Woke up to yet more grey, rainy, cold weather this morning. It even set a record for coldest high yesterday as the high only reached 69 degrees. A slow morning because of it, just a little bit of breakfast and a chance to read the paper and hangout with my friends. I had set up a lunch date with one of my other friends, Joe, and headed over for that just before noon.
A good hour or so of conversation and food with him.... It's always fun to catch up with friends while I am in town. But you can only eat so many chips and salsa and drink so much ice tea before it is finally time to take off.
As far as the rain is concerned; I guess some places in eastern Colorado ended up with at least 3" more. There are a few spots north of Denver that are seeing flooding but there were several spot flooding sites right here in the Denver area. It looks like it will start to slow down and clear out by tomorrow evening. The temperature is suppose to stay cool for the next several days with highs only in the 70's and low 80's. It will be a relief in many ways as it has been so hot these last few weeks.
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Wednesday, July 30, 2014
Tuesday, July 29, 2014
Woke up to a nice cloudy and cool morning today. Spent several hours just hanging out with my friends, having breakfast and reading a real newspaper. One that you can actually hold in you own hands, not one on a computer screen. I was wonderful.
I did have a couple of errands to do though, so I did eventually hit the road around 10:00. First stop was over at 'Discount Tires' where I hoped to just get the tires rotated and rebalanced. Unfortunately one of the four didn't have enough tread still on it to make it safe. The other three only had a little more than needed, but in the end they were so close as to need replacing immediatly too. I had hoped to get another 6 months out of this set, especially since I only got a little more than 60,000 miles on this set, instead of the 80k I got on the set preceding this one. But in the end I coughed up the dough for 4 new tires and had them mounted up and balanced. So now I should be set for another couple of years if I end up keeping this truck in the future.
I also spent some time looking for a beach umbrella my friend had told me about. This is a piece of equipment that is nice to have when doing canoe trips in the West where trees or shade along the river might be hard to find. He had mentioned that I could find this particular item over in a specific sporting goods store for $59 each. But my friend Marge had mentioned to me that she had seen the same item in her local King Super's store for only $39. So I went to the store I thought she meant, but could not find them there. In the end George and I stopped by the store they do go to late this evening and yes.... they did have the umbrella, and yes, I did managed to buy one.
But I'm getting ahead of myself here. Before that happened, George, Tom and I went and did a 'Boy's Night Out' at the movies. Today's pick was the film 'Lucy', a Sci-Fi thriller starring Scarlett Johansson. Not only did it have an actual plot, but it also had all the tense, gratuitous sex and violence that we have come to like in guy movies. We all talked about it for quite some time after the movie was over and as we went to eat dinner at a local Mexican restaurant.
Lot's of rain in the area this afternoon and evening. In some areas around Denver there was 1"-3" of rain over the course of only a very few hours. The whole state needs some rain of course, but it is suppose to keep raining over much of the state for the next 2-3 days. Tonight, areas that saw some of the highest totals this evening are in for another 1"-3" rain before the night is done. I hope everyone stays safe tonight.
*
I did have a couple of errands to do though, so I did eventually hit the road around 10:00. First stop was over at 'Discount Tires' where I hoped to just get the tires rotated and rebalanced. Unfortunately one of the four didn't have enough tread still on it to make it safe. The other three only had a little more than needed, but in the end they were so close as to need replacing immediatly too. I had hoped to get another 6 months out of this set, especially since I only got a little more than 60,000 miles on this set, instead of the 80k I got on the set preceding this one. But in the end I coughed up the dough for 4 new tires and had them mounted up and balanced. So now I should be set for another couple of years if I end up keeping this truck in the future.
I also spent some time looking for a beach umbrella my friend had told me about. This is a piece of equipment that is nice to have when doing canoe trips in the West where trees or shade along the river might be hard to find. He had mentioned that I could find this particular item over in a specific sporting goods store for $59 each. But my friend Marge had mentioned to me that she had seen the same item in her local King Super's store for only $39. So I went to the store I thought she meant, but could not find them there. In the end George and I stopped by the store they do go to late this evening and yes.... they did have the umbrella, and yes, I did managed to buy one.
But I'm getting ahead of myself here. Before that happened, George, Tom and I went and did a 'Boy's Night Out' at the movies. Today's pick was the film 'Lucy', a Sci-Fi thriller starring Scarlett Johansson. Not only did it have an actual plot, but it also had all the tense, gratuitous sex and violence that we have come to like in guy movies. We all talked about it for quite some time after the movie was over and as we went to eat dinner at a local Mexican restaurant.
Lot's of rain in the area this afternoon and evening. In some areas around Denver there was 1"-3" of rain over the course of only a very few hours. The whole state needs some rain of course, but it is suppose to keep raining over much of the state for the next 2-3 days. Tonight, areas that saw some of the highest totals this evening are in for another 1"-3" rain before the night is done. I hope everyone stays safe tonight.
*
Busy, yet almost boring day for me today. Was up a little late, 9:00 a.m., to begin with, but probably because I had a hard time falling asleep last night for some reason. Might of been to warm, but hard to really say..... Anyway; George and Marge were on their way over to some other friends house, Tom and Donna, to do a little canoeing out on their lake before it got too hot or the wind picked up. Neither of which actually happened today, as it stayed cloudy and there was only a little rain activity this afternoon.
For me it was time to grab a little breakfast and head out the door. Was headed over to the Service Department at the local Ford dealer in order have some work done on the truck. They seemed to be extremely busy today so I ended up spending nearly the whole day, 7 hours, there. Hadn't expected to be there that long or I would of made arrangements to be picked up by one of my friends. In the end they managed to do a complete oil change with filter, replace the gas filter, new air filter and service the fuel injector system. They also polished out my headlights as the lenses on them were getting pretty scratched and faded. In the end they gave that service to me for free because they knew they had taken way to much time on the rest of the stuff. Along the way though they also did one of their standard checks of everything else and really didn't come up with anything major to do. Still; with that being said I will need to take the truck in again at least one more time as I would like to have them change the transmission fluid and filter, as well as check out how much wear there is in there while they have it all open. They will also have to re-visit the noisy lifter that I have, once a few miles and some time has elapsed since I poured in this secrete additive to the oil. (It seems to be working already).
I was starved once the truck was finally done so it was a quick dash over to Chipotle for some dinner. It's not like eating real Mexican food, but it tastes pretty good anyway.
Got back to G and M's around 8:00 and spent the rest of the evening reading more of my book as well as starting in on the box of mail I picked up last night at my friend Tom's place. Speaking of that, I never talked about the canoe trip meeting we had last night. Only 6 of the 9 people going on the trip could make it, but the other 3 will do just fine. Sandy and Fino have been on several canoe trips already, and the other participant, Rima, will be going with me, so she should be okay also.
After thousands of paddling miles under all our belts, the canoe meeting is pretty much just a formality for many of us, but it is still so much fun just being around other boaters and talking boating. We had a fun time of it, had a drink or two and then pie and ice cream for dessert. Now it's just a matter of finding all my boating and camping gear before we go, buy all the groceries and deal with all of the other 1,001 items that need to be thought of between now and the put in on the Green River.
*
For me it was time to grab a little breakfast and head out the door. Was headed over to the Service Department at the local Ford dealer in order have some work done on the truck. They seemed to be extremely busy today so I ended up spending nearly the whole day, 7 hours, there. Hadn't expected to be there that long or I would of made arrangements to be picked up by one of my friends. In the end they managed to do a complete oil change with filter, replace the gas filter, new air filter and service the fuel injector system. They also polished out my headlights as the lenses on them were getting pretty scratched and faded. In the end they gave that service to me for free because they knew they had taken way to much time on the rest of the stuff. Along the way though they also did one of their standard checks of everything else and really didn't come up with anything major to do. Still; with that being said I will need to take the truck in again at least one more time as I would like to have them change the transmission fluid and filter, as well as check out how much wear there is in there while they have it all open. They will also have to re-visit the noisy lifter that I have, once a few miles and some time has elapsed since I poured in this secrete additive to the oil. (It seems to be working already).
I was starved once the truck was finally done so it was a quick dash over to Chipotle for some dinner. It's not like eating real Mexican food, but it tastes pretty good anyway.
Got back to G and M's around 8:00 and spent the rest of the evening reading more of my book as well as starting in on the box of mail I picked up last night at my friend Tom's place. Speaking of that, I never talked about the canoe trip meeting we had last night. Only 6 of the 9 people going on the trip could make it, but the other 3 will do just fine. Sandy and Fino have been on several canoe trips already, and the other participant, Rima, will be going with me, so she should be okay also.
