Moving water.....

 8:00 am - Sunday - March 15th - TWW - 53° F, humidity 14%, cloud cover 36%, wind 6 mph out of the north by northwest.....mostly clear skies today with a forecast high of 70° F.  The view this morning....

....and on this date in 2015 TLE and I were in Sedona, AZ.....

....hiking the airport loop trail.  Over the years we've been to Sedona 4, or 5 times.

Charles asked us to empty the lower tank at the water tower into the 5 of 6 IBC totes we have on site.  The 6th one is 'ours', and is already full.  As you know there is an upper and lower tank at the water tower, each of which holds 2,500 gallons of water.  The way the system works is you initially fill both tanks, and then pump water into the home from the top tank.  When the top tanks is down to about 1,000 gallons we then pump water from the lower tank up to refill the upper tank.  Over the time Phyllis has owned this property (about 2 years now) we have never emptied the lower tank, so Charles felt it was time to completely empty it, and then rinse it out before refilling it.  He believes the water is getting stale, and that certainly could be the case.  He estimates there are about 1,000 gallons left in the lower tank, and that should fill all 5 totes.  We began the process Saturday morning just using gravity to begin filling the two tanks on the east side of the house....

....it took most of the day to move that water, but we got each 4/5's full by 6:30 pm.  We left the last 5th in each in case we get any rain before we begin to drain them in the future.  We also topped off the IBC tote on the southwest side before we called it a day Saturday.  We'll have to use the SeaFlo 12 volt water pump to fill the tanks at the greenhouse as it is slightly uphill from the lower water tank, and with it being so empty now there is not enough natural water pressure to to fill them without mechanical aid.....

We completely filled the IBC tote on the southwest corner of the house as we will be transferring water from it to the greenhouse in the next week, or so, and no rain is forecast for that time period right now

.....while we let gravity do the work to transfer the water I spent time with the Jeep, and Ford 420 diesel tractor trying to figure out why each of them had fuel delivery issues.  You will recall that when I left off work on the Jeep the other day it would idle, but you could not accelerate above the idle.  When we were in town Friday I bought a bottle of SeaFoam gas treatment which is good for cleaning out the ports in carbs, and injectors such as we have on the Ford.  I put about half the bottle in the Jeep fuel tank, then started her up.  She fired pretty quickly, but would only idle at first, however, over the next 10 minutes I could tell she was running better and using the throttle linkage at the carb was able to accelerate very smoothly.  In fact, this is the beast I've heard her run since after I first purchased her.  I restarted her several times, and she fired right up and ran very smoothly for a change.

Next up I did the same for the Ford.  The last time I ran her she began running like only 2 of the 3 cylinders were firing.  After pouring in the rest of the SeaFoam into the diesel tank I started her up, and she began running roughly just as she did a couple of weeks ago, however, after she warmed up, she began to run on all 3 cylinders again....SUCCESS!  I restarted her several times over the course of the day, and got the same result.....she runs much more smoothly now with very little smoke.  In celebration I made a short video for you viewing pleasure....

....for the first time in two winters all of the equipment is running well, including the Yamaha Rhino with which we have had a lot of fuel issues involving bad fuel lines.

I received the new propane gas regulator for the Sea-B-Que the other day, but had not yet grilled anything on her so TLE got out 2 tender loin steaks we bought at Fred Meyers in Klamath Falls last summer....OMG!  They were so tender......

....they were very thick steaks, so it took me about 14 minutes to get them to medium rare. TLE added a side of boiled spinach, which was perfect.  That steak was melt in your mouth delicious!

Thanks for stopping by!

Town interval.....

 7:11 am - Saturday - March 14th - TWW - 42° F, humidity 17%, cloud cover 41%, wind 4 mph out of the south by southeast.....partly cloudy today with a forecast high of 73° F.  The view this morning.....

....and on this date in 2012 TLE and I had just disembarked from the Galveston Free Ferry on the Bolivar Peninsula....

....we were on our way to Louisiana....about 6 weeks into our nomadic life.

Charles and Phyllis headed back to Phoenix around 8 am, and shortly thereafter TLE and I took our 15th 1 mile out and back walk of the winter.....

....as has been the case lately, we averaged 2.9 mph.

We hadn't been to town in about 9 days so around 10 am we headed into town to pick up our mail, so some shopping, and get some Gelato at Highway Hot Dog.....

A scoop each of Dark Chocolate and Cookies and Cream for moi, and for TLE a scoop each of Apple Pie & Caramel

....we made a stop at the General Store to buy some hardware items, such as some perforated angle steel to mount the 100 watt solar panel for the 4Patriots solar charger we're using in the garage to power the chest freezer.  We mounted it on the back of the garage about 6 feet up so it can get sun all day long.  It was sitting on the ground next to the garage, and only getting sun a few hours a day.  Charles has ordered 2 more of these panels, which should be enough to keep the battery topped off while powering the freezer....we'll see.....

....I screwed a 2 x 4 to the garage, and then added the perforated angle steel on top of that so we could hang the solar panel....it worked better than I had expected.

While in town we also filled up two 5 gallon gas cans as we were down to one 5 gallon can.  We've now got 15 gallons of unleaded regular and 15 gallons of diesel on hand, but I doubt we will significantly dent those supplies the rest of the winter.

Our favorite coffee shop in town, The Commodore House, reopened on the 11th after being shut for a couple of months in the off season, so we made a stop there for a cup of coffee to enjoy on the way home, where we arrived around 12:30 pm....

