations for things. So either way you can get some information. The way that I’m going to say this may sound bad, but we’ve individually went out and we’ve done a bunch of things to the low hanging fruit because we know we need to make some changes. But when you’re talking about full facility stuff, we’ve made changes inside facilities so that the facilities that are there are available but some of our facilities to get to them are not accessible. But that’s not like a, hey, let’s take that out of the park budget and make a new building.

Brian Frahm [00:45:22]:

We’re looking at millions of dollars to just create the new building, let alone anything else that’s going there. So. Yeah. And anybody who comes to state parks over the next few years, I’m sure you will see massive changes in that. In that form and facet. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:45:37]:

How many boats do you think launch from here?

Brian Frahm [00:45:42]:

You know, that is a great. And I didn’t. I grabbed the overall numbers but.

Scott Cowan [00:45:48]:

Gosh.

Brian Frahm [00:45:52]:

I mean, we’ll have a line of boats. Oh yeah. We have a very small parking lot for them. But it’s a large launch in February. If you came up here. Kokanee is huge. The Kokanee are typically on this end of the lake. People are coming from all over Washington to come this parking lot.

Brian Frahm [00:46:09]:

They’re parked over the bumper blocks and down, parallel parked all the way down the way and in through the boat. I mean it’s all kokanee fishermen.

Scott Cowan [00:46:15]:

There was a boat, a truck with a trailer today. I thought I saw that.

Brian Frahm [00:46:21]:

Yeah, we have three of them over there.

Scott Cowan [00:46:22]:

Okay, so what are they? What are they?

Brian Frahm [00:46:24]:

Probably kokanee fishing. Yes. I mean mostly. I mean that’s what a lot of people. You can get kings in here. You get kokanee. Okay. Rainbow.

Brian Frahm [00:46:32]:

We had a guy a couple weeks ago, he was here for some lake trout. You know, we get bulb in there, which is kind of a bottom feeder type fish. So there’s kind of a conglomerate. But really people are. People come up here for the kokanee is really.

Scott Cowan [00:46:48]:

When you and Alta Lake. How big is the lake, do you know?

Brian Frahm [00:46:53]:

I just don’t know.

Scott Cowan [00:46:54]:

Not that big of a lake, really.

Brian Frahm [00:46:55]:

It’s not that big of a lake.

Scott Cowan [00:46:56]:

It’s not that big of a lake, really. Okay, so all four of these. I just realized all four of these have water.

Brian Frahm [00:47:01]:

Correct. All of them have technically what we call like the Columbia’s. Rufus woods is what they.

Scott Cowan [00:47:06]:

Yeah, but I’m sorry, I was just like. I’ll just say, oh yeah, Central Lakes area. Yeah. Come on, don’t make fun of the host. Go ahead. Why not? What? I’m gonna. Okay. I’m gonna give you a magic wand or a magic leaf blower.

Scott Cowan [00:47:26]:

Okay. And you can do anything you want to this park. Anything. One thing. What would be the one thing you would do? You have no budget constraints. You have to be practical in the sense you’re not going to go, I’m going to put up a 700 story building. No, not. But it’s got to be like, what would you do? What? Your vision, what would it be?

Brian Frahm [00:47:47]:

One thing, man, there isn’t just one thing. Yeah, I know.

Scott Cowan [00:47:51]:

I got to make it do one thing.

Brian Frahm [00:47:53]:

If you’re going to pin me down the. Can I make it two things?

Scott Cowan [00:47:57]:

You know, I wouldn’t stop you, but I’m going to. Yeah, go ahead.

Brian Frahm [00:47:59]:

Yeah, two things. Well, because the number one thing that I would do right now if I had. If everything was ready and we had the money to do it, the one bathroom we’ve been trying to replace for a couple years needs to be replaced. It’s just gotta. It’s gotta go now.

Scott Cowan [00:48:11]:

When you say putting you on the spot here, you mean knock it down, start over or.

Brian Frahm [00:48:16]:

Yeah, that’s what’s gonna have to happen with it.

Scott Cowan [00:48:18]:

So it’s a complete build of a new building.

Brian Frahm [00:48:19]:

One of the reasons why it’s within 200ft of the water. We’ve got permitting issues all those the whole list of stuff.

Scott Cowan [00:48:25]:

All right, so we got what else?

