New Life in the Woods

Sorry I haven’t posted in a while, but the last couple of weeks have been very busy! Susan, the landlord, showed up on Sunday the 13th and her brother Guy came down from Portland the next day, ostensibly to repair the roof of the main house. By Tuesday morning that plan was abandoned and I was recruited to help tear up several rotting decks around the main house. There was initially talk of building new decks but that plan evolved into putting Tin flashing around the base of the house and then filling in the spaces where the decks used to be with gravel. The next day a dump truck, trailer and bobcat were rented to cart away a bunch of the trash around the property, bring gravel up from the shale quarry, spread more gravel around the driveway down to the cabin, and clear off the space above the hidden underground room so that a barn or something could (eventually) be constructed on top of that foundation. The trailer was also to be used to bring in a load of dry wall for the cabin so that I could continue repairs down there at a later date.

It turned out that the “gravel” from the shale quarry was more a mixture of dirt, gravel, and rocks which had the unfortunate effect of making the driveway (on one side at least) pretty much unusable. The small Bobcat that had been rented didn’t have the power to push it around very well, flatten it, or crush it. So, after all the decks were demolished at the main house I spent a couple days bashing rocks with a maul to break them down into smaller chunks that would, hopefully be more manageable for the Bobcat. It didn’t help much, but I got some great bruises on my shins from flying rock splinters and at the end of the second day was attacked by a swarm of bees. Pretty discouraging all-in-all and I was feeling pretty badly used at that point. Susan had had to leave the day before so it was just Guy and me from that point on.

Here you can see where one of the old decks was removed and some of the damage to the wood siding on the main house. We were working 10-12 hour days (far longer than I had tried to do on my own up to this point) in 90+ degree weather and I went through about a gallon and a half of water or other liquids each day, sweating all of it out. Around this time Guy discovered a leak in the water pipes leading to the main house, right where the main shut off valve was, so that became another project. On Friday the 18th I dug out all the rocks and dirt around that pipe and discovered that some past tenant had replaced the PVC with cheap black irrigation pipe, spliced together in short sections with pipe clamps. I dug out the entire length of the pipe over to the driveway and (finally) discovered where it joined up to the remaining PVC pipes on the other side where those pipes run down from the water tanks up the hill.

Here you can see the remains of the decks plus other old wood piled up for burning once the rains start again in the Fall. Guy and I both took the weekend off to recover a bit and then went shopping on Monday to get new PVC to replace the water pipes. That same day a new bulldozer of sorts was delivered and that was used to finish scraping off the roof over the underground room and scrape the driveways flat. It was also used to dig a trench across the driveway where we would put down the new water pipe.

Here you can see how much better the driveway was after the new earthmover was used a few times on it. Unfortunately, there were still a few big rocks left here and there and one of them knocked the muffler off my car. On Tuesday, after repairing my muffler, I finished work on laying down the new pipes, cutting, and gluing them together. We also made another trip to get a gate for the entrance to the driveway and we spent the last half of the day boring holes for the posts to hold the gate and then mounting it.

Wednesday morning Guy had planned to work on jacking up the main part of the house to fix the foundation a bit, since it had evidently subsided over the years and the floors were very uneven inside. It was thought that this should be done first before the work on the outside walls was done, the inside floor repaired, or the roof rebuilt (not to mention the gravel shoveled into the space where the decks used to be). However, a planned power outage by Pacific Power foiled that plan and Guy had to leave mid-day. So, in the end, the roof didn’t get repaired, nor the floor inside (damaged by last years rains), nor the siding around the house, or the tin flashing, so the gravel couldn’t be shoveled in.

On the plus side, I did get a load of dry wall delivered plus some wood to make scaffolding (so I can reach the vaulted ceiling in the living room), I got paid a bit, and I got new gravel on the driveway, which should make it a lot easier to get up and down during the Winter rains and snows. We also cleared out a lot of trash, including the old water heaters from both buildings, the old wood stoves, an old gas stove and toilet that were under the cabin, and about a ton of other stuff from around the property.

Susan was very concerned about how much a new roof for the main house was going to cost her, and seemed very upset and depressed about all the other work that Guy determined should be done first, but the main house is in better shape now, ready for some of those other repairs to get underway. Another leak in the water system was fixed and the main house has a proper water line now, protected under the driveway by a larger pipe surrounding it. There is also a locked gate that should help keep vandals out, something I know she has wanted for some time.

I have spent the last several days resting and recovering, letting my new blisters heal, but I am now ready to get back to work on some of the tasks left for me to complete here, plus the dry wall, and my job search. You can see the rest of the pictures of the recent work on my Flickr site. Meanwhile, my garden has been making backward progress. I have kept it watered but the peas and spinach were largely done in by the heat and this morning I went up and found a rather large rabbit sitting calmly eating the last of my spinach. I spread some fertilizer and watered again, but it is time to finish fixing the fence, get some more mulch, and replant half the garden… so I’ll be working on that as time allows and I’ll keep you updated.