....once home I began work on the aforementioned solar panel hanging project.  By the time I finished it was close to 3 pm.   For the first time in a while I wore shorts and a t-shirt all afternoon, and for the first time in weeks we did not need to run any of our heaters in the evening.  We decided to take a night off from the 'sunset fire deck', but I'm sure we'll be back out there Saturday evening.

Thanks for stopping by!

The committee of four....

 7:15 am - Friday - March 13th - TWW - 38° F, humidity 19%, cloud cover 5%, wind 3 mph out of the east.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 74° F.  The view this morning....

.....and on this date in 2025 this was the view first thing in the morning....

....I forgot how late we had snow last winter....what a difference a year makes!

Before engaging in any outdoor work TLE and I took our 1 mile out and back walk averaging 2.9 mph once again....

.....can't seem to break that 3 mph barrier...lol.  Now onto regularly scheduled activities.

You just knew this would be the story for Thursday.  I'm sure you did.  We finally got to finish organizing the garage.  Thanks to Charles' efforts Wednesday (he assembled the new shelving unit) we got to begin our day (after our walk) moving the new shelving unit into place, instead of building it...saved about an hour or more.  It took a committee of four to get it all done, and I think we adjusted the shelving in all three shelving units a dozen times before we settled on the correct spacing between shelves in order to put everything on them which needed to be off the ground, and this is what is looked like after 3 hours...

Now....

....before....

.....we were able to hookup the solar generator battery to the chest freezer....

....by the time we finished it was after 1 pm, and time for a break, so TLE and I sat on the 'lido deck' for a while before changing into cooler, non working clothes (shorts, t-shirts, flip flops).  I puttered around in the trailer for while with the Tournament Players Championship (golf) playing in the background.

We had dinner at the usual time, 4 pm, in the house.  TLE and Phyllis had prepared cheese melt sandwiches, a spinach salad, a carrot salad, and some more of Charles' delicious potato salad.....

....for a change there was not a breath of wind when we headed out to the 'sunset fire deck', so it was perfect.....

Just after sunset the various solar lights we've installed began to come on

.....thanks for stopping by!

Teaming up to get things done....

 7:23 am - Thursday - March 12th - TWW - 35° F, humidity 21%, cloud cover ZERO %, wind 11 mph out of the north by northwest.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 71° F.  The view this morning.....

....and on this date in 2012 TLE and I had just arrived at Galveston Island, TX....

....snagged the last spot at Bayside RV Park during Spring Break....soooo humid there!

Late last summer we had a big windstorm here at TWW, and two of the 16 solar panels on the roof of the CONEX blew over causing damage to one of them....

The damaged panel

....the  two panels were attached to the roof via a wood structure composed of 2 x 6's and 2 x 4's, which had rotted over the years, and gave way during the windstorm out of the north.  The panels are tilted to face south, so the north wind caught the back of them, and ripped them off the roof.  Charles' handyman, Matt, came up to the property and turned them over shortly thereafter so at least they would be facing the sun, but they had not been set back in place until Wednesday.

At dinner Tuesday night TLE asked Charles what he wanted to do Wednesday to which he answered "Fix the solar panels on the CONEX", so that is what we did Wednesday morning....

In this picture we had already removed the damaged panel, and dragged the remaining one, and its metal support structure to the side so we could remove all the damaged wood

Where the 2 x 6 blocks of wood were fastened to the roof....there were 6 in all

In this picture we have replaced the 2 x 6's, and attached to them two 8 foot 2 x 4's (redwood)

The aluminum framework is reassembled and ready to be attached to the 2 x 4's

The aluminum framework is reattached to the wood platform, awaiting a replacement 175 watt solar panel

....from beginning to end it took us about 3 hours to demo the old wood platform (what was left of it), install the new one, and then reattach the aluminum frame with the remaining solar panel.  Charles will order a new 175 watt panel to replace the damaged one.  As you can see in the last picture, the wooden platform for the two solar panels to the left needs replacement also, and we will do that Thursday.  Thankfully, the rear portion of the wooden platform is still intact, and not rotten.

While Charles and I were on the roof the girls moved three more piles of rocks to our rock pile on the eastern edge of the property, and also moved a large pile of branches we cut off the juniper trees by the diesel fuel tank we will soon be installing....

The pile of cut branches (from last winter) was so large you could not see the gravity diesel fuel tank sitting there

Right through there is where the 3 piles of rocks were...now we can walk through there without tripping over rocks

.....Charles bought the diesel fuel tank last winter, but we haven't had time to set it up, however, we will be doing so in the near future.  I think it is about 180-200 gallons.

By the time we cleaned up, and put away our tools it was around 12:30 pm, and time for a lunch snack, which we took inside the house as the afternoon winds had arrived (15 mph +).  After our snack I headed home to take a nap...the wind, and sun took a toll on moi.  Charles, on the other hand, still had lots of energy, and wanted something to do so he headed out to the garage to assemble the new shelving unit he and Phyllis had delivered to us on Tuesday.....

....I didn't know he was doing that, so when I went out to the garage around 3 pm he was almost done.....what a nice surprise!  Now all we have to do is move it into position, and begin moving things onto the shelves!

We had a nice dinner of corned beef, cabbage with carrots and potatoes, and its not even St. Patty's day yet!  Around 6 pm we convened out at the 'sunset fire deck' to watch the sun heading downhill to the western horizon....

....this is the afterglow around 7 pm (sun sets at 6:38 pm now).  We were out there until almost 7:30 pm watching the stars make another appearance, and all of our security lights responding to the impending darkness.

Thanks for stopping by!