Brian Frahm [00:48:28]:

So we are. We are an agency that has to make our own money. I say that loosely, but for the most part, we’re supposed to be making our own money as a government agency. And the thing that we probably. We could always take more, but on the weekends, we. By 9:00 in the morning, we’re full and we’re literally turning away money because we don’t have a place to park people. And I’m not going to ruin things just to bring more people in, if that makes sense. Right.

Brian Frahm [00:48:59]:

And so I would replace our day. A lot of our day use area, put in additional parking, replace our day use bathroom. Because. Yes. If you just create more parking, you have a facility that can’t take that as well, then you have sewer backups. And now we’re. We’re not doing anything. Good.

Brian Frahm [00:49:15]:

Additional terraces through here, underneath here, where people can actually come to this lake. The reason there’s not a lot of public access on this lake. It’s a ginormous lake, 50 miles long. There’s almost no public access space. There’s a little bit in town, but most of it’s private. Right. And that’s where we’re missing. If I could do something to this park, I would make.

Brian Frahm [00:49:34]:

Do something to allow more people to access it and upgrade the facilities while.

Scott Cowan [00:49:41]:

Keeping the experience level high. You’re not going to just go, oh, I want to have 2,000 people here just because we can collect money and they won’t be happy. But you want to make it.

Brian Frahm [00:49:50]:

I don’t want to pay paradise to put up a parking lot.

Scott Cowan [00:49:51]:

Right, right, right.

Brian Frahm [00:49:52]:

Okay. But kind of. But not really.

Scott Cowan [00:49:54]:

Not really. Yeah. You. You want to. Yeah.

Brian Frahm [00:49:57]:

All right.

Scott Cowan [00:50:01]:

I’m getting distracted by the deer running through here, which I don’t know why I have deer running through my yard at my house. It’s not like I’m not used to seeing them. It’s more like I’m kind of wondering if that’s a mountain lion kind of.

Brian Frahm [00:50:12]:

They’re my. They’re my grass mowers for the, for the winter.

Scott Cowan [00:50:14]:

Yeah. How many come through here? I mean.

Brian Frahm [00:50:17]:

Yeah, it varies. In years past, I’ve seen as many as like 30. They’ll just kind of wander through and stay down here.

Scott Cowan [00:50:24]:

Yeah.

Brian Frahm [00:50:25]:

Hunting season comes and people leave and they’re kind of pushed in. You can’t hunt in the park, so they kind of just venture down here. We’ve got this nice green grass for them to eat and fertilize. For me. Okay.

Scott Cowan [00:50:35]:

I’m gonna give you another scenario.

Brian Frahm [00:50:37]:

You’re gonna.

Scott Cowan [00:50:37]:

You get a week off. Okay. You have to play by my rules, by the way. Okay. Okay. You get a week off. You and the family. So it’s gonna be a family adventure.

Scott Cowan [00:50:47]:

Can go stay at one Washington State park, and you get to decide. So wife doesn’t get. You’re gonna decide. You want the kids and wife to be happy, but you’re gonna pick it. Which Washington State park would you go hang out for a week? Is there one you haven’t been to? You want to go or.

Brian Frahm [00:51:04]:

So there’s some that I haven’t been to. I’ve been to a lot, but if I was gonna be someplace for a week, I would probably go to Fort Worden. And I say that because there’s so many things to do at that park. Right. They’ve got the marine facility down there. They’ve got the aquarium in there. You got tide pools that you can go and you can explore, but then you can venture into town. And there’s a lot to do in town there.

Brian Frahm [00:51:31]:

They’ve got the big ball field out there, and then they’ve also got, like, tennis courts.

Scott Cowan [00:51:35]:

I know. It’s a great. It’s a great.

Brian Frahm [00:51:36]:

Yeah. They even do performances in there, and they have a restaurant inside the. Down in the park there, too.

Scott Cowan [00:51:41]:

So.

Brian Frahm [00:51:41]:

Yeah, it’s. If I had to spend a week.

Scott Cowan [00:51:44]:

Somewhere, that would be.

Brian Frahm [00:51:46]:

Yeah, you’ve got the sound right there. I mean, just the forts. The kids love playing in the forts. So.

Scott Cowan [00:51:51]:

Yeah. All the bunkers that you can. Well, many, many years ago.

Brian Frahm [00:51:55]:

I don’t know.

Scott Cowan [00:51:55]:

You can go through them anymore. I don’t know that I would fit through them anymore because as a teenager, they were cramped for me, but as an adult, I. Excuse me. The fat man is stuck in the bunker. Can somebody get the Crisco and pull him out, please? Just bad visions there for me. But beautiful park at Port Townsend’s amazing little community. Yeah, that’s a.

