Our biggest burn pile yet.....

 7:30 am - Wednesday - April 8th - TWW - 48° F, humidity 15%, cloud cover 5%, wind 7 mph out of the south by southeast.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 76° F.  On this date in 2022 TLE and I had just arrived in Bishop, CA....

The Eastern Sierras

.....at the Tri-County Fairgrounds.  We had spent the last week getting the big radiator removed, rodded, and reinstalled.  Within a few days we would arrive for our first season at Likely Place Golf & RV Resort.  The view this morning.....

....our second day in a row with now wind, and lots of sun.

Tuesday presented us with a perfectly windless day, and what better day to ignite one of our largest burn piles to date!  This pile has been sitting there for over a year, and, as you may recall, I recently used the Ford 420 diesel tractor to push it out in the open to we could finally burn it, and Tuesday was the day to do so.....

....within 30-40 minutes it had burned down to this.....

I went out this morning (Wednesday) to spread the ashes, and

 it was still VERY hot in the middle

....TLE has become pretty adept at the burn pile routine.  Just give her a lighter, and some paper she will soon have an inferno.  She is also in charge of our 'burn barrel' in which we burn all of our paper/cardboard trash.  We had to sit about 50 feet away from the blaze to escape most of the heat generated by that fire.  The slight breeze we had was blowing away from us and the trees, so it was the perfect time to burn that pile.  While TLE tended to her blaze I went over to that rascally juniper stump we've been trying to burn out for a few weeks now....

Burning that juniper stump again

....I first doused the hole in the middle of the tree stump with diesel, then piled logs around it, and on top of it then lit it.  It burned all day long, and into the early evening.  When I checked it this morning (Wednesday) it was still hot.  I'll probably repeat the process again Wednesday as we seem to be making some progress.

The rest of the day I moved from one tiny job to another, which included ascending to the CONEX roof once again to caulk the 6, or 7 screw holes in the barn roof we had discovered when we were tightening all the sheet metal screws a while back.  Now the barn roof is sealed, but only another rainfall will tell us how good a job we did.  I also hand watered the potato beds, blew the dirt and dust out of the garage with our Toro electric blower, fussed around in the trailer clearing my workbench for the umpteenth time, steamed cleaned one of our area rugs, put away tools that had been sitting outdoors for a few days, cleared the work bench in the CONEX again, and numerous other things which caught my attention around the property.  It was a good day for small jobs.

For our evening's entertainment we binge watched three more episodes of Survivor Season 50, and were in bed a little after 10 pm.  Our time here grows shorter by the hour, and soon we will begin to take down our site, and organize the trailer for VW insertion.

Thanks for stopping by!

Up on the roof......

 7:40 am - Tuesday - April 7th - TWW - 45° F, humidity 18%, cloud cover 1%, wind 2 mph out of the southeast.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 75° F.  On this date in 2015 TLE and I hiked the Honaker Trail from Goosenecks State Park down 1,000 feet....

....to the San Juan River....one of my favorite boondocking memories.  The view this morning....

Before we began our workday TLE and I took another of those 1 mile out and back walks....our 18th of that variety.....

....we averaged just under 3 mph, and for the first time this winter I wore a short sleeve t-shirt.

After a many days of procrastination made easier by frigid, windy days, it was time to climb the ladder to the roof of the CONEX to finally reseal the areas Charles and I had removed  old caulk from....mainly the area where the barn is attached to the CONEX, and the center seam where the north and south roof panels meet in the middle....

Where the CONEX roof (right) joins the barn roof (left)

There were a few tunes being played on my Bluetooth speaker

The center seam....yeah, it looks ugly, but it is now SEALED

.....it took me less than an hour to get it all sealed.  I know there are a few screw holes to be caulked, and I will take care of them Tuesday.  Below is a look at our next barn roof project....

....that 2 x 4 is totally rotten, and will be replaced soon...in fact, the new 2 x 4 which will be used for this repair is in the 1st and 2nd pictures above....my Bluetooth speaker is sitting upon it.

The Drifters  - "Up on the roof"

I spent some time later in the day attempting to assemble some scaffolding which we found on the property last Winter....