After thousands of paddling miles under all our belts, the canoe meeting is pretty much just a formality for many of us, but it is still so much fun just being around other boaters and talking boating. We had a fun time of it, had a drink or two and then pie and ice cream for dessert. Now it's just a matter of finding all my boating and camping gear before we go, buy all the groceries and deal with all of the other 1,001 items that need to be thought of between now and the put in on the Green River.
*
Sunday, July 27, 2014
Took a trip back up to Longmont this morning in order to clean out and straighten up the trailer for the long rest she'll have until the next time she has to go back out on the road. Most of what this entailed was cleaning out the refrigerator and freezer and turning off the propane and battery power. Turns out that it was good that I went up today as the fridge had already shut down, probably because the propane tank I had left on ran out of gas. So it was all off, but when I got there but everything was still cold, and in the freezer, mostly still frozen, so it hadn't shut off very long before I got there.
It only took about two hours to get everything done and the trailer buttoned back up before it was time to head out and find some lunch. Ended up over at the Longmont Chipotle where I had a very nice chicken burrito with brown rice and both black and pinto beans. Along with a nice cold beverage and a good book it was easy to sit inside the air conditioned restaurant and read for about an hour before heading back.
The trip back down to George and Marge's took just as long as it did to drive up there. Because of extensive construction on I-25 through Denver I took the I-470 bypass around the west side of the city. Then because it was still clogged up between the intersection of I-470 and I-25 and the 80th avenue exit to the north, I ended up circling around and driving north on Pecos and Huron streets as far north as 120th street. So a little slower over all, but at least I was moving. Did the whole thing in reverse on the way back so I was back in town by 4:00.
Had told Marge and George that I would take them out to dinner around 5:15 and then promptly fell asleep on the couch reading my book. They are so polite that they didn't even wake me up, waiting instead until nearly 6:00 when I woke myself up, probably snoring. We went over to Los Delicious for a dinner of Mexican food. They had assorted classics such as tacos, enchilada's etc. while I had the tamale plate. Two pork tamale's smothered in green chili with a side of refried beans and rice. It was delicious!
We got home a little late, but part of what I brought down from the trailer was what was in the fridge and freezer, which included a package of frozen strawberries and one of blueberries as well as a couple uncooked pie crusts. I had promised to make them a pie for eating with their normal evening ice cream, so I got busy with that. Put all the ingredients from my basic pie recipe together and popped it in the oven. About an hour later we had it out of the oven and dished it up in a bowl for everyone. Add in a scoop of vanilla ice cream and you have a pretty good desert. Not sure you can really call it a pie, it was pretty soupy, but then, how can baked fruit, rolled in sugar with cinnamon and nutmeg be bad? ..... well actually.... it can't!
Looks like the weather around here is going to be wetter over then next week which will mean cooler temperatures for a few days. Looking forward to being cooler during the day.
Below are the rest of the photo's from the couple of day's spent fixing Rima's wood shed.
p.s. Just a couple of final thoughts. I now have people from 67 countries who have seen this blog at least once. In most cases I think there must be people who actual look at it more than once, but I can't be for sure because I have no way of knowing who sees this Blog. That being said; I'm a little surprised that after more than 16,000 views, there have only been a handful of comments logged. It may be that there is a problem with actually doing a comment, but I have had several friends send me a practice one just to make sure, and they all seem to come through with no problem. There does seem to be one type of viewer that sends comments, but it turns out that my software sends all of those directly to my spam folder, because that is what they actually are. All of those are written and sent under an 'anonymous' name and they all, after making some generic comment that lets you know that no one actually read the blog, then goes on to invite you to read their blog. Maybe if they actually showed some real interest...... but most are pretty badly written.... more so than even my own writing. Plus they are all to sites that advertise for divorce counseling or welding or some such commercial venture. So just saying, if anyone out there wants to comment, as long as you keep it on point and reasonably clean, I wouldn't mind hearing from some of you.
Brian
*
It only took about two hours to get everything done and the trailer buttoned back up before it was time to head out and find some lunch. Ended up over at the Longmont Chipotle where I had a very nice chicken burrito with brown rice and both black and pinto beans. Along with a nice cold beverage and a good book it was easy to sit inside the air conditioned restaurant and read for about an hour before heading back.
The trip back down to George and Marge's took just as long as it did to drive up there. Because of extensive construction on I-25 through Denver I took the I-470 bypass around the west side of the city. Then because it was still clogged up between the intersection of I-470 and I-25 and the 80th avenue exit to the north, I ended up circling around and driving north on Pecos and Huron streets as far north as 120th street. So a little slower over all, but at least I was moving. Did the whole thing in reverse on the way back so I was back in town by 4:00.
Had told Marge and George that I would take them out to dinner around 5:15 and then promptly fell asleep on the couch reading my book. They are so polite that they didn't even wake me up, waiting instead until nearly 6:00 when I woke myself up, probably snoring. We went over to Los Delicious for a dinner of Mexican food. They had assorted classics such as tacos, enchilada's etc. while I had the tamale plate. Two pork tamale's smothered in green chili with a side of refried beans and rice. It was delicious!
We got home a little late, but part of what I brought down from the trailer was what was in the fridge and freezer, which included a package of frozen strawberries and one of blueberries as well as a couple uncooked pie crusts. I had promised to make them a pie for eating with their normal evening ice cream, so I got busy with that. Put all the ingredients from my basic pie recipe together and popped it in the oven. About an hour later we had it out of the oven and dished it up in a bowl for everyone. Add in a scoop of vanilla ice cream and you have a pretty good desert. Not sure you can really call it a pie, it was pretty soupy, but then, how can baked fruit, rolled in sugar with cinnamon and nutmeg be bad? ..... well actually.... it can't!
Looks like the weather around here is going to be wetter over then next week which will mean cooler temperatures for a few days. Looking forward to being cooler during the day.
Below are the rest of the photo's from the couple of day's spent fixing Rima's wood shed.
Fixing Rima's Woodshed #2 - May 2014
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| The rear sheathing has been put on and the shed is nearly done at this point. I used pressure treated 1"x6"x 8' long fencing slats for the exterior because it will match the existing once it has faded, and it is fairly cheap, and it should last for quite a few years. |
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| Looking at the finished west side of the shed. |
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| The back side of the shed showing the new 1"x6" sheathing we used. The wood comes from the building center still pretty wet from the pressure kilns. It also has a tendency to twist but Rima and I worked together at putting them on. I did most of the holding and de-twisting as she put a couple 6d nails into them at each framing member. She's pretty darn good at using a nail gun. |
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| Just one of the stacks of wood to be cut up and put into the new shed once it is done. |
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| Another pile of wood ready to be cut up and stored away. All of these trees are ones that I have cut down over the last couple of months. All are hardwoods that I thinned from around the house and barns. It won't be enough for the whole winter, but it will be a good start. |
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| The first batch is cut and now stacked in the shed. |
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| Some of the pieces are to big to put directly into her furnace so she borrowed a log splitter from a friend and we split all of those pieces up over an afternoon. I was off cutting up more trees at this point and she didn't wait until I was finished to start the machine up and get started. |
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| She's pretty good at this kind of thing. The log splitter has more than 34,000 psi, which was actually needed on some of the bigger pieces of black walnut. |
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| Success! |
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| A last view of the wood pile as it is growing. Rima actually cuts most of it as I hold the log and feed it into her. By the time we were finished cutting up all the trees we had down, there were nearly 6 full columns in the shed. Each one is about 8' long by 24" wide and nearly 7' high. So each column had nearly 1 actual cord in each stack. |
p.s. Just a couple of final thoughts. I now have people from 67 countries who have seen this blog at least once. In most cases I think there must be people who actual look at it more than once, but I can't be for sure because I have no way of knowing who sees this Blog. That being said; I'm a little surprised that after more than 16,000 views, there have only been a handful of comments logged. It may be that there is a problem with actually doing a comment, but I have had several friends send me a practice one just to make sure, and they all seem to come through with no problem. There does seem to be one type of viewer that sends comments, but it turns out that my software sends all of those directly to my spam folder, because that is what they actually are. All of those are written and sent under an 'anonymous' name and they all, after making some generic comment that lets you know that no one actually read the blog, then goes on to invite you to read their blog. Maybe if they actually showed some real interest...... but most are pretty badly written.... more so than even my own writing. Plus they are all to sites that advertise for divorce counseling or welding or some such commercial venture. So just saying, if anyone out there wants to comment, as long as you keep it on point and reasonably clean, I wouldn't mind hearing from some of you.