Brian Frahm [00:52:13]:

And you can literally walk to the ferry. And you’d be at Ebe, Right. You can literally be in Eevee, right across the. The water there.

Scott Cowan [00:52:22]:

So. Yeah. And you’re not far from Flagler either. If you wanted to take a day trip, you could hit that whole ring of fire thing if you’re. If you’re kind of a history buff.

Brian Frahm [00:52:30]:

Yep. All right. All right.

Scott Cowan [00:52:34]:

I asked my guest three questions, and this is. We’re going to transition to that kind of abruptly. Oh, before.

Brian Frahm [00:52:42]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:52:43]:

Best camping spot in this park or Actually, I’m going to change it up on you.

Brian Frahm [00:52:47]:

Okay.

Scott Cowan [00:52:47]:

I warned you about this that I was gonna. Yep. I’m gonna give you all four parks to pick. You can pick the best camping spot for only one spot out of four parks. That’s gonna probably be really hard. And I’d let you give. I’d let you cheat.

Brian Frahm [00:53:00]:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I, I would pick. So my, my number one would be probably site 34 at 25 Mile Creek State Park.

Scott Cowan [00:53:10]:

Why?

Brian Frahm [00:53:11]:

Because right on the creek. Okay. I would probably choose it towards our closing portion of the. You know like September. Right. Because the coconut running through the creek so you can jump right out and you can see the reds running up the creek there.

Scott Cowan [00:53:26]:

All right, so that would be yours.

Brian Frahm [00:53:27]:

Yeah. I think if I was going to choose. And 25 Mile Creek, it’s on the way to nowhere. The road ends half mile past the park and that’s. You’re going to be four wheel drive in somewhere. Right.

Scott Cowan [00:53:38]:

Does that road. Can you. Can you go off road up to Stahekin that way at all? No. So it’s really okay.

Brian Frahm [00:53:44]:

Yeah. You can cross over into the Inat Valley. We get a lot of people who on motorbikes will do that. Things like that.

Scott Cowan [00:53:51]:

All right. So when you’re not being a park ranger and I think I asked you this question to begin with when we first started talking. I love coffee.

Brian Frahm [00:54:00]:

Mm.

Scott Cowan [00:54:01]:

Now you’re. How far are you from town here?

Brian Frahm [00:54:04]:

15 minutes.

Scott Cowan [00:54:05]:

15 minutes. Which seems like 15 minutes too long to drive for coffee. When I want coffee. Just kidding.

Brian Frahm [00:54:10]:

Except if you have to drop the kids off at School at 6 o’ clock in the morning.

Scott Cowan [00:54:13]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:54:13]:

Practice.

Scott Cowan [00:54:14]:

Where’s a great place to get coffee in Chelan?

Brian Frahm [00:54:16]:

So. All right. And I’m going to caveat this one. If I’m going to sit down for coffee, I’m going to go to the. This. It’s called the Vogue. It’s right on the main strip. It’s really just kind of a nice sit down place.

Brian Frahm [00:54:27]:

They’ve got some bakery items in there as well. Just gives you a good. Then you can pop out and you have access to all kinds of things as you go.

Scott Cowan [00:54:34]:

And what’s the coffee drink of choice for you?

Brian Frahm [00:54:36]:

So pretty much at any point will be like a Carl macchiato.

Scott Cowan [00:54:41]:

Okay. Yeah. All right.

Brian Frahm [00:54:42]:

But we’re seasonal now so we go like pumpkin and soon get into the. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:54:48]:

Interview is over. Man. You’re one of those people. What’s your watch? Does your wife drink coffee?

Brian Frahm [00:54:53]:

Yes.

Scott Cowan [00:54:55]:

What does she. What’s what’s her go to?

Brian Frahm [00:54:57]:

Drink of choice?

Scott Cowan [00:54:58]:

Yeah.

Brian Frahm [00:54:58]:

Caramel brulee latte. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:55:02]:

Kids. Your kids?

Brian Frahm [00:55:03]:

No, they don’t drink coffee.

Scott Cowan [00:55:04]:

Be thankful for that.

Brian Frahm [00:55:05]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:55:06]:

Okay. How about lunch? You’re gonna scoot out of here. I mean, I don’t know. This maybe not realistic for you, but you’re gonna get a lunch hour or a lunch break. And I’ll even give you all the.

