A year in the making.....

 8:06 am - Saturday - February 7th - TWW - 33° F, humidity 30%, cloud cover 7%, wind 4 mph out of the east by southeast.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 63° F.  The view this morning....

.....and on this date in 2022 I was polishing our four ALCOA aluminum wheels on the Newell....

.....it took about 4 hours to clean 6 months of salt air from the Coastal Oregon off of them.

First thing Friday morning TLE and I took another 1 mile out and back walk.....our 9th of this winter....

......once again we averaged 3.0 mph over the course of the 1 mile walk burning 166 caloric units and gaining 42 feet in elevation....

....next we dumped our black tank, and refilled our fresh water tank, which we hadn't done for 11 days (of course we were gone for 2 days for Phyllis and Charles' wedding).  We're getting pretty good at this, and it only took 30 minutes this time.  We only used 85 gallons of fresh water the last 11 days.....that's around 7.73 gallons per day.  

Now that the Ford 420 diesel tractor is running again, and quite well I might add, it was time to finish the new RV site for Phyllis' Newell.  We figured we had 4-5 bucket loads of grave left to finish the site, and that was just the amount we needed.  After dumping and spreading four bucket loads of gravel she was finished....

.....by 1:30 pm we were officially done, and all that remains is to move Phyllis' Newell to the new site, which we will try to do in the next few days.  We began working on this new RV site last Winter, so finally completing it was a major accomplishment for us.

I spent the afternoon disassembling the wind turbine we tried to use last year, but never worked.  As we were getting ready to leave TWW last Spring we took it down, and left it at the back of the garage in front of the Jeep.  I meant to disassemble it when we first arrived back in late October, but never seemed to find the time until Friday.  It took me from 2 pm until 3:30 pm to completely disassemble it, and stow it, which is part of the reason I procrastinated.

Around 5:15 pm we headed out to the 'sunset deck' to light a fire, and watch the sun descend towards the western horizon.  There was a cigar, and two fingers of Scotch, and some Classic Vinyl music....

The sun just 'kissing' the western horizon around 6:05 pm

.....we were out there until after 6:30 pm as the sunset continued to evolve.  By 7 pm we were back inside watching the opening ceremonies for the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan Cortina, Italia.  I'm not a big fan of 'opening ceremonies', but this one was about as classy as I have seen in all the years I've been watching the Olympics....Winter or Summer.

Our  EcoWorthy dual axis solar tracker tilted at 7:59 am Friday, and for the 4th consecutive day we did not employ our Predator 500 dual fuel generator to add any electrons to our two battery banks.  Electrically speaking, we are on auto pilot....the system continues to regenerate itself each day without any outside assistance.  I know there are heavily cloudy days in our near future when we will need the Predator's assistance, but for the next 4-5 days we are good.

Thanks for stopping by!

On our own for the next 3.5 weeks......

 7:35 am - Friday - February 6th - TWW - 38° F, humidity 31%, cloud cover 29%, wind 5 mph out of the east by southeast....partly cloudy today with a forecast high of 62° F.  The view this morning.....

.....and on this date in 2012 TLE were watching a sunrise in Indio, CA....we had just began our nomadic journey six days earlier.....

.......later that day we crossed out of California into Arizona on our way to Texas, and would not return to California again until November of 2013.

Our EcoWorthy dual axis solar tracker tilted at 8:00 am Thursday.  We have not run the generator since Monday evening (February 2nd), and have managed to fully charge both banks of batteries with only solar input each day.  

Elaine and Phyllis worked on the outdoor growing beds first thing Thursday, and Charles repaired, and enhanced the watering system before they left for their return trip to Phoenix....

 ....we will probably not see them again until either the very end of February, or early March as they will be in Texas for two weeks beginning the 11th, so we've got the place to ourselves for almost a month!

They left around mid morning, and then TLE and I took our first 1 mile out and back walk in  a long time here at TWW....

.....we managed 3 mph over the course of the mile walk.

After the walk I began taking down the old solar security lights to be replaced by the more compact ones I recently purchased, while TLE focused on a couple loads of laundry.  One set of the old solar lights was mounted on the dog kennel, and the rest on the front of the house.  Since they were mounted pretty high on both the dog kennel and the house I had to use one of the very tall 'A' frame ladders to reach them.....

The old....

The new...

....next I installed one more piece of fiberglass corrugated roofing to a patch of single layer fencing next to the south gate of the greenhouse....

....which we had missed the other day.  We're just about ready to plant potatoes again, so we'll see if our modifications to the fencing keep the cottontail rabbits out of those growing beds.  By this time it was after 2:30 pm, and time to wrap it up for the day.  