Brian
*
Saturday, July 26, 2014
Took off from Chadron State Park around 10:00 a.m. yesterday morning. It took a couple of hours for me to pack up the trailer, hook it up and then drive it over and empty all of the tanks before heading on to the highway. Took the highway out through the town of Lusk and on to I-25 headed south. There was a head wind against me the whole way and it was blowing at least 35+ mph, so the highway signs said. So it was hard to ever get the truck to go above 55 mph. Even at that though, you could pretty much watch the gas gauge and watch it ticking over toward empty faster than you can believe. Let me put it this way.... my gas mileage yesterday 'SUCKED'.
I had a late lunch in Cheyenne and waited for about an hour as a huge rain/hail storm appeared to be mangling the area just south of the border with Wyoming. Even with the delay it was only about 6:00 p.m. when I pulled into the St Vrain State Park near Longmont. I like camping there the night before tucking Esmerelda into her storage spot, because it gives me one last chance to flush out and empty all of the black and grey water tanks on the trailer. Unfortunately, there was no room in the campground last night, even though it was still only Thursday. So that was a bit of a bummer.
Turned the truck and trailer around and headed on back into the outskirts of Longmont where my trailer storage place is located. It only took an hour or so to get her unhooked and some stuff that lives in the back of the truck moved into the trailer for temporary storage. Also picked out some clean clothes and grabbed my basket of dirty ones, before heading on down to the south part of the Denver area. I had a quick bit to eat on the way, but it still took nearly two hours to go the distance. Lot's of road construction going on in the Denver area including two places where 4 lanes were squished down to one. Finally pulled up to my friends place, George and Marge, around 10:00 p.m. and managed to get everything unloaded and into the house.
Really nice to be back with my friends again. They are such a nice couple and I often feel they are much like a 2nd pair of parents. Except they are also such good friends. We sat around and talked for awhile and then headed off to bed.
Slept well last night and a good benefit of being here in the house is that my allergy cough had pretty much gone away over night. It is still there, but so much better now than it has been for several weeks. I am hoping that it will all go away the longer I am in the area.
Interesting to me is that I slept most of today. Woke up pretty early and had breakfast with G & M, but afterwards found that my eyes just kept closing. The same thing happened after lunch and I spent several hours this afternoon snoozing away. I was a little bit better this evening in that I managed to stay awake for most of the evening, although there may have been a little bit of snoozing going on as I sat on the couch and tried to read my book. Right now though it is nearly midnight and I am once again feeling sleepy. There are a bunch of photo's following this missive. I spent a couple of days last spring working a woodshed at Rima's. The whole back side of it had collapsed and was threatening to bring down some of the roof along with it. Had to move the rest of the wood out of it and clean a bunch of litter off the floor, but finally got to where I could start putting it back together again. The following pictures show some of the construction that went on and there will be a bunch more in a day or two.
*
I had a late lunch in Cheyenne and waited for about an hour as a huge rain/hail storm appeared to be mangling the area just south of the border with Wyoming. Even with the delay it was only about 6:00 p.m. when I pulled into the St Vrain State Park near Longmont. I like camping there the night before tucking Esmerelda into her storage spot, because it gives me one last chance to flush out and empty all of the black and grey water tanks on the trailer. Unfortunately, there was no room in the campground last night, even though it was still only Thursday. So that was a bit of a bummer.
Turned the truck and trailer around and headed on back into the outskirts of Longmont where my trailer storage place is located. It only took an hour or so to get her unhooked and some stuff that lives in the back of the truck moved into the trailer for temporary storage. Also picked out some clean clothes and grabbed my basket of dirty ones, before heading on down to the south part of the Denver area. I had a quick bit to eat on the way, but it still took nearly two hours to go the distance. Lot's of road construction going on in the Denver area including two places where 4 lanes were squished down to one. Finally pulled up to my friends place, George and Marge, around 10:00 p.m. and managed to get everything unloaded and into the house.
Really nice to be back with my friends again. They are such a nice couple and I often feel they are much like a 2nd pair of parents. Except they are also such good friends. We sat around and talked for awhile and then headed off to bed.
Slept well last night and a good benefit of being here in the house is that my allergy cough had pretty much gone away over night. It is still there, but so much better now than it has been for several weeks. I am hoping that it will all go away the longer I am in the area.
Interesting to me is that I slept most of today. Woke up pretty early and had breakfast with G & M, but afterwards found that my eyes just kept closing. The same thing happened after lunch and I spent several hours this afternoon snoozing away. I was a little bit better this evening in that I managed to stay awake for most of the evening, although there may have been a little bit of snoozing going on as I sat on the couch and tried to read my book. Right now though it is nearly midnight and I am once again feeling sleepy. There are a bunch of photo's following this missive. I spent a couple of days last spring working a woodshed at Rima's. The whole back side of it had collapsed and was threatening to bring down some of the roof along with it. Had to move the rest of the wood out of it and clean a bunch of litter off the floor, but finally got to where I could start putting it back together again. The following pictures show some of the construction that went on and there will be a bunch more in a day or two.
Fixing Rima's Woodshed #1 - May 2014
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| An overall view of the woodshed from Rima's deck. At this point I have already framed up a new back wall and 'bashed' it into place with a sledge hammer. The existing wall had pretty much rotted out and the roof was sagging nearly 2 feet in the center. |
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| The new back wall framing. It's all made out of pressure treated lumber and hopefully won't rot out as bad as the last wall did. Had to figure out a way to frame it up so it would fit in with the existing framing style. The original siding was clear cedar and a pretty good material in it's time. But even though resistant to rot and critter damage, it will eventually rot out and ants and termites will damage it as it gets older. |
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| The shed is built on a hill, which isn't the greatest place to put one. But it is what it is, so you just have to work with it. I installed some new pressure treated boards on the down hill side to strengthen the walls as well as hold the cut wood in better once it was stacked. Had to put in a couple support posts everywhere the new framing went in. Yet more holes to dig. |
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| Looking at the east side you can see the slope of the hill and how the boards fill up the space at the bottom. I hope that pulling the dirt along the side down hill a little will help save the original siding on the east and west sides. |
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| Had to do the same retaining wall kind of thing on the west wall also. |
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| Looking at the exterior of the west wall. |
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| I also dug out twenty years worth of old rotted bark and wood on the bottom of the shed floor so there would be more volume to store firewood in. I needed to put in a low retaining wall along the front of the shed also. |
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| Once the back wall was re-framed and the roof joists were beefed up and some 'hurricane ties' were installed, it was time to actually start on the roof itself. Here I'm peeling off the old roof shingles and underlayment. You can see there's a bit of rot going on up here also, but most of it is minor. The biggest problem is that they only used 3/8" plywood on the roof even though the joists were set on 24" centers. Very under designed. Eventually I swept the existing roof sheathing and sprayed it with a fungicide/insecticide before installing new 1/2" thick OSB over the whole thing. It finally felt strong enough to even support me. |
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| This is the existing front facia board. You can see where the carpenter ants, termites and rot have been having a field day. More stuff was sprayed on and then a new PT facia was nailed over it. |
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| A view looking at the new OSB, Oriented Strand Board, sheathing that I nailed on. |
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| Found a couple bundles of old shingles up in the barn. Enough anyway to put on this roof. Really don't like nailing on shingles, especially 3-tab types, but it isn't a very big roof and it's nearly flat. |
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| Looking out on the completed shed. Next time I'll show the sheathing we put on the rear wall as well as the start of the wood we cut up and started to stack inside. |
*
Wednesday, July 23, 2014
The rest of last night was kind of interesting. After finishing up doing pictures while sitting in Micky D's yesterday afternoon, I went in search of real food and found a wonderful little Mexican restaurant on the east side of the town of Alliance. I had one of their combo plates with an enchilada, taco and tostada. Had really wanted a tamale as one of my choices, but unfortunately they had run out of them for the day. Making me think that they might actually make them there on site. Based on the rest of the food though, I will need to go back at some point and try them out. The rest of the meal was wonderful, with good home made salsa and green chili to go with the rest of the items. Topping it all off was a hot out of the fryer sopapilla dipped in sugar and cinnamon and then served up with honey on the side. Really the best one I have ever had.