Brian Frahm [00:55:15]:

All the.

Scott Cowan [00:55:15]:

All your travels. Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:55:17]:

All my travels.

Scott Cowan [00:55:18]:

Okay. I mean, because I’m thinking of poteros. The bakery in poteros is pretty solid. That is. Yeah.

Brian Frahm [00:55:22]:

So that’s what I was gonna say. If I’m on. So that was my caveat, is if I’m going through or I’m up in Piteros. Sweet River Bakery is where I stop. Because they’ve got the bakery and I can get one of those nice cinnamon rolls and a coffee. They also do a sweet sandwich stuff up there. But that’s not. I mean, because we’re in this community here.

Brian Frahm [00:55:43]:

If I was going to take, you know, Saturday and we’re going to do lunch somewhere or whatever, we. We probably hit Tacos La Roca once a week.

Scott Cowan [00:55:51]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [00:55:52]:

Which is if you’re in the last Schwab parking lot, you go a little bit further and they’re the taco truck that’s back there. And it is.

Scott Cowan [00:55:58]:

Is.

Brian Frahm [00:55:58]:

It’s just amazing.

Scott Cowan [00:55:59]:

It’s really, really good. So what are your taco choices?

Brian Frahm [00:56:02]:

So their taco salad, which comes in the tacos shell. Right. My wife and I split one of those. It’s really good.

Scott Cowan [00:56:10]:

How about the kids?

Brian Frahm [00:56:11]:

So, like, three carne asada tacos. My oldest gets the sopas.

Scott Cowan [00:56:17]:

So not real adventuresome.

Brian Frahm [00:56:19]:

Not really. I mean, it’s. But they’re good enough that you don’t have to be adventuresome on. It’s just good food.

Scott Cowan [00:56:29]:

All right. All right. Before I hit you with the last question, which hopefully you didn’t cheat, what didn’t we talk about here? Because we could have gone on this. This episode could continue going in many, many different directions. But let’s just. You’ve got to get back to your leaf blank.

Brian Frahm [00:56:45]:

Well, they keep falling.

Scott Cowan [00:56:45]:

Yeah, I know. Been watching that. Now, just. What? Is there anything that you want to leave the listener with that we may not have talked about? About.

Brian Frahm [00:56:58]:

Gosh, there’s. I mean, we talked a little bit about numbers briefly.

Scott Cowan [00:57:04]:

Before you go there, let me jump in. You said, and I can’t believe I forgot this. This annoys me. I don’t have my glasses. I mean. Okay, so you said And I’m paraphrasing for you, but Washington State Parks is a self. The goal is. It’s a self funding agency.

Brian Frahm [00:57:21]:

Mostly.

Scott Cowan [00:57:21]:

Yeah, mostly. You shared with me a percentage earlier, which is a pretty substantial self funding. Kudos. I’m going to give you the ability to be the state Parks Discover Pass salesman. Why should everybody that’s listening, no matter where they’re located, even if they’re Colorado, they should buy one. Why should they buy a Washington State Discover Pass?

Brian Frahm [00:57:47]:

Well, it did just go up to $45. Right. But my wife and I went to dinner the other day at Campbell’s here in town and we paid $45 for lunch. Yeah, one, it was a couple hours, maybe it was $45.

Scott Cowan [00:58:00]:

Right. No shade to Campbells, by the way.

Brian Frahm [00:58:02]:

Yeah, yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:58:03]:

But yeah, it was good food. 45 bucks is lunch nowadays.

Brian Frahm [00:58:05]:

Yeah. A movie. Try to take a family of four to a movie.

Scott Cowan [00:58:08]:

Good luck with that.

Brian Frahm [00:58:09]:

Yeah. For $45. Yeah, yeah. You’re gonna get popcorn or you’re gonna candy. Not happening. Dark. So really you have access to 120 state parks, the Fish and Wildlife, Lands Department, Natural resources for that $45. I wish I could say that I’m a better salesman on that.

Brian Frahm [00:58:30]:

I literally have people that I see every weekend show up to this park, pay for a day pass for $10 and they show up four, five, six weekends in a row and they pay $10, which is fine. They’re paying me 60 bucks, which is, yeah, sure, I’ll take that. But that’s not. What if you’re going to come back like pay 45, I can save you some money, right? I mean $45 is not that much anymore, right.

Scott Cowan [00:58:57]:

I think it’s a great value.