For the first time in a long time we had a sunset fire.  With the sun setting later and later now we have time to eat dinner, and still get out there by 5:15 to watch the 6:o5 pm sunset....

....it wasn't what I would call a spectacular sunset, but it good enough for the occasion.  And thus ended another TWW day!  Thanks for stopping by!

One thing.....

 7:22 am - Thursday - February 5th - TWW - 35° F, humidity 21%, cloud cover 3%, wind 7 mph out of the east....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 65° F.  The view this morning.....

.......and on this date in 2012 TLE and I were taking a ride on our tadpole recumbent trikes.....

near Indio, CA with good friend Claude Banker.

We were expecting it to be a little breezy Wednesday, but what we got were winds over 20 mph with gusts close to 30 mph.  High winds kind of put a damper on outdoor activity here at TWW, as as a result we spent most of our day indoors.  Whatever allergenic agents being born by this wind were making me sneeze, cough and generally plow through Kleenex at a rapid rate for most of the day.

I did manage to spend about an hour installing a new solar powered light in the greenhouse just like the one we have on our patio, so I did get one thing done Wednesday.  I programmed it to come on when there is motion in its proximity after dark, and it works great.....it remains on for about a minute, or until motion stops.....

.....after letting it charge all afternoon I went out to greenhouse around 9 pm to provide some 'motion' to be sure it was working as it should.....yup, it is working!

I spent the rest of my time Wednesday reading in the warm confines of our Newell.  Around 4 pm we convened inside the house for our daily communal meal consisting of a hamburger patty with cheese (cooked by Charles to a perfect medium), some corn, and coleslaw.....

....for our evening entertainment we watched an episode of 'Shetland' on BritBox (streaming service), which is a well performed, well written British production as one might typically expect of the British.

We have not employed our Predator 5000 to charge our battery banks since Monday evening for about 15 minutes.  Each day both the Bluetti bank, and the house bank have returned to 100% charge.  Wednesday the solar tracker tilted at 8:03 am....the earliest in some time.  The sun now sets at 6:05 pm, and rises at 7:28 am.

Thanks for stopping by!

We have a winner!

 7:22 am - Wednesday - February 4th - TWW - 37° F, humidity 22%, cloud cover 0%, wind 9 mph out of the east.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 64° F.  The view this morning.....

......and on this date in 2017 TLE and I were at the Desert Bar near Parker, AZ.....

Listening to live music at the Desert Bar

.....with Steve and Candy Landry.  Reachable only by four wheel drive, high clearance vehicles.  The Desert Bart is completely off grid, and relies upon 100's of solar panels to charge batteries to power everything at the bar.

Our main goal Tuesday morning was to get the Ford Diesel 420 tractor running, and moved out of the entry driveway before Charles and Phyllis arrived.  It was perhaps our earliest start in over a month when we headed outdoors at 9 am.  In order to get the tractor running I first needed to haul the Honda generator, an 8d battery, tools, and jumper cables out to the tractor.  Once I had the battery charging, and the 8d battery attached via the jumper cables, I then reattached the fuel shutoff valve, installed the repaired fuel line, refilled the diesel fuel tank, filled the fuel filter with diesel, and then bled the air out of the fuel lines running up to the three cylinder heads.  It took me just under two hours to get all that done.  Just as I was about to try starting her Charles and Phyllis arrived....doh!  So, so close!  Within 5 minutes of their arrival we had the tractor running, then quickly moved it to its parking spot near the CONEX where we can plug in the battery maintainer, and keep the battery topped.  I think this is the smoothest I've heard the tractor run since I first began using it last winter.  

Charles and Phyllis delivered the final two IBC water totes (there are three in all) for the house water catchment system we will be installing on Wednesday.  They paid only $40 per tote (a very good deal), and they appear to be almost brand new.  In addition to the totes they delivered 3 gallons of Chevron Delo 100 40 wt., which I ordered from Amazon for our Newell.

Now that the tractor is running again we can finally move the gravel to the site we built for Phyllis' Newell, thereby finishing it, then move the Newell, which has been parked next to the barn since last winter, to its permanent site.  Things are beginning to move quickly here at The Wilson Wilderness!

Thanks for stopping by!

Back to the Wilderness.....

 8:10 am - Tuesday - February 3rd - TWW - 30° F, humidity 24%, cloud cover 0%, wind 5 mph out of the east.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 65° F.  The view this morning.....

....and on this date in 2013 TLE and I were watching our 38th and final sunset....