It was nearly dark when I turned the truck towards home and headed north. All along I could see clouds blotting out the sky and lightening flashing on a continuous basis. It only got darker and wilder as I approached the top of the plateau overlooking the valley the town of Chadron sits in. By that time I could see a huge black cloud sitting just to the west of the campground. I thought it might miss me though as the wind up there at that time was blowing out of the SE, away from the campground location. Of course when I finally drove into the state park 10 mins later the wind had shifted 180 degrees and was now blowing the worst of the storm right towards me and the trailer. Didn't even have time to hop out of the truck and get inside before the skies just opened up. Within seconds everything was drenched.... and then the hail started falling. Still sitting in the truck at this point so I just fired it back up and drove it over under a lone pine tree nearby. It wasn't a lot of protection, but it probably kept me from having to replace a windshield or get some cosmetic work done on the truck. Like most storms out here it only last about 10 mins, but probably dropped at least an inch of rain in that amount of time. It finally quieted down enough that I could drive back to Esmerelda and run inside. Much calmer feeling inside, but I noticed right away that one of the skylights there in the living area had been knocked full of holes. Not much I could do about it last night, but luckily the rain was soon over. It was obvious though that it was going to need to be patched, at least temporarily until it can be replaced.
So that is what I spent a couple hours this morning doing. Grabbed the ladder out of the back of the truck and a couple rolls of window and door flashing and went to work. Basically this stuff is a lot like a wide roll of duct tape, but it has a sticky layer of bitumen on the bottom of it. It works pretty well over all, but the sun and ultra violet light will break it down at some point, so it doesn't last forever. But it is now patched for the time being, and I'll need to grab a replacement skylight and get it installed at some point in the near future.
Got a few other chores done while the temperature was still cool enough to work outside. Put the lawn chairs and bike back on their rack, and got the cover repositioned over them all. Put the bike on facing the other way this time as a couple people pointed out to me that the front tire was hiding the license plate and rear brake light when it was facing that direction. It is hoped that turning it around will fix that problem. As a bit of a side light; the bumper my brother in law welded on for me last year has held up very well. No cracked welds and nothing on the verge of falling off this year. Have to thank him again for such a great job.
Stopped at the post office in town this afternoon and got my passport renewal form mailed off to the government. It is still more than 6 months before it will be needed again, so I hope it will all be done and sent back by then.
Just hanging out right now waiting until it's time to take off for Fort Robinson and Post Playhouse. Tonight's offering is my second screening of 'The Sound of Music'. Looking forward to hearing all my old favorites sung by a very talented cast. Am also hoping that the weather will stay decent this evening.... at least until I can make it back to the trailer later on.
*
It was nearly dark when I turned the truck towards home and headed north. All along I could see clouds blotting out the sky and lightening flashing on a continuous basis. It only got darker and wilder as I approached the top of the plateau overlooking the valley the town of Chadron sits in. By that time I could see a huge black cloud sitting just to the west of the campground. I thought it might miss me though as the wind up there at that time was blowing out of the SE, away from the campground location. Of course when I finally drove into the state park 10 mins later the wind had shifted 180 degrees and was now blowing the worst of the storm right towards me and the trailer. Didn't even have time to hop out of the truck and get inside before the skies just opened up. Within seconds everything was drenched.... and then the hail started falling. Still sitting in the truck at this point so I just fired it back up and drove it over under a lone pine tree nearby. It wasn't a lot of protection, but it probably kept me from having to replace a windshield or get some cosmetic work done on the truck. Like most storms out here it only last about 10 mins, but probably dropped at least an inch of rain in that amount of time. It finally quieted down enough that I could drive back to Esmerelda and run inside. Much calmer feeling inside, but I noticed right away that one of the skylights there in the living area had been knocked full of holes. Not much I could do about it last night, but luckily the rain was soon over. It was obvious though that it was going to need to be patched, at least temporarily until it can be replaced.
So that is what I spent a couple hours this morning doing. Grabbed the ladder out of the back of the truck and a couple rolls of window and door flashing and went to work. Basically this stuff is a lot like a wide roll of duct tape, but it has a sticky layer of bitumen on the bottom of it. It works pretty well over all, but the sun and ultra violet light will break it down at some point, so it doesn't last forever. But it is now patched for the time being, and I'll need to grab a replacement skylight and get it installed at some point in the near future.
Got a few other chores done while the temperature was still cool enough to work outside. Put the lawn chairs and bike back on their rack, and got the cover repositioned over them all. Put the bike on facing the other way this time as a couple people pointed out to me that the front tire was hiding the license plate and rear brake light when it was facing that direction. It is hoped that turning it around will fix that problem. As a bit of a side light; the bumper my brother in law welded on for me last year has held up very well. No cracked welds and nothing on the verge of falling off this year. Have to thank him again for such a great job.
Stopped at the post office in town this afternoon and got my passport renewal form mailed off to the government. It is still more than 6 months before it will be needed again, so I hope it will all be done and sent back by then.
Just hanging out right now waiting until it's time to take off for Fort Robinson and Post Playhouse. Tonight's offering is my second screening of 'The Sound of Music'. Looking forward to hearing all my old favorites sung by a very talented cast. Am also hoping that the weather will stay decent this evening.... at least until I can make it back to the trailer later on.
Puckett's Cabin along the Blue Ridge Parkway in Virginia May 2014
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| The original cabin of Orlena Hawks Puckett. She began a career of midwifery after the age of 50 and by the time she died at 102 she had helped deliver over 1,000 babies..... I just think it's a neat little cabin. |
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| A close look of the dovetail corners, all chopped out, as are the logs themselves, with nothing more than a sharp axe and adz. Note the telltale lines along the face of each log which shows where the log was chopped with an axe in order to square them up. Also note how low the top of the door is. I think people were just shorter back then. |
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| Another close up of the cabin corner. |
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| On one end of the cabin is the fireplace. This one is built out of stone instead of sticks and mud like so many of them were back then. Of course many of those buildings are no longer around, many of them because their chimneys caught on fire and burnt to the ground. This is a very nice chimney. |
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| Another view showing how the chimney pops out of the cabin framing and then turns and goes up the side of the building. |
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| One last view showing how small this building really was. |
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Tuesday, July 22, 2014
Still very hot in NW Nebraska, not as hot as yesterday where the temperature hit over 100 degrees, but still plenty warm in any case. I was up late last night because it was still 90 degrees at 9:00 p.m., so it was well after midnight before it dropped in to the low 80's and I stopped sweating. Once it cooled off however it made for some decent sleeping. There was some rain storms going on somewhere around me as I could see the lightning flashes reflecting off the clouds. But I could never figure out if the storms were south, north or west of me.
Was up and out the door of the trailer around 10:00 this morning. First thing on my list of things to do was to go over to the Park Office and see if they would let me stay one more day longer than I had intended. Since the park campground was nearly empty, and has never been full, even on the weekends while I have been here, it was no problem to stay as long as I wanted to. Indeed, the ranger behind the desk gave me some information that may come in handy next year as I pass through. Turns out you can actually get a discount if you stay more than 15 days during certain times of the year, with a sliding scale that increases with the amount of time you sign up for. Of course you have to pay ahead of time, and there is no refund if you have to leave early, but that is no different than any other park I have stayed in. To bad I didn't know that this time around, I could of saved 15%-20% this summer alone. Oh well..... next year.
Also stopped in at the building where you can do arts and crafts and check out fishing poles, archery equipment and tennis rackets. My aim there was to pick up a new shot glass from the park. They had some that are hand etched by one of their seasonal workers. It just says Chadron State Park, and isn't at all well done. But it is hand made, and it didn't come from China, so that is one good point anyway.
Drove on down to the town of Alliance after that. The Carnegie Art Museum was open today and that was a nice way to spend an hour. All of the art is supplied by local artists, and nearly all of it is for sale, so in that respect it is actually more like a very nice art gallery. They had 3 featured artists this quarter and all of them were very good. Lots of scenery paintings but also some featuring Native American themes and some featuring wildlife. I didn't see anything I couldn't live without, but there was a lot of very nice stuff. There are also other items on display from other artists in the area and all of that is for sale. They have some very nice blown glass items that are quite reasonably priced. If someone was in need of a vase or glass bowl I would highly recommend that place to look for them.
Also spent some time walking around some of the area in and around the old downtown section. They have some wonderful old bungalow style houses in the area, some that are rather run down and some that look like they were built yesterday. One really interesting thing I noticed in an old brick building on a corner of the old main street was a series of old stain glass windows high up at the top of the outside walls. They were about 3' tall and more than 20' long and one had the word 'GARAGE' in big opaque white glass right in the middle of one of them. I could only think how neat it was to still have that wonderful piece of history in place. The building is no longer a garage of course, in fact it is cardio work out place now..... they have a nice "neon" sign to call attention to themselves.... it's just not the same somehow.