Brian Frahm [00:58:58]:

Well, and your tax money isn’t going to this anymore, right. So if you want control of some of that money, where that money is spent, Right. If you just. If it was, if we were tax funded, you don’t get a control of that. Someone gets to decide where that goes at that point.

Scott Cowan [00:59:15]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [00:59:16]:

But with that $45, you are deciding where that $45 goes.

Scott Cowan [00:59:19]:

Let me ask you this question. So every state park that I’ve been to has a ability to sell estate. Discover Pass, you know, like a kiosk there. So you collect x dollars here, 25 mile collects x dollars there. What happens to the money and what I mean by that is does it stay at your park or does it all get aggregated up together to the department and to be divvied back out?

Brian Frahm [00:59:44]:

It gets to the department. And there’s my thought. Yeah, there’s a good reason. There’s parks that don’t get as much visitation, but it’s still important that we have those parks.

Scott Cowan [00:59:53]:

Well, like Pochaston Pinnacles, for example. Yeah. Although every time I go there, there’s somebody there. But it’s not.

Brian Frahm [00:59:59]:

It’s not overflowing.

Scott Cowan [01:00:00]:

No, it’s not overflowing. Way.

Brian Frahm [01:00:01]:

Not overflowing.

Scott Cowan [01:00:02]:

But. But. But it’s still kind of cool. Yes, if you’re a climber type person. But anyway. But okay, so you. The parks can collect this revenue in. Or you can buy Discover Pass online or go.

Scott Cowan [01:00:16]:

REI sells them. I mean, you can buy them.

Brian Frahm [01:00:18]:

There’s. Yeah, there’s multiple.

Scott Cowan [01:00:20]:

Now, I will say this. I don’t know if you’re familiar with it. Do you know you can get a state park from the public library?

Brian Frahm [01:00:25]:

Yeah. You can rent a state park.

Scott Cowan [01:00:27]:

I think that’s really kind of cool. And I think there’s also. Correct me if I’m wrong, I may be wrong, but I think you can be a volunteer for a period of time and return.

Brian Frahm [01:00:34]:

Yeah, yeah. There’s some pieces of that. It’s, you know, our campground hosts, for instance, who are getting free camping spots.

Scott Cowan [01:00:41]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [01:00:41]:

And free is. They’re not paying. However, they do multiple hours for us. They have to put in, you know, 28 hours with us. Similarly. So if you are a community member around a park somewhere and you want to put in 28 hours of substantial work. Right. Not just like picking up garbage in the day, you say which.

Brian Frahm [01:00:59]:

But that. With that being.

Scott Cowan [01:01:01]:

That might be what.

Brian Frahm [01:01:04]:

That may be what that park needs, but the intent is not that you’re just walking and picking up a bag of garbage and going, hey, I get a free Discover Pass. Most of those parks have something. They actually need those volunteers to do something substantial. And if you have a skill set that you can do something, and that could be drilling holes and rebuild picnic tables, but if you put in the 28 hours, you can apply to get. Yeah. So there’s Discover Pass.

Scott Cowan [01:01:26]:

So I guess what I’m trying to say is that the parks are very inclusive.

Brian Frahm [01:01:29]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [01:01:30]:

$45 shouldn’t stop anybody in the sense that they could go to their local library. I’m not. I don’t believe every library has them, but my understanding is there’s probably a library very close to the state park you want to go to. That could help if you’re a library and you can get a library card for free.

Brian Frahm [01:01:47]:

So. All right, let me. And there’s other ways to do this as well. So disable VAT system. There’s a disabled vet pass that works for camping and for your Discover pass, the blue ADA pass that you would have to, you know, park at the Walmart ADA parking spots. Same here. Permanent. Those permanent ones work here as for Discover passes.

Brian Frahm [01:02:09]:

And then there’s also just, you know, you can get other discounted passes that can. That can potentially get you into there. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [01:02:16]:

And it’s a whole lot cheaper than the 99 ticket.

Brian Frahm [01:02:19]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [01:02:19]:

So let me ask you this. I’m gonna put you on the spot. How many tickets do you think you ride a year?

Brian Frahm [01:02:22]:

Year? I’m not sure that everybody wants to. I’m probably. I probably write probably close to like 200 some tickets a year. Wow.

Scott Cowan [01:02:34]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [01:02:35]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [01:02:37]:

I don’t know if I think that’s a lot or a little. I’m kind of. I can’t go either way with that too much.