....at Cedar Key, FL......time to move on to more adventures!  Over the next few weeks we headed out to the Florida Keys, and ultimately, Key West, then up the east coast to Washington D.C.

We slept in until after 7 am Monday morning, but within two hours we were in the VW Beetle heading back north to TWW.  The traffic was light on I-17 as we drove north to pickup Arizona route 69, which would take us to 89A, and ultimately Able Saw (Stihl dealer in Prescott) where I wanted to drop off our 16" Stihl chainsaw to have a new pull rope installed as the original one snapped the other day when we were cutting up the pinyon pine.  Since we were going there anyway I brought three chains to be sharpened.  From there we headed over to Fry's (Kroger) to do a BIG shopping, which took about an hour.  By the time we were back in the Beetle it was after 11:30 am, meaning we would be arriving at TWW around 1:30 pm.....in fact we arrived around 1:20 pm without incident.

Everything was as we left it, and our Bluetti battery bank, without the aid of the Predator 5000, was back to 86%.  Within 90 minutes it was back 100%.  The house batteries had been at 100% for a few hours.  This caused me to rethink our use of the Predator every morning for 1-2 hours (depends on cloud cover).  After thinking about that for a while I told TLE we would be running an experiment Tuesday by not running the Predator 5000 at all, so we could see how long it took the Bluetti batteries to recharge.  The only thing different between being gone for two days and being home is the early morning usage of the electric hot water kettle for our coffee, and running my laptop and external hard drives for an hour, or so.  It may take longer each day to get the Bluetti battery bank back to 100% without the Predator, but if we can then that would reduce our usage of propane significantly, which is our only major expense outside of groceries (propane costs us about $225/month in the winter).  Added to that is the sun is getting higher in the sky with each passing day, and the EcoWorthy dual axis solar tracker is tilting earlier and earlier, and stowing later and later each day, so we are getting more charging time each clear day.  Naturally, when there is significant cloud cover we get less maximum charging time.  I will report back to you tomorrow with the results.  Right now as I write the Bluetti battery bank is at 52%, and the solar tracker tilted about 30 minutes ago (8:03 am).

Charles and Phyllis will be arriving for a three day stay Tuesday, midday, and we will begin installing the rain gutters on the house to capture rain fall into 3 new IBC water totes, thus doubling our water catchment ability.  We will also, in the near future, begin refurbishing the chicken coop which came with the property, plus resealing the barn roof, which leaks when it rains, or snows, and finally moving the eight 400 watt solar panels which are now on the ground up to the barn roof. Additionally we will be moving, in the very near future, Phyllis' Newell to its new site next to ours.  However, the first thing I need to do is reinstall the fuel shutoff valve, and fuel line on the tractor so we can get it moved out of the driveway before Charles and Phyllis arrive around noon time.

Thanks for stopping by!

The wedding day.....

 7:48 am - Monday - February 2nd - Phoenix, AZ - 52° F, humidity 23%, cloud cover 47%, wind 3 mph out of the east.....partly cloudy skies today with a forecast high of 80° F.  On this date in 2025 TLE and I were enjoying a beautiful sunset.....

at The Wilson Wilderness.

At last, the day of the wedding!  Charles and Phyllis' oldest daughter, Christina, was up in Sedona taking a class to be able to perform weddings, while TLE and Phyllis put the finishing touches on desserts and the meal to follow the wedding.  The plan was that after Christina completed her training she would join us via ZOOM.  TLE and I took a walk mid morning of about 1 mile, something we haven't done for a while.  

By 4 pm Christina had joined via ZOOM, along with a dozen, or so family and friends who could not be in Phoenix.  The rest of us gathered in the living room for the ceremony.....

Christina

The bride and groom (center) flanked by Richard, son, and Heather (youngest daughter)

After the wedding...Charles, Phyllis and Becky (Charles' younger sister)

.....this is the second 'ZOOM' wedding we've attended in recent weeks, and I've lost track of all the weddings we've attended over the years, but this one was like out of a fairy tale.  You have a couple that had been divorced for 40 years, and somehow found their way back to each other four or five years ago, falling in love for the second time.  Christina read from 1st Corinthians 13 about what love is, and how without it you are nothing.  I don't think there was a dry eye in the audience.

The post wedding dinner was held on their patio, and was delicious.  After dinner the wedding the amazing carrot cake was cut, and champagne was poured followed by many words of congratulation.  By 5:30 pm it was down to Charles, Phyllis, TLE and I, so we headed out to the fire pit for a celebratory sunset fire.....

....it was a day 45 years in the making, and well worth the wait.  Congratulations to Charles and Phyllis!

Thanks for stopping by!