.....there are actually two of these, but the other one is missing some critical pieces, such as cross members of the same length.  There are longer cross members, but that would make it impossible to stack them to the desired height.  We wanted to put the diesel fuel gravity tank (below) on them, but now that only one can be used I'm not sure 4 feet tall will be enough height.  I guess it is back to the drawing board.

....around 3 pm Christina, Charles and Phyllis' oldest daughter, arrived for an overnight stay on her way north to Provo, UT.  TLE made Meat Loaf for dinner with sides of smashed potatoes and coleslaw.  I neglected to memorialize our dinner with a picture.  We enjoyed endless conversation with a side of good food until after 5 pm when we bid our adieus and headed home for the evening to watch the final game of this year's 'March Madness' between UCONN (#2), and Michigan (#1). One could tell early on that Michigan was clearly the better team, but UCONN's inherent tenacity kept the game in hand.  Michigan held a 4 point lead at half time, and grew that lead to as many as 11 points in the 2nd half, but with a couple of minutes to play UCONN got it down to 4 points....they had a chance, however, that would be as close as they got.  The final score was Michigan 69 and UCONN 63.

Thanks for stopping by!

Let's get some work done!

 8:04 am - Monday - April 6th - TWW - 55° F, humidity 30%, cloud cover 87%, wind 4 mph out of the southeast.....heavy cloud cover today with a forecast high of 65° F.  On this date in 2015 TLE and I were hiking around Goosenecks State Park....

....I took this panorama shot of our campsite in the distance....just beyond the campsite is a 1,000' deep canyon.  The view this morning....

....there will be little, or no sun this day, so our Predator 5000 is running for the first time this month.

As you know, we have been in the middle of an almost 10 day wind event here at TWW, and have put off working on several projects including finishing installing the insulation board in the shed, and installing the new auxiliary turbo water pump in the VW.  When we awoke Sunday to the absence of wind we decided to get right on those aforementioned tasks, and 'knock them out of the park'.  It took less than an hour to cut the two pieces for the two doors, and affix them....

....now, all that is left is to cut the pieces for the floor, and install the turbine roof vent.

Next up it was time to dive into the project to which I assigned the rest of the day....remove and replace the damaged auxiliary turbo water pump on the Beetle.  I've never done this job before, and wasn't sure how long it might take, but TLE and I were committed to finishing it Sunday, no matter what....

....first I moved the '69 Jeep CJ-5 out of the right garage bay, and into the empty space I drove the VW Beetle.  As you can see, I now have a four wheeled tool cart courtesy of Charles and Phyllis who brought this back from their Texas trip.  In order to remove the damaged pump I had to remove three hose clamps,   the two bolts which affix it to the front of the engine bay,  just above the radiator, and unplug the wiring....

The culprit

....that was the most difficult part of the job.  As you can see (above) the intake nipple broke off the pump causing the massive coolant loss in just a couple of minutes.  Even after removing the hose clamps it was difficult to remove the hoses which have been in place for about 25 years....lol...but I did.  Installing the new pump took less than 20 minutes, and the entire job about 90 minutes.   Way, way less time than I expected.  Now it was time to pour in the new coolant, which Charles had purchased at O'Reilly's down in Phoenix a few days ago.  It took one gallon to fill the system, and the coolant reservoir. I got into the driver seat of the VW and started the 1.8 liter engine, then went back to the front of the car to look for any leaks......

About 2/3's of the way to hooking up the hoses on the new pump, and plugging in the wiring

.....there were no leaks!  I let the engine idle, and come up to temperature, and it ran fine...whew!  What a relief to see no dumbell lights on the instrument display!  Once I was satisfied the engine was running as it should I shut it down, then checked the oil which needed about 1/2 quart.  Finally we began to put away the tools.  It was about 2 pm at the time.  Now if this had been the actual engine water pump, that would have been a 2, or 3 day job for me, because you have to remove the entire front bumper assembly to get at it, plus deal with the timing belt.  The new pump is made by Bosch, and that is who I turn to when needing to replace parts on the VW.  Back when our fuel pump ceased working in 2015 I bought an aftermarket one on Amazon, and within 3 years it failed, so that time I bought Bosch fuel pump, and have had no issues in 8 years.  

Around 6:40 pm TLE and I headed outside to the 'sunset fire deck' (no fire this night) to watch the sun set....we were not disappointed....