Brian Frahm [01:02:41]:

And so, I mean, the idea is that State parks wants to educate. Yeah, right. Educate over enforcement. And so we have to gauge that a little bit.

Scott Cowan [01:02:49]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [01:02:49]:

We don’t have a quota. It’s not like, hey, you’ve got a right. We don’t quote stuff. But when you’re looking at a thousand people, maybe approximately the same amount for the day use area, we have regulations on. Fire was the big one this year. I wrote a lot of fire tickets. People were barbecuing with barbecue briquettes in August.

Scott Cowan [01:03:12]:

Okay. And see, that’s. That’s just safety, man. Yeah. That’s just not you being punitive. That’s just being safety because a mistake. And this could. Because it’s dry here.

Scott Cowan [01:03:24]:

And we already had that fire just down the road that was impacting all of us. Yep. Every. It seemed like everybody was working there. Yep. They don’t need to come here.

Brian Frahm [01:03:32]:

Correct. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Scott Cowan [01:03:33]:

Right. Yeah.

Brian Frahm [01:03:34]:

Yeah. All right. Yeah. Noise violations. That are other ones. You know, it’s. It’s, you know, midnight, well past our quiet hours, and you’ve decided to set up your. Your DJ stand.

Scott Cowan [01:03:44]:

Right. But do they got lights, man?

Brian Frahm [01:03:46]:

Right. Yeah. And you know, they’re like. Everybody’s loving it. You know, that’s a little beyond at that point. Right.

Scott Cowan [01:03:56]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [01:03:57]:

So that’s really the goal.

Scott Cowan [01:03:58]:

But do you go. Let me ask you, not to put you on the spot, but do you like, go like. Let’s just say. Let’s say it’s me and I’m in that camper down there and I’m. It’s 10:30 at night and I Got my stereo that you installed 20 years ago.

Brian Frahm [01:04:11]:

Rolling.

Scott Cowan [01:04:12]:

And I’m playing a little. You might like the music I’m playing, but I’m disturbing people. Do you go over with the intent to say, hey, man, can you knock it off? Because it’s always, yeah, so. And if I. If I give you static at that point now we begin the decision tree of how am I going to handle this?

Brian Frahm [01:04:29]:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. There’s a little bit of decision. You know, I try to explain it to them. Hey, man, I get it. And it’s well past the quiet hours. You’re typically. My conversation is like, I don’t care what you do, but I want to make sure your neighbors don’t have. You can watch the sunrise for all I care.

Brian Frahm [01:04:43]:

Stay up and watch the sun, but I want to make sure your neighbors don’t have to stay up and watch the sunrise.

Scott Cowan [01:04:47]:

Right. Yeah. No. And then a lot of it is just the. I’m guessing, in my interpretation of how I think you would act, if that person’s decent to you, turns the music down, you probably go, thanks. Have a good night. Enjoy your stay. And you walk away.

Scott Cowan [01:05:07]:

If you’re back 20 minutes later, you’re probably not. Not quite as happy.

Brian Frahm [01:05:12]:

Yeah. Yeah. I give people the benefit of that doubt. But yeah, return. Return contacts for the same thing. Yeah. There’s far less. Far less leeway than that.

Brian Frahm [01:05:21]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [01:05:21]:

All right, so once again, what did we skip over that you’d like to bring up?

Brian Frahm [01:05:27]:

Glad we hit the. That you brought back the kind of. The discover pass thing that we were talking about. I think something that. And maybe I should wait for the last question. But. But I think one of the questions that you’ve asked previously is something you wish campers knew when they. And I thought about that for a little bit, and sometimes it took a little bit.

Brian Frahm [01:05:48]:

But I think the biggest thing that people come and ask me about is maybe they didn’t see staff or they didn’t know they had an issue in the middle of the night. And I don’t know that people know that we have emergency contact information on our bulletin boards. And one of the reasons we live in the park work is so that we can help make your night a good night. Right. You don’t have to deal with that DJ stand next door playing out until 2 o’ clock in the morning. Right. That’s the reason they give us that.

Scott Cowan [01:06:22]:

You’re actually really good about that. Yeah, he’s over here mixing, everybody.

Brian Frahm [01:06:27]:

I’ve seen a few this. It’s actually a really Good story from Riverside that involves a DJ stand and a lot of people. But, you know, that’s. That’s part of. That’s part of why we get that discount, is to come out and to take care of those issues at the night.