Headed back to camp after this, but want to work on a few pictures before I leave the nice air conditioning here. Not much else that has to be done otherwise. Tomorrow I have a ticket to go see the play 'Sound of Music' one last time out at the Post Playhouse. Have been wanting to see that play once more since the night I first saw it. Yesterday I just decided to see if there was a ticket available, and since there was one, I bought it. Would also like to go out to Fort Rob a little early in order to go through the several museums out there that I still haven't seen yet. In the meantime, there are still more than a dozen books loaded on the Kindle so I'm pretty happy and content to just hag out.
*
Was up and out the door of the trailer around 10:00 this morning. First thing on my list of things to do was to go over to the Park Office and see if they would let me stay one more day longer than I had intended. Since the park campground was nearly empty, and has never been full, even on the weekends while I have been here, it was no problem to stay as long as I wanted to. Indeed, the ranger behind the desk gave me some information that may come in handy next year as I pass through. Turns out you can actually get a discount if you stay more than 15 days during certain times of the year, with a sliding scale that increases with the amount of time you sign up for. Of course you have to pay ahead of time, and there is no refund if you have to leave early, but that is no different than any other park I have stayed in. To bad I didn't know that this time around, I could of saved 15%-20% this summer alone. Oh well..... next year.
Also stopped in at the building where you can do arts and crafts and check out fishing poles, archery equipment and tennis rackets. My aim there was to pick up a new shot glass from the park. They had some that are hand etched by one of their seasonal workers. It just says Chadron State Park, and isn't at all well done. But it is hand made, and it didn't come from China, so that is one good point anyway.
Drove on down to the town of Alliance after that. The Carnegie Art Museum was open today and that was a nice way to spend an hour. All of the art is supplied by local artists, and nearly all of it is for sale, so in that respect it is actually more like a very nice art gallery. They had 3 featured artists this quarter and all of them were very good. Lots of scenery paintings but also some featuring Native American themes and some featuring wildlife. I didn't see anything I couldn't live without, but there was a lot of very nice stuff. There are also other items on display from other artists in the area and all of that is for sale. They have some very nice blown glass items that are quite reasonably priced. If someone was in need of a vase or glass bowl I would highly recommend that place to look for them.
Also spent some time walking around some of the area in and around the old downtown section. They have some wonderful old bungalow style houses in the area, some that are rather run down and some that look like they were built yesterday. One really interesting thing I noticed in an old brick building on a corner of the old main street was a series of old stain glass windows high up at the top of the outside walls. They were about 3' tall and more than 20' long and one had the word 'GARAGE' in big opaque white glass right in the middle of one of them. I could only think how neat it was to still have that wonderful piece of history in place. The building is no longer a garage of course, in fact it is cardio work out place now..... they have a nice "neon" sign to call attention to themselves.... it's just not the same somehow.
Headed back to camp after this, but want to work on a few pictures before I leave the nice air conditioning here. Not much else that has to be done otherwise. Tomorrow I have a ticket to go see the play 'Sound of Music' one last time out at the Post Playhouse. Have been wanting to see that play once more since the night I first saw it. Yesterday I just decided to see if there was a ticket available, and since there was one, I bought it. Would also like to go out to Fort Rob a little early in order to go through the several museums out there that I still haven't seen yet. In the meantime, there are still more than a dozen books loaded on the Kindle so I'm pretty happy and content to just hag out.
*
Monday, July 21, 2014
Hot, hot, hot! It has been in the very high 90's these past few days.... maybe even up above 100 late in the afternoon. So it is a good thing the humidity outside is still in the single digits, otherwise everyone would be slowly melting into the dust on the street.
So I have been taking it pretty slow because of the heat these during the last couple of days. I took a long drive all the way into Scott's Bluff on Saturday. Partly to go visit a couple of sites, and partly so I could spend some time sitting in the air conditioning of the truck. That being said; I went and visited the site at 'Chimney Rock' again and looked through all the old pictures and accounts of the monument. Chimney Rock was used as a guide post for settlers going west on the Oregon Trail back in the 1880's. What is most interesting to me is to see the old photo's of the rock spire from the last century, and compare them to what it looks like today. Made of a pretty erodible type of stone, it is less than half the height of what it was even 100 years ago.
Once done there I headed west to the actual Scott's Bluff Monument. Another site keyed in the settler migration along the Oregon Trail. This area was important because the wagon trains had to turn away from the Platte River at this point and climb up and over a pass through some cliffs bordering the river. Looking at the area today, with all the roads and trails, you wouldn't think there would of been any real problems moving one of the old 'prairie schooners' up and over the pass. But it obviously wasn't that easy way back then. Anyway; they have a small museum there and some displays of wagons and such outside. You can also walk out a trail and see where some of the ruts from the wagons on the trail are still viewable. It's nice to sit in the comfort of your 4-wheel drive truck and wonder about the hardships the pioneers must of experienced.
Yesterday was spent in and around the State Park for most of the day. Did some walking earlier in the day and cleaned up some of the inside of the trailer. I had thought my nephew Brian and his girlfriend Liz were coming out later on for a cookout, but it turns out that I was actually suppose to go into town to their house instead. So I drove in only a little late and met up with them. Brian grilled up some of the biggest T-bone steaks I had ever seen, along with some fresh asparagus. With the salad and bread that Liz fixed it was a meal to remember. In fact I am still in awe that I ate the whole thing, but it was delicious.
The temperature usually drops a good 15 degrees as soon as the sun goes down at night, so I have been staying up late and reading until one or two in the morning. Not last night though, for some reason I was ready to go to sleep before even 11:00 p.m. So you would think I would be up pretty early in the morning with all of that sleep, but it is so nice and cool in the trailer until around 9:00 that you really don't want to get up and waste the cool.
I was up soon afterwards though, and just hung out around the trailer until about 11:30. I headed on into Chadron at that point as my nephew Luke and his family were going to be passing through on their way to Rapid City and they wanted to do lunch with me one last time while I was in the area. We ended up meeting at a local restaurant here in town and had a wonderful meal together. The two kids, Aubree and Rykin are just adorable, especially when they are in good moods. Aubree usually is, but Rykin, at the age of two, is always a question. But if he's fussy, just wait 5 mins and he'll change. Today though is was just about perfect for a two year old. He spent most of lunch trying to feed me his french fries and then giggling when I would eat one. So it was a fun meal. The adults are doing well of course, but you sometimes almost forget they are there when the kids are around.
Lunch had to end eventually though, and after saying goodbye I headed over to the local Wal-Mart. The lady down at the court house in town had told me that they could do passport photo's there so I went in search of a couple of them. My passport isn't actually due to expire until early next year, but it seemed a good idea to get all the paperwork in now just in case a problem developed later on. Plus I hear it sometimes takes up to 4-5 months any more just for them to process it these days. Unless you pay extra of course. For some reason that concept just seems wrong to me for some reason.
Anyway; the photo's are done and they are a bit.... ugh! But what the heck, I don't have to look at that picture very often anyway. Hopefully they will have everything done and sent back to me before I need it next February when I go to the Caribbean. Will also need it later on next spring when I head over to England for a week long contra dance there. Hope to visit a bit longer than a week and maybe take in a couple other countries while there also, but it will depend on funds, or the lack of them at that point.
Am also exploring the possibility of going to Australia next fall for a week long contra dance. Just heard about it not too long ago and really don't know much about it yet. But that one sounds like it would be a lot of fun also. Of course, once down there I may not come back until they actually kick me out of the country. Something to do with that accent. But then I can always go over to New Zealand and check that country out too.
Only one more day in this area for me. Will start to pick up and put things away tomorrow in preparation for getting on the road again. Only going down to Colorado from here so it shouldn't take more than a day to get there. Even then though I may spend one more day in a state park outside of Longmont before tucking Esmerelda into her storage space. It just takes a long time to unpack everything, put it all away, turn off the batteries and propane and do all of the other 100 or so things that need to be done before heading off to my friends place in Denver. Looking forward to seeing a lot of people again. Most of them I haven't seen for nearly a year, so it will be fun to catch up with them all once again. Right now though I need to go do some email and banking stuff that I have let slide. There are a couple photo's below that I took a couple of weeks ago when I first made it into town. My nephew Brian and I walked into some ponds he knows of, to do some fishing. Plenty of fish in the ponds but nothing biting that day unfortunately. Still, it was a very nice day to be outdoors enjoying life.