.....(by the way, sunset is at 7 pm now) we remained there until almost 7:30 pm as the sunset continued to evolve, then headed back inside to watch the first episode of Season 50 of Survivor, which was 2.5 hours in length!  For Season 5 they invited people from all 24 years of Survivor, and based on the first episode it should be a very interesting season.

Thanks for stopping by!

Moving water......

 8:01 am - Sunday - April 5th - TWW - 51° F, humidity 13%, cloud cover 12%, wind 7 mph out of the southeast.....few clouds today, mostly sunny with a forecast high of 75° F.  On this date in 2017 TLE and I were at the Oceano Elks Lodge.....

....near Pismo Beach, CA.  The lodge was 1/2 block from the ocean.  The view this morning.....

Just as the weather guessers guessed the 20+ mph winds returned early morning and continued until early afternoon.  TLE and I spent time at the greenhouse transferring water from the tote at the northwest corner of the greenhouse to the one at the southeast corner from which we water the potato beds....

.....the process took most of the morning, and also included moving water from the tote at the southwest corner of the house to refill the one on the northwest corner from which we had just transferred water.  On another day we'll move water from the two totes on the east side of the house to that one (southwest corner of the house) as it is almost empty now.  The overnight temperature got down to 30° F, and a few of the potato greens wilted as a result, but 98% of them are fine.  The indoor plants are doing wonderfully, and we should be harvesting some more cauliflower and broccoli soon.  So far our experiment growing food at 5,500' elevation during the winter has been a resounding success, and we hope to expand our crops significantly next winter.

We didn't do much else Saturday due to the winds.  I'm pretty the high winds will be gone Sunday, and we'll be able to get back to work on several fronts.....fix the VW, finish installing insulation board in the shed, install the turbine vent on the shed roof, caulk the roof seams on the barn roof, and caulk some old screw holes in the garage roof....at least that is our hope.

The two 'Final Four' NCAA men's basketball games were played Saturday afternoon/evening.  The first game between UCONN and Illinois was close early, but UCONN steadily increased their lead to double digits, and except for a few minutes when the lead was down to 4 points, UCONN was in control, and as time expired held a 9 point lead.  The evening game between Arizona (ASU) and Michigan (both #1 seeds) was never close.  After 3 minutes it was 10-1 Michigan,  with Michigan holding a 16 point lead at half time.  ASU got within 5 points for a a minute in the 2nd half, but then Michigan went on a run leading by as many as 30 points.  They ended up winning by 18.  So the Final game will feature #2 UCONN vs. #1 Michigan on Monday evening as this year's version of 'March Madness' draws to a close.

Other than dealing with wind these past 8 days, life here at TWW is great.  In just 15 days we'll begin our northward trek back to LPG&RVR, but for now our hearts are here at TWW where life moves at our pace.

Thanks for stopping by!

That rascally 'Wayward Wind'.....

 7:55 am - Saturday - April 4th - TWW - 46° F, humidity 12%, cloud cover 12%, wind 20 mph out of the east by northeast.....cloudless, blue sky right now with a forecast high today of 69° F.  On this date in 2015 TLE and I arrived at Goosenecks State Park.....

......in Southern Utah.....you might have thought this was Horseshoe Bend near Page, AZ, but you would be wrong.  This is the San Juan River near Mexican Hat, UT.  We stayed for almost two weeks....one of the top 5 boondock sites from our 14 years of travel.  The Newell and trailer are literally parked about 50' behind me in this picture.  The view this morning....

....we are in our 7th day of wind, but today should be the last....we hope!

It was still too cold, and windy to caulk the barn roof Friday, and frankly too cold and windy to do much of anything outdoors.  We were expecting to hear at any time that the replacement auxiliary turbo coolant pump had been delivered to our PO Box in Seligman, so we remained indoors awaiting the notification.  It finally came around 11:30 am, so we got dressed and headed into Seligman arriving there without incident around 12:30 pm.

First stop was the General Store to buy some large, flat washers to aid in affixing the insulation board to the inside of the shed doors, some clear, half inch diameter tubing for my gas syphon hose (the OEM hose's walls were too thin, causing it to kink, and restrict the flow of gasoline), and a vent housing for the shed (we're going to install one of those turbine roof vents)....