Scott Cowan [01:06:42]:

Right.

Brian Frahm [01:06:43]:

But a lot of people, they don’t Want to call 9 1. It’s just annoying. They’re just making noise. I don’t want to call 91 1. And I’m not saying, yeah, it is an avenue, and you can. You can always tell 911 that it’s not an emergency. But that’s not really the. That’s really not the purpose of 91 1.

Brian Frahm [01:06:56]:

Right, right. So most parks, and this one, all of the parks that I supervise, my number is actually on that board. But also the ranger, the local ranger for each one of those is also on that board. So even if it’s Bridgeport and my number is on that board, I know how to call someone who is living at that park that can potentially take care of that problem for you.

Scott Cowan [01:07:16]:

Okay. All right. All right, last question. Yeah. I warned you about this, and you promised you’d play along. Yep. This is a really hard question. Cake or pie? And why.

Brian Frahm [01:07:29]:

So I’m gonna choose cheesecake.

Scott Cowan [01:07:31]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [01:07:32]:

Because it’s like a pie and it’s a cake. It’s the mix of the two.

Scott Cowan [01:07:35]:

You cheated. You listened ahead. But.

Brian Frahm [01:07:38]:

But to be honest, also. Also, cheesecake is just amazing.

Scott Cowan [01:07:42]:

So what type of cheesecake?

Brian Frahm [01:07:43]:

So I really like just that standard New York style.

Scott Cowan [01:07:48]:

Like, it would be just the plain. I don’t wanna call it boring, but just.

Brian Frahm [01:07:51]:

Just plain.

Scott Cowan [01:07:51]:

Yeah.

Brian Frahm [01:07:52]:

Because you can do so much with it. Right. But it’s gotta have.

Scott Cowan [01:07:54]:

Have.

Brian Frahm [01:07:55]:

I don’t like the, like, chocolate graham cracker crust. It’s got to have the standard graham cracker. Right.

Scott Cowan [01:08:01]:

You don’t like the.

Brian Frahm [01:08:02]:

Okay, don’t do stuff with it. Don’t do stuff with the crust. But, you know, you put, you know, little raspberry jam on it or a drizzle of strawberry, whatever. Or, you know, you can just. There’s a huge variety of things.

Scott Cowan [01:08:17]:

Cheesecake’s amazing. It’s a great answer. And I’m surprised more people don’t say it, actually. All right.

Brian Frahm [01:08:22]:

Because it’s a mix of both.

Scott Cowan [01:08:23]:

Both. Well, yeah, but I. You know, it’s so funny watching. Anyway.

Brian Frahm [01:08:26]:

Yeah. People’s.

Scott Cowan [01:08:27]:

People’s ex. Some people. It’s like you’re asking me to pick between my children. Like, I can’t decide. Other people are like, it’s. It’s cake. And Pie is disgusting. And those people are wrong.

Scott Cowan [01:08:38]:

And it’s like. It’s just interesting to me. Most people are kind of like you. I like this. And I’m. Okay. I don’t. I’m not anti anything, but I like cheesecake.

Scott Cowan [01:08:46]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [01:08:47]:

Food is my. I’m a foodie, so you’re a foodie. Those are probably the hardest questions you asked me is when you said, well.

Scott Cowan [01:08:52]:

Let me put you on the spot. You went to Campbell’s here, which is a resort at south end of the lake. You talked about the Vogue, which I’ve been to a few years ago. Pre Covid, I think talked about the taco truck.

Brian Frahm [01:09:03]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [01:09:04]:

Where else around here you can take the wife out for a special dinner. You just went to Campbell, so you can’t say Campbell’s, but you’re going to take the wife out for a special dinner anywhere. Anywhere in Central Washington.

Brian Frahm [01:09:18]:

Where are you? Central Washington.

Scott Cowan [01:09:19]:

Well, where are you going to take her?

Brian Frahm [01:09:20]:

Well, the landing is really nice in town, too.

Scott Cowan [01:09:22]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [01:09:23]:

That. That’s probably one of my. They have a really good. I mean, even just their hamburgers are good. You’re like, oh, it’s a hamburger.

Scott Cowan [01:09:29]:

It’s a good hamburger.

Brian Frahm [01:09:31]:

Really good fire pasta, which is just really okay. You can’t get it anywhere else.

Scott Cowan [01:09:36]:

Okay.