*
So I have been taking it pretty slow because of the heat these during the last couple of days. I took a long drive all the way into Scott's Bluff on Saturday. Partly to go visit a couple of sites, and partly so I could spend some time sitting in the air conditioning of the truck. That being said; I went and visited the site at 'Chimney Rock' again and looked through all the old pictures and accounts of the monument. Chimney Rock was used as a guide post for settlers going west on the Oregon Trail back in the 1880's. What is most interesting to me is to see the old photo's of the rock spire from the last century, and compare them to what it looks like today. Made of a pretty erodible type of stone, it is less than half the height of what it was even 100 years ago.
Once done there I headed west to the actual Scott's Bluff Monument. Another site keyed in the settler migration along the Oregon Trail. This area was important because the wagon trains had to turn away from the Platte River at this point and climb up and over a pass through some cliffs bordering the river. Looking at the area today, with all the roads and trails, you wouldn't think there would of been any real problems moving one of the old 'prairie schooners' up and over the pass. But it obviously wasn't that easy way back then. Anyway; they have a small museum there and some displays of wagons and such outside. You can also walk out a trail and see where some of the ruts from the wagons on the trail are still viewable. It's nice to sit in the comfort of your 4-wheel drive truck and wonder about the hardships the pioneers must of experienced.
Yesterday was spent in and around the State Park for most of the day. Did some walking earlier in the day and cleaned up some of the inside of the trailer. I had thought my nephew Brian and his girlfriend Liz were coming out later on for a cookout, but it turns out that I was actually suppose to go into town to their house instead. So I drove in only a little late and met up with them. Brian grilled up some of the biggest T-bone steaks I had ever seen, along with some fresh asparagus. With the salad and bread that Liz fixed it was a meal to remember. In fact I am still in awe that I ate the whole thing, but it was delicious.
The temperature usually drops a good 15 degrees as soon as the sun goes down at night, so I have been staying up late and reading until one or two in the morning. Not last night though, for some reason I was ready to go to sleep before even 11:00 p.m. So you would think I would be up pretty early in the morning with all of that sleep, but it is so nice and cool in the trailer until around 9:00 that you really don't want to get up and waste the cool.
I was up soon afterwards though, and just hung out around the trailer until about 11:30. I headed on into Chadron at that point as my nephew Luke and his family were going to be passing through on their way to Rapid City and they wanted to do lunch with me one last time while I was in the area. We ended up meeting at a local restaurant here in town and had a wonderful meal together. The two kids, Aubree and Rykin are just adorable, especially when they are in good moods. Aubree usually is, but Rykin, at the age of two, is always a question. But if he's fussy, just wait 5 mins and he'll change. Today though is was just about perfect for a two year old. He spent most of lunch trying to feed me his french fries and then giggling when I would eat one. So it was a fun meal. The adults are doing well of course, but you sometimes almost forget they are there when the kids are around.
Lunch had to end eventually though, and after saying goodbye I headed over to the local Wal-Mart. The lady down at the court house in town had told me that they could do passport photo's there so I went in search of a couple of them. My passport isn't actually due to expire until early next year, but it seemed a good idea to get all the paperwork in now just in case a problem developed later on. Plus I hear it sometimes takes up to 4-5 months any more just for them to process it these days. Unless you pay extra of course. For some reason that concept just seems wrong to me for some reason.
Anyway; the photo's are done and they are a bit.... ugh! But what the heck, I don't have to look at that picture very often anyway. Hopefully they will have everything done and sent back to me before I need it next February when I go to the Caribbean. Will also need it later on next spring when I head over to England for a week long contra dance there. Hope to visit a bit longer than a week and maybe take in a couple other countries while there also, but it will depend on funds, or the lack of them at that point.
Am also exploring the possibility of going to Australia next fall for a week long contra dance. Just heard about it not too long ago and really don't know much about it yet. But that one sounds like it would be a lot of fun also. Of course, once down there I may not come back until they actually kick me out of the country. Something to do with that accent. But then I can always go over to New Zealand and check that country out too.
Only one more day in this area for me. Will start to pick up and put things away tomorrow in preparation for getting on the road again. Only going down to Colorado from here so it shouldn't take more than a day to get there. Even then though I may spend one more day in a state park outside of Longmont before tucking Esmerelda into her storage space. It just takes a long time to unpack everything, put it all away, turn off the batteries and propane and do all of the other 100 or so things that need to be done before heading off to my friends place in Denver. Looking forward to seeing a lot of people again. Most of them I haven't seen for nearly a year, so it will be fun to catch up with them all once again. Right now though I need to go do some email and banking stuff that I have let slide. There are a couple photo's below that I took a couple of weeks ago when I first made it into town. My nephew Brian and I walked into some ponds he knows of, to do some fishing. Plenty of fish in the ponds but nothing biting that day unfortunately. Still, it was a very nice day to be outdoors enjoying life.
Fishing with Brian near Fort Robinson Nebraska - July 2014
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| One of several ponds we were fishing in. By this time in the summer the moss and algae has grown pretty thick. The fish are still there and are doing well, but it might be to hot for any kind of bite. Still pretty though. |
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| Brian and I both saw a monster trout, (at least 24" long), hanging out around the outlet, but neither of us had any luck in tempting it to bite. I even bounced my fly off it's head a couple of times, but it just wasn't interested. I can't even talk about it as the 'one that got away', because it was never on my line in the first place. |
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| There were still a few wild flowers out and about that were still blooming including this very common milk weed bloom. The closer I got in the prettier it got. |
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| You can never... at least I can't, catch the way the light reflects off of and through these things. Still not a bad shot though. |
*
Friday, July 18, 2014
Spent the day yesterday driving west into Wyoming and the town of Lusk. No real reason to go other than I had driven through that town several times over the years, always with the trailer behind the truck, so I never had a chance to actually tour the town and see what there was to see.
As it turns out there really isn't much of anything to see in town, not for outsiders or tourists anyway, and that is okay. I walked the 6 or so blocks of the old downtown area and looked at the building fronts where every 2nd or 3rd store front was boarded up and empty. Still a few bars, still a hardware store and a couple car parts stores as well as a couple of gas stations on the corners. So that left the 'Stagecoach Museum' as about the only thing to really visit. But first some food...
After talking to a local it looked like the only place in town to eat was either the local 'Subway' or some place called the 'Triangle 4', or some such derivation of those words. I picked it just because I'm not enamored of Subway sandwiches, and there seemed to be a fair number of cars parked out front of the other restaurant.
Turns out that it was a good choice as I chose the 'Mule Kicker' burger from the menu. This brought me a huge 1/2 pound cheese burger, handmade with all the fixin's, and hot french fries. A couple of glasses of ice cold tea finished up a pretty nice meal out and it was all well under $10, even with a tip.
Walked on back to the Stagecoach Museum after that and paid my $2 fee to come in and view the exhibits. While it did have a whole room devoted to the stagecoach history in the area, most of the museum actually seemed to be more involved with the history of that area of Wyoming, including sections detailing the range war between the sheep ranchers and the cattle men, as well as the history of the railroad in the area and the impact it had on the influx of homesteaders that it brought into that little corner of the country. There was some old farm and ranch machinery to view as well as domestic homesteading items to look at, so the price to get in was quite reasonable.
After filling the truck up with some decent Wyoming gas I was ready to head back towards the town of Crawford where I was to meet my nephew Brian and his partner Liz for dinner. I speak of "good" gas because the stuff I have been putting in my tank since arriving in this state really sucks. I have watched as the mileage has dropped all the way down to slightly more than 12 mpg, even without the trailer on, as well as the engine running rougher than it should. I would of thought it was my imagination if my brother in law hadn't told me that Nebraska was now allowing a new blend of gas to be sold, I guess because it can keep the price low, even if it is horrible stuff. Once I filled the tank with the same level of gas in Wyoming you could immediately feel and see, via the gas gauge, that this was a lot better stuff.
I got back to Crawford a little early so I found a nice shade tree to park under and took a nice, though short nap. Brian and Liz showed up right on time and we headed to a good restaurant there in Crawford, 'The Ranch House'. They serve basic western food, burgers, steaks, chicken etc. Unfortunately I was still rather full from lunch so I stuck with a reuben sandwich instead of taking on the fully loaded chicken fried steak with mashed potatoes and gravy that the other two had. It looked good too.
From dinner we headed on out to the Post Playhouse for that nights play, Guys and Doll's. Even though it was the second time for me to see this play, it was still a wonderful couple of hours sitting and watching these actors ply their trade to good effect. It is a long play, nearly two and a half hours, but it still seemed to go by way to fast.