The washers and 4" diameter 'roof boot'

4" diameter roof vent pipe - the land provided, but will have to shorten it

4" diameter roof turbine vent - bought last winter

....I'm always amazed that this little hardware store has precisely what I need 99% of the time!  From there we headed to Westside Lilo's for lunch before hitting the PO Box, and Family Dollar.  TLE and I both had salads (Cobb for TLE and a Chicken Caesar for moi), a side of onion rings, and coffee....their coffee is so gooood!  While we were eating I noticed a picture of Guy Fieri (Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives) hanging on the wall next to our table, who apparently ate at Westside Lilo's back in 2019....

.....he apparently came there for their famous Carrot Cake, which we sampled way back in 2024 when we first visited Seligman to see the property Phyllis eventually purchased.  It is the best Carrot Cake I've ever had!

While TLE shopped at the Family Dollar I headed over to the Post Office to retrieve our packages from the parcel locker.....

......the new auxiliary turbo coolant pump looks like a perfect match to the now defunct one, so weather and wind permitting I will attempt to do the R & R Saturday, or Sunday.

Didn't really do any work outside, or anywhere on the property before, or after we went to town Friday due to the wind, but now we have the necessary parts to begin to complete several ongoing projects. By the time we finished unloading the car and putting things away it was almost 4 pm, and the end of another day at TWW.

Thanks for stopping by!

An inside job.....

 8:07 am - Friday - March 3rd - TWW - 41° F, humidity 18%, cloud cover ZERO %, wind 14 mph out of the north by northeast.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 62° F.  On this date in 2015 TLE and I were visiting Monument Valley.....

....in Northern Arizona just south of the Utah border.  We did the sunset tour, which we highly recommend.  One of our 'Bucket List' items.  Does not seem like 11 years ago.  The view this morning....

....the sun has moved so far to the north now that is comes in my bedroom window first thing in the morning (drivers side window) even with the window awning deployed.

We had planned to caulk the metal roof on the barn Thursday, but it was extremely windy, and cold.  Caulking can be difficult when it is warm enough, but the cold just makes it more difficult, so we postponed that activity until another day when it is much warmer, and there is no wind.  We've had wind here at TWW since before we returned form our dental appointment trip, and it is getting a little old.  Nevertheless, it is the Spring, and it is typically more windy than not in the high desert this time of year, so it is what it is.

Charles and Phyllis left for Phoenix around 9 am, and shortly thereafter I got to work on a job which allowed me to be indoors.  Phyllis had delivered a number of shelves from a shelving unit they had dismantled down south to use on the Baker's Cart she brought up months ago, so I spent some time cutting them to 18" in length to fit the cart....

The pieces I cut off the shelves to reduce them to the required 18"

....TLE and Phyllis plan to use this to sprout seedlings next Winter, so the shelves are very close together.  While I was so engaged TLE was harvesting some more cauliflower and broccoli for dinner.  That was the third time we've harvested broccoli and cauliflower since the plants matured a couple of weeks ago.

Later, using the Ford F420 diesel tractor, I moved the large tree trunk we cut down a week, or so ago, and hauled it out to the barrier we have been adding to all Winter, and as I was putting the tractor away I decided to drag some dirt away from barn doors on the west side of the barn.  There is been a sort of 'lip', or dirt curb in front of those doors since we arrived last Winter which makes it difficult to open the doors, but I couldn't do anything about it until we moved Phyllis' Newell. Now that we have moved it to another location it was time to scrape away that dirt, and level the entrance to the barn....

Now it's smooth and level....time to paint that wood!!!

That's the mound of dirt we moved in the foreground.  We'll have to figure out where to move that dirt, but that is for another day.

....it only took around 15 minutes to scrape, and then smooth the area using both the Gannon and loader bucket.  Without the tractor that would have been a multi hour task!  And with that I called an end to the our work.  It was around 2 pm, and time for a snack, and maybe a nap.  The winds freshened all day to almost 30 mph, so I was happy I had an indoor job for part of the day.

We're hoping the new auxiliary turbo water pump arrives at our PO Box Friday, so we can retrieve it, and begin the process and removing and replacing the broken one.  It arrived at Post Office in Prescott Thursday morning, so it should be in Seligman by Friday afternoon, but you never know, do you?

Thanks for stopping by!