Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
A fine misty morning but still a good day for a drive up the mountain for an awesome view. I am hoping the mist clears by the time we get to where we are going but either way it's still a beautiful drive.
First drive through is a drive to Connel Lake. This is a lake with a really old dam on it. The dam used to feed water to both the creek and to a pulp mill a few miles away. The water got to the pulp mill via big pipes made of wood. They don't make those anymore so I had to show our guests the remaining ones. They are still full of water and pressurized just so they don't dry out and rot. Every now and then some idiot will shoot the pipe and water will gush from the hole until they come repair it. So off to Connel Lake we go. Showed off the wooden pipe and decided we should go ahead and drive to the lake. Man was I surprised when I saw how low the lake is. The back side of the dam is almost completely exposed! A few days of rain and it should be back to normal but this is the lowest I have ever seen. The water is usually pouring over the spillway but the water is about ten feet below the spillway right now. Well, at least we got to see an eagle perched at the dam. Its in the picture but you might have to squint to see it.
I have a leaky aluminum boat my buddy and I use to cross the lake and bring firewood logs back with. One of the advantages of having a friend who was a logger for thirty years! Between him and I, we have accumulated quite a collection of logging equipment. I have five chainsaws of different sizes, hay wire of various lengths, blocks, chokers, and other stuff. We collect firewood and that's how we heat the house.
Curiosity sated, we head down White River road. This road has recently been opened to let us drive further up the mountains toward the back side of the island. The road is rough but still okay for an old logging road. You still can't drive all the way the road goes but at least we get pretty far. The mist did not clear up as I had hoped so the view is very limited. On a god day, you can see forever and what an awesome sight. Since we are here and Tammy and I know this is an excellent area for thimble berries, we take advantage. Everyone but Nina got out for a short walk past the gate that stopped us. She had a bit of a hard time with the ups and downs and winding road. The rest of us wander around eating thimble berries where we find them.
Time to head back and I decide to go as slow as I can to make the car not bounce around as much. We are driving along when Raul spots a bear to the side of the road. I stopped and backed up so we could see it and the bear did not notice us right away. Excellent opportunity for a photo shoot. Tammy was the only one in a good spot to take pictures so she snapped a couple. I shot one through the window but it sucked. The bear was busy eating berries and it didn't take him long to notice that he was being watched. When he did notice, he took off like a bolt of lightning into the woods. Lots of black bears on our side of the island but they are fairly harmless if you leave them alone and if they don't have a cub.
Anthony used to have friends who lived at a trailer park near our home when he was a kid and was always running into bears there. His last hunting trip, he shot a deer and was bring it back when a black bear charged at him. He charged back at the bear and it took off running the other way. They scare easy! We even have them come to the house looking for garbage. I had to clean their poop off the deck once as well.
Back in time for a great dinner. When we went fishing a couple of days ago, we brought home three nice silver salmon which I am shipping to Texas. Greg let me borrow the cooler for bringing the fish home. Once I finished the cleaning and vacuum packed them for freezing, I cleaned Greg's cooler up pretty well. Greg said he would stop by on the way home from work and get it. When we came home we found that he left us a movie on the cooler. The movie was a history of Ketchikan so we took it in with the intent of watching it. I was surprised he had not taken the cooler but didn't give it much though thinking he probably had the car instead of truck with him. Greg called and said I over-cleaned the cooler and he didn't recognize it! He asked if I looked inside the cooler. I said no and he said to go look. He left us two bags of freshly frozen halibut in the cooler! What an awesome and generous gift. He wanted to make sure everyone got to have some before they went home. Tammy fried it up and it made for one good dinner! We all enjoyed the halibut immensely. Even Jerry tasted it and he doesn't like fish!
A quick game of high stakes Pirate Farkell and everyone retired to the living room where every last one of our guests promptly zonked out. I just had to get a picture of that! Oops, too much halibut, I guess!
- comments