Brian Frahm [01:09:37]:

But, yeah, I. Between the food and the wine scene here, if I. If I wasn’t. If I didn’t come here to work, it would just be. I mean, that in and of itself is a reason to come out here.

Scott Cowan [01:09:49]:

How about the kids? Where do you think the kids would want to go for. If you said, I’ll take you out to dinner tonight? Anywhere you want to go. What do you think your kids would pick?

Brian Frahm [01:09:56]:

They would probably pick Stormy. Okay. Stormy Mountain Brewery, because they have this ginormous pretzel with this, like, cheesy. It’s like a cheesy sausage sauce. I don’t even know what they call it necessarily, but it’s. I think it’s what they use maybe on their, like poutine, I think, is what the cheese. The chili fries or whatever.

Scott Cowan [01:10:17]:

Yeah.

Brian Frahm [01:10:17]:

But. Yeah, you get this. They’re like that.

Scott Cowan [01:10:19]:

Oh, yeah, yeah. There’s so many choices. You’re just in. In this little basket of choice.

Brian Frahm [01:10:28]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [01:10:28]:

You’re just overflowing with choice. Yeah.

Brian Frahm [01:10:31]:

And there’s. They say the valley. This valley will rival Napa Valley for wine in just a few years.

Scott Cowan [01:10:38]:

I mean, we’re pulling out Washington State. Yeah. So I have a friend who’s really big into wine. Does not live in the State of Washington goes to Napa regularly. I mean, this person’s really, really into wine. And I sent them a T shirt which he didn’t find funny. And that is Walla. Walla is for wine.

Scott Cowan [01:11:00]:

Napa is for auto parts.

Brian Frahm [01:11:03]:

Yes.

Scott Cowan [01:11:03]:

Yeah. There you go. Come on.

Brian Frahm [01:11:05]:

Yeah. And Washington State as a whole, I mean, what a. You’re doing a great thing here. We. I came from Colorado, right. And when people say, oh, why you came from Colorado? Wow, it must be so amazing. I would say that Washington State is 10 to 15 years behind the busyness of Colorado. I’ve climbed 42 of the 53 14,000 foot peaks in the state of Colorado.

Brian Frahm [01:11:33]:

And the last few that I went on, I was literally waiting in line to take the picture at the top because there were so many people there. But you can still find places in Washington that you aren’t doing that.

Scott Cowan [01:11:47]:

Have you done Rainier?

Brian Frahm [01:11:48]:

I’ve not done Rainier.

Scott Cowan [01:11:49]:

You have not done Rainier. Do you have any intention of doing Rainier?

Brian Frahm [01:11:53]:

I haven’t. So I haven’t done Adam’s, Rainier or Helen’s.

Scott Cowan [01:11:57]:

And Helen’s is kind of.

Brian Frahm [01:12:00]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [01:12:00]:

Have you done Baker?

Brian Frahm [01:12:01]:

I have done Baker. Okay.

Scott Cowan [01:12:02]:

Yeah.

Brian Frahm [01:12:03]:

Yeah, I’ve done a few of them. It just hasn’t been. We started having kids when we came out here.

Scott Cowan [01:12:09]:

Yeah.

Brian Frahm [01:12:09]:

Working in the parks. I love working in the parks. I’m glad I get to spend 40 hours a week in the parks and outdoors because that’s where I really love. But I’d say that because of that, I probably have spend less of my recreation time outdoors. And I look, I. I solo a lot more stuff. I like to get on my mountain bike and go through the forest service up here a little ways. Or, you know, ride, ride to Manson and back, you know, just a little bit more.

Brian Frahm [01:12:37]:

Not the 4 o’ clock wake up to go bag a peak somewhere.

Scott Cowan [01:12:41]:

Yeah, fair enough. Well, Brian, thank you. Yeah. I get to say this a lot. I always learn a lot when I talk to people. And this episode is way. Not way, but very informative. And in a lot of ways I didn’t think.

Scott Cowan [01:12:56]:

Not that I didn’t think it was gonna be informative. I don’t mean like that, but like we talked about things I didn’t think about talking about. So it’s like, this is really cool for me. So thank you. And I’m sure next time I come out here it’ll be leaf blank, but. Well, it depends.

Brian Frahm [01:13:06]:

If you come in in July, we don’t have leaves on the ground.

Scott Cowan [01:13:08]:

Oh, you’ll still be out here. Maybe. Maybe. All right. Thanks so much, man.

Brian Frahm [01:13:13]:

Yeah. Thank you, Scott.

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