Back home to the trailer after that and a nice cool few hours of sleep. My allergies have really been kicking up these past few days. It may be all the flowers and weeds out there that are having a field day this year because of all the rain in the area. It may also have to do with the wind that has been blowing constantly, though not too hard, for the past two weeks. Or it might be that there are more wildfires out west, or north or south of me, that are blowing their load of particle filled smoke my way. What ever the reason I have been downing over the counter allergy drugs like candy these past few days, all without much relief. Indeed, the only thing it seems to of done is make my pee really, really expensive. So last night, since it was cool, I closed the windows and vents on the trailer and went to bed like that. Amazingly, that seemed to work. I woke up hot, but my sinuses were much clearer and I had nearly stopped coughing this annoyingly little cough that often develops along with other allergy symptoms. My ribs are still a bit sore from all the coughing but I am now feeling much better. I decided not to take another road trip today, this time to the east and the town of Valentine, because I was feeling puny enough that I just didn't want to sit in my truck for 4-5 hours. Instead I have been holed up at McDonald's trying to up grade some software and try to figure out why the computer keeps bombing out and giving me the 'Blue Screen of Death'. It seems to be working better now.
Getting ready to head back out to the trailer in a few more moments. Need to stop and do some grocery shopping, but otherwise it seems like it will be a pretty quiet evening.
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As it turns out there really isn't much of anything to see in town, not for outsiders or tourists anyway, and that is okay. I walked the 6 or so blocks of the old downtown area and looked at the building fronts where every 2nd or 3rd store front was boarded up and empty. Still a few bars, still a hardware store and a couple car parts stores as well as a couple of gas stations on the corners. So that left the 'Stagecoach Museum' as about the only thing to really visit. But first some food...
After talking to a local it looked like the only place in town to eat was either the local 'Subway' or some place called the 'Triangle 4', or some such derivation of those words. I picked it just because I'm not enamored of Subway sandwiches, and there seemed to be a fair number of cars parked out front of the other restaurant.
Turns out that it was a good choice as I chose the 'Mule Kicker' burger from the menu. This brought me a huge 1/2 pound cheese burger, handmade with all the fixin's, and hot french fries. A couple of glasses of ice cold tea finished up a pretty nice meal out and it was all well under $10, even with a tip.
Walked on back to the Stagecoach Museum after that and paid my $2 fee to come in and view the exhibits. While it did have a whole room devoted to the stagecoach history in the area, most of the museum actually seemed to be more involved with the history of that area of Wyoming, including sections detailing the range war between the sheep ranchers and the cattle men, as well as the history of the railroad in the area and the impact it had on the influx of homesteaders that it brought into that little corner of the country. There was some old farm and ranch machinery to view as well as domestic homesteading items to look at, so the price to get in was quite reasonable.
After filling the truck up with some decent Wyoming gas I was ready to head back towards the town of Crawford where I was to meet my nephew Brian and his partner Liz for dinner. I speak of "good" gas because the stuff I have been putting in my tank since arriving in this state really sucks. I have watched as the mileage has dropped all the way down to slightly more than 12 mpg, even without the trailer on, as well as the engine running rougher than it should. I would of thought it was my imagination if my brother in law hadn't told me that Nebraska was now allowing a new blend of gas to be sold, I guess because it can keep the price low, even if it is horrible stuff. Once I filled the tank with the same level of gas in Wyoming you could immediately feel and see, via the gas gauge, that this was a lot better stuff.
I got back to Crawford a little early so I found a nice shade tree to park under and took a nice, though short nap. Brian and Liz showed up right on time and we headed to a good restaurant there in Crawford, 'The Ranch House'. They serve basic western food, burgers, steaks, chicken etc. Unfortunately I was still rather full from lunch so I stuck with a reuben sandwich instead of taking on the fully loaded chicken fried steak with mashed potatoes and gravy that the other two had. It looked good too.
From dinner we headed on out to the Post Playhouse for that nights play, Guys and Doll's. Even though it was the second time for me to see this play, it was still a wonderful couple of hours sitting and watching these actors ply their trade to good effect. It is a long play, nearly two and a half hours, but it still seemed to go by way to fast.
Back home to the trailer after that and a nice cool few hours of sleep. My allergies have really been kicking up these past few days. It may be all the flowers and weeds out there that are having a field day this year because of all the rain in the area. It may also have to do with the wind that has been blowing constantly, though not too hard, for the past two weeks. Or it might be that there are more wildfires out west, or north or south of me, that are blowing their load of particle filled smoke my way. What ever the reason I have been downing over the counter allergy drugs like candy these past few days, all without much relief. Indeed, the only thing it seems to of done is make my pee really, really expensive. So last night, since it was cool, I closed the windows and vents on the trailer and went to bed like that. Amazingly, that seemed to work. I woke up hot, but my sinuses were much clearer and I had nearly stopped coughing this annoyingly little cough that often develops along with other allergy symptoms. My ribs are still a bit sore from all the coughing but I am now feeling much better. I decided not to take another road trip today, this time to the east and the town of Valentine, because I was feeling puny enough that I just didn't want to sit in my truck for 4-5 hours. Instead I have been holed up at McDonald's trying to up grade some software and try to figure out why the computer keeps bombing out and giving me the 'Blue Screen of Death'. It seems to be working better now.
Getting ready to head back out to the trailer in a few more moments. Need to stop and do some grocery shopping, but otherwise it seems like it will be a pretty quiet evening.
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Wednesday, July 16, 2014
Very quiet here still. Kind of grey and cooler overall, it is a nice change from the high 90's and higher last week. So it was a nice morning to sleep in and enjoy the coolness of the early morning. Add in that there are maybe 8-10 other campers in the campground, and the closest to me is several hundred feet away, and it is nice and quiet with only a few birds making any noise in the morning.
Once up it was still awfully quiet. There were no plans for anything big today so I just loafed around the trailer and read my book and took a nice shower. Did have a couple of phone calls during the late morning, although there still isn't much phone coverage out in the campground. It is still better than it has been in the past though, as I could almost understand my nephew Brian as we set up a time and a place to meet this evening in order to go out for a drive in a new area he wants me to see.
Also got another call from a friend in Denver wanting to know when I'll be arriving there. I'll need to give him a call later on and let him know what day I think I'll be there. Right now it looks like next Tuesday late in the day, but that may change by a day or two as time goes on.
I must say something about the play I saw last night out at the Post Playhouse in Fort Robinson State Park. It was 'A Tribute to Frank Sinatra' and consisted of 2 male and 2 female actors as well as a 3 piece band on stage, singing songs made famous by Frank. Over all it was a very good performance. All 4 of the singers have strong voices, but only one of them, one of the women, had a truly wonderful voice for doing Sinatra songs. The band was outstanding, consisting of a piano player, bass player and drummer. All three also perform at some of the other plays performed out there and they are really, really good.
So over all, it was fun to hear some of the old songs. I learned that Frank actually recorded over 1,300 songs during his career. They didn't sing them all last night, but it was neat to note that there were only 4-5 of them they did perform that I didn't know right off.
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Once up it was still awfully quiet. There were no plans for anything big today so I just loafed around the trailer and read my book and took a nice shower. Did have a couple of phone calls during the late morning, although there still isn't much phone coverage out in the campground. It is still better than it has been in the past though, as I could almost understand my nephew Brian as we set up a time and a place to meet this evening in order to go out for a drive in a new area he wants me to see.
Also got another call from a friend in Denver wanting to know when I'll be arriving there. I'll need to give him a call later on and let him know what day I think I'll be there. Right now it looks like next Tuesday late in the day, but that may change by a day or two as time goes on.
I must say something about the play I saw last night out at the Post Playhouse in Fort Robinson State Park. It was 'A Tribute to Frank Sinatra' and consisted of 2 male and 2 female actors as well as a 3 piece band on stage, singing songs made famous by Frank. Over all it was a very good performance. All 4 of the singers have strong voices, but only one of them, one of the women, had a truly wonderful voice for doing Sinatra songs. The band was outstanding, consisting of a piano player, bass player and drummer. All three also perform at some of the other plays performed out there and they are really, really good.
So over all, it was fun to hear some of the old songs. I learned that Frank actually recorded over 1,300 songs during his career. They didn't sing them all last night, but it was neat to note that there were only 4-5 of them they did perform that I didn't know right off.
