From the journal of Correctional Officer Steven Williams, April 20

April 20, 2017

     Today we are going to head to Glenwood Springs. It is the longest stretch on this trek we are driving in one day. The rest of the sections we broke the trip into were only around 30 miles, or so. The trip from Eagle, where we stayed last night, to Glenwood Springs is a little over 40  miles. I know it doesn't sound like a long drive,  but with the way the world is today it takes all day just to go that far. There are traffic snarls and groups of undead that we have to get through.

      The groups of undead are not that hard, as long as they don't get over 10 or 15 in the group.  We have a really good group of people here and some of them have  gotten really efficient at taking out the undead with quiet weapons. It would be faster to take them out with the firearms, but the sound could draw others that might be really close to where we are traveling. Instead, we have other weapons that we turn to. There are machete's, bats, hunting knives, axes or hatchets, and others, too. Whenever we scavenge, we keep an eye out for anything that can be used as a weapon.
     I told Aaron and Linda that it's good we have a part of the group that are really good at doing this, but we need to get everyone up to snuff. When we get to Aspen, we are going to hold training sessions to get everyone trained up on the best use of all the weapons we have in our arsinal. Most of them already know the basics of using the firearms, but the best way to hold and use a bat? The best way to handle a machete without hurting yourself? Yeah, we need to work on how everyone uses them.
     The traffic snarls, on the other hand, take a hell of a lot of effort to get around or through. We have to make sure the cars are empty or zombies before we go to move them. We try to have, at the least, two people per vehicle, and it takes time to clear them before we get ready to move them. Then, it takes someone behind the wheel and several others, or one of our vehicles, to push them out of the way. Sometimes, the vehicles are just unmoveable and then we have to find a way around the mess. Most of the time, we go on the side of the road and around the cars. But there have been times that even the edge of the road is clogged and the cars are stuck. In this case, we have to back track and find another way to continue in the same direction. This can add hours, and miles, to our trips.
     Amanda and her crew are preparing breakfast right now and the vehicles are being packed as we speak. Once we eat, we are heading out and I hope we don't run into any huge hordes or traffic jams. There is really only one place to stop between if we need to, a place called Gypsum. But, with luck and the skills we are learning on our way, we will make it all the way to Glenwood Springs.

As a writer and artist, I appreciate any readers and their comments. Thank you for taking the time to read this blog. Please, come read the other blog I write for our artisan collective, Raven's Castle Creations, on our website at www.ravencastlecreations.com. It includes posts on art, the mythology of symbols we use in our art, history and more! Also, come see the art we produce in our Etsy store at etsy.com/shop/RavenCastleCreations. Follow us on Twitter at @ravencastleart and on Facebook at @ravencastlecreations.