Bison in the Black Hills of South Dakota - July 7, 2014
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| A single old bull off by his self. |
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| The rest of the herd is off in the distance enjoying the lush green grass. |
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| I would of loved seeing herds of millions, but I'm about 200 years to late for that. So I guess this will have to do for the time being. |
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| A standoff as this bull crosses the road to get back to the rest of the herd. I thought for a little bit that there might be an actual confrontation. I would of been betting on the buffalo. |
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Tuesday, July 15, 2014
As thought, last night was pretty quiet after the hectic running around of the previous couple of days. I did go out for a nice drive in the late evening, seeing lots of deer and about 30 head of elk. Most were seen in the last 30 mins of light of course, so they were hard to pick out at times, but I was able to discern a couple of spike elk, one 2x2 bull and one small 5x5, most likely he was only two years old. All the others appeared to be cows and calves just out enjoying a nice cool night of munching on some farmers alfalfa field.
One really cool thing though, was seeing at least 7, there may have been 1 or 2 more, whitetail bucks silhouetted against the red tinged sky. Most were smaller 2x2, 3x3, etc., but there was one really nice 5x5 with a really broad spread. It was nice to see them though, and all of the other deer I saw last night, because a couple of years ago this area experienced a viral disease of ruminants called Bluetongue disease. It usually isn't that contagious among deer species as it's main vector is sheep. But once in awhile it will hit other species like cattle, antelope or deer. For some reason whitetails in this area really got hit hard back then killing a lot of them in a very short amount of time. So they have been in short supply around this area since then.
Very cool temperatures last night. When I finally went to bed after finishing up another book, it was already down to 52 degrees. I imagine it got down into the 40's for sure, but forgot to check the thermometer this morning to see.
Spent most of the morning just hanging out at the trailer reading and cleaning up a bit. I hit the road around 2:00 p.m. where my first stop was at the State Park office at the entrance to the park. Had to go in and see if they would let me stay for another week even though it is suppose to be a maximum of 14 days at any one time. But then, since I got there two weeks ago, they haven't been full in the campground, even over the 4th of July or Fur Trade Days weekends. They let me stay in the end, money up front trumping maybe getting some one else coming in later, thereby proving that money still triumphs over most anything else. How sad.
From the park it was on to a barbershop here in Chadron. There is one guy there that owns it and that I have gotten a haircut from for 3 years now. He always does a good job, is quick and he is pretty cheap over all. Came out of there with shorter hair and feeling much more cool.
I'm headed out to Fort Rob. after I finish up here. The play for this evening is a tribute to Frank Sinatra. Not sure what that really means, but I am sure it will include someone singing a lot of the songs that Frank use to like.... and I like those.
Other than that, there isn't much else going on. I will have another play on Thursday and plan to hang out with my nephew and his girlfriend tomorrow night. There are still a few things around in this area that I haven't seen and there are always things that I don't mind going back and looking at again.
But right now there are a bunch of pictures below from the trip I took to the Black Hills of South Dakota last week.
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One really cool thing though, was seeing at least 7, there may have been 1 or 2 more, whitetail bucks silhouetted against the red tinged sky. Most were smaller 2x2, 3x3, etc., but there was one really nice 5x5 with a really broad spread. It was nice to see them though, and all of the other deer I saw last night, because a couple of years ago this area experienced a viral disease of ruminants called Bluetongue disease. It usually isn't that contagious among deer species as it's main vector is sheep. But once in awhile it will hit other species like cattle, antelope or deer. For some reason whitetails in this area really got hit hard back then killing a lot of them in a very short amount of time. So they have been in short supply around this area since then.
Very cool temperatures last night. When I finally went to bed after finishing up another book, it was already down to 52 degrees. I imagine it got down into the 40's for sure, but forgot to check the thermometer this morning to see.
Spent most of the morning just hanging out at the trailer reading and cleaning up a bit. I hit the road around 2:00 p.m. where my first stop was at the State Park office at the entrance to the park. Had to go in and see if they would let me stay for another week even though it is suppose to be a maximum of 14 days at any one time. But then, since I got there two weeks ago, they haven't been full in the campground, even over the 4th of July or Fur Trade Days weekends. They let me stay in the end, money up front trumping maybe getting some one else coming in later, thereby proving that money still triumphs over most anything else. How sad.
From the park it was on to a barbershop here in Chadron. There is one guy there that owns it and that I have gotten a haircut from for 3 years now. He always does a good job, is quick and he is pretty cheap over all. Came out of there with shorter hair and feeling much more cool.
I'm headed out to Fort Rob. after I finish up here. The play for this evening is a tribute to Frank Sinatra. Not sure what that really means, but I am sure it will include someone singing a lot of the songs that Frank use to like.... and I like those.
Other than that, there isn't much else going on. I will have another play on Thursday and plan to hang out with my nephew and his girlfriend tomorrow night. There are still a few things around in this area that I haven't seen and there are always things that I don't mind going back and looking at again.
But right now there are a bunch of pictures below from the trip I took to the Black Hills of South Dakota last week.
1880's Steam Train in the Black Hills of South Dakota
July 7, 2014
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| The first view of the train as it pulls into the station at Keystone. Today the train consists of 7 assorted passenger cars while the locomotive is a 2-6-6-2T Mallet type steam engine. |
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| This station has a short concrete platform that is long enough to unload the front 2-3 cars. Passengers in the cars behind them have to walk through the other cars to the head of the train. |
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| Once the passengers are unloaded the engine is uncoupled and pulls into the station to fill up on water, it needs about 2,700 gallons for the trip, and a chance to look over all the moving parts. |
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| The 'fireman' is in charge of climbing up on the tank and lowering the water tank spout down to where it can refill the tanks. This locomotive, instead of pulling a separate tender which holds water and fuel, has a tank that wraps around the outside of the engine fire box. This does several things, the first being that the weight of all that water directly over the driving wheels helps with traction and allows the engine to pull more weight. It also puts the water in direct contact with the outside of the fire box so that it is already warm when it is needed and therefor takes less fuel to bring it up to steaming temperature. Putting the water there also means that the engine no longer has to tow a separate car behind it and can therefor pull more cars that increase the bottom line. In this locomotives case the fuel it uses is used oil, and it is stored in a second tank located at the very back of the engine. |
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| Looking at the front coupler on the locomotive. |
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| The engineer spends some time oiling some of the many moving parts on the locomotive. |
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| What makes this locomotive different from most is that it actually has two separate driving engines in one locomotive. In front of the engineer is the first set of 6 driving wheels, with another separate set of 6 just behind them to the left. The back engine uses high pressure steam running through the rear set of smaller cylinders to provide power through the driving rods. The front engine then takes that previously used steam, and because some of it's power, (pressure), has been used, it sends it through the larger front set of cylinders to drive that set of driving wheels. Note the difference in size between the front and rear cylinders. Those are the bulky apparatus just in front of the driving wheels of each engine. |
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| Back in the 80's there was evidently a flash flood along the creek the train follows and it wiped out the last 3 miles of track into the town of Keystone. Since the line wasn't making much money at that time running freight the owners at that time never rebuilt that section. Instead they sold much of the land and infrastructure in Keystone, including the engine barn and turntable to the city which then sold it to Holiday Inn which built a hotel in it's place. So when the train was finally sold to the current owners they found that they no longer had a way to turn their engines around at the end of the line. So now when the train pulls into the newly built station it uses a short siding to 'run' around the cars and hook up onto the 'front' of the train for the trip back to Hill City. Of course this means the engine has to run backwards the whole way back, but that is actually no problem for this type of locomotive as you can see. |
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| Being a short side line that was originally built to service the mines and lumber mills in the area, the line is built to much looser tolerances than modern day train tracks would be. The radius of the curves is much tighter as you can see, and the grade in some places along the line is more than 6%. A regular mainline seldom has a grade of more than 2% these days. |
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| I'm sitting at the front of the third car back from the engine so you can see that the curves are very tight in spots. |
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| That is the engineer sitting on the window sill of the locomotive watching what comes ahead of the train. |
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| Some of the scenery along the way includes Haney Peak which is the highest point in the U.S. east of the Rocky Mountains. There is a Forest Service tower located on top of it from which you can see 5 states on a nice day. The tower is now made out of native stone as the first two wooden ones were both struck by lightening and burned to the ground. How ironic! |
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| You can tell by the smoke that the engine is working a little harder in this section. |
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| Once at Hill City there is an hour to wander around and check out the train museum and gift shop as well as get a snack to eat. The engine also does it's 'run around' trick again so it is once again at the front of the train. It could actually move the train just as well from either end of the train but with 20 road crossing along it's 9-10 mile run it is better that the engineer is up at the front of the train to watch out for crazy people who try to beat the train. |
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| Coasting down hill the engine isn't working very hard so there isn't much smoke coming out of the stack. |
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| One of the aforementioned road crossings. |
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| Some more of the scenery along the route. |
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| Back in Keystone and getting ready for the last trip of the day. |
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