Sunday ; This morning we heard the loud sound of a helicopter landing. We opened the door to see a helicopter descending for a landing on the ranch next door. And ... OMG ... smoke near the top of the mountain across the road ! ! ! The sound of the helicopter's engines never changed, even though we knew it had landed nearby. It wasn't picking up water, there had been no bucket on a long line underneath, so ... I thought it was doing a medevac after a highway accident. In a just a minute or two it lifted off again, reinforcing my thought that it had landed just to pick up a patient. There was a pod attached to one of the skids, and I thought it was a patient stretcher pod.
It slowly climbed up over us, and made a slow, circling climb to ... HUH ? ... the smoke on the mountain ? I ran inside the trailer and grabbed my binoculars. The helicopter approached the side of the mountain very near the smoke. It hovered, touching the front of its skids against a very small ledge on the side of the mountain. A door opened, and two figures in bright red coveralls climbed out onto the skid and jumped down to the ledge. FIREFIGHTERS !
The helicopter slowly backed away from the ledge, turned, and descended back down to land at the ranch again. In another minute or two it rose again, this time with a large net hanging under a long line. FIREFIGHTING EQUIPMENT ! It circled and climbed back up to the smoke. With brilliant precision the helicopter pilot slowly lowered his craft until the net on the end of the long line could be reached by the red clad firefighters. They unhooked the net, and the helicopter rose and left. In a minute the red clad firefighters disappeared from view.
The smoke slowly diminished, until it disappeared about four hours later. Shortly afterwards, the helicopter returned. Once again I grabbed my binoculars. The helicopter slowly approached the mountain side, hovering with the front of its skids touching the small ledge. A firefighter reached out over the skid, hanging over the cliff ( YIKES ! ), opened the pod on the skid, and tossed a bunch of gear inside before closing the pod, climbing onto the skid ( YIKES ! ) and into the hovering helicopter.
And you thought you had a tough commute to work ? ! ?
We spent the afternoon clearing weeds from lot 4. And we met ... the daughter / sister, and legally now the owner of the home. For the next week and a half until it's ours. She was coming to make a final inspection of her mom's vacation home. She was accompanied by her boyfriend, a man from Germany. They met when he was here
( well ... Vancouver / Whistler BC ) for the 2010 Olympics. After the Olympics they began a long distance relationship, and eventually he returned to Canada to be with her. We spoke very briefly with her, giving us an opportunity to express our condolences in person, and thanking her for selling her mother's home to us. I was surprised by how young she looks, although I think she's probably in her late 20's.
While Joanne was pulling weeds behind the house, I was trying to remove what I thought were some dead shrubs on the front slope. Turned out they were stumps with a bunch of dead "runners" growing out of them. While I was contemplating cutting them off below ground level, my soon to be next door neighbour, an "old farmer" as he put it, suggested I use my honkin' huge truck to pull the damn stumps right out of the ground. Being an old "city boy" I really had no idea how to do that. He coached me, and in just a few minutes, they were out. Not that much of a challenge for that large a truck ! Who knew ? Thanks, Gord. I knew there must be a good reason why my honkin' huge truck has tow rings in the front bumper ! I mean ... besides being a chick magnet in Texas. HA HA HA !
Monday ; Today was sunny and hot. In addition to cooking beef stew in the Sun Oven for supper tonight, Joanne also baked a Saskatoon berry matrimonial cake in the Sun Oven < drooling >.
HA ! I was right. Yesterday it appeared to me that the helicopter dropped two firefighters near the top of the mountain across the road, but only picked up one late in the afternoon. Late this afternoon the helicopter returned ... and picked up another firefighter that had evidently been left behind for 24 hours to ensure that the problem was solved, I guess.
While placing online ads regarding lot 89 for sale Joanne discovered a treasure trove of used goods for sale, and even free, nearby. I responded to a few of the ads, and tomorrow when we go to Penticton to run errands, one of our chores will be pick up a truck load of landscaping sand ... for free. And lot 4 desperately needs landscaping. It's in the "weed infested rock pile" original state of lots in this park.
Tuesday ; Today was sunny and hot.
< sigh > I'm typing this late at night after a very long and very tiring day of running errands in Penticton. Including ... buying a used portable air conditioner for our new home ... AND ... shovelling a truck load of landscaping sand into the back of our truck in Kaleden on our way home. Joanne found an ad in Kijiji for free sand available in Kaleden. This couple has so much sand they want to get rid of we will probably take a truck load full on each of the next three or four trips we make to Penticton. We want the sand to use as a base for a pavestone patio we want to construct. And you know I LOOOOOOVE a good bargain ... like "free" ! HA HA HA !
Wednesday ; WHEW ... hot day today. Especially for hard, outdoor work ! Joanne spent entire day manually weeding lot 4. Three thousand square feet of weed infested rock pile ! I spent morning preparing FOR SALE signage to place on pole on lot 89, and at front gate "for sale tree". And mounted information sheet holder box on pole. And prepared information sheets. Easier than weeding !
In the afternoon I mixed a batch of strong herbicide and did some spraying on lot 4. And unloaded truck load of sand. HMPH ... there was more sand in the truck than I thought there was. One load was 1/3 to 1/2 of what we need, so only need one or two more loads like this one. After our tough outdoor work for the day was done we spent time in the swimming pool. Well deserved !
While Joanne watered a neighbour's yard I took Bo for a drivey to the front gate to check if there were still any Saskatoons left worth picking. < sad sigh > I picked about a dozen nice berries. Bo and I ate them as I picked. The rest of the berries still on the bush ( more of a tree actually ) were dried out. Saskatoon berry season is over for this year. Poor Bo.
Thursday ; WHEW ... I'm tired. We're tired ! Today was sunny and hot.
We made a trip into Keremeos this morning to run a few errands. Most of Joanne's day was spent manually weeding lot 4. Most of my day was spent on lot 4 purchase matters, legal and financial. I'm out of practice !
Some of our neighbours seem to think that we have been living in an RV for the last eight years because we are too "poor" to afford a "bricks and sticks" house, and must be very pleased that we were finally able to buy one. HA HA HA < SNORT > HA HA !
Friday ; Today started out sunny and hot. Late in the morning an extremely strong wind blew up very suddenly, followed by violent thunderstorms. Bo ... who experienced Hurricane Ivan in Alabama as a puppy ... hid from the storm on our bed, trembling. Poor Bo.
Joanne spent the morning weeding lot 4. So much done, so much still to do. I spent much of the day on financial matters related to the purchase of lot 4, which necessitated a trip into town. Almost done, I hope ! This very simple real estate deal has become far more complicated than I expected it to be, reinforcing my theory that most work done by lawyers exists mostly to ... create work for lawyers ! No offense intended to our current lawyer.
Saturday ; AHHHHH ... today was a great day. Well ... except for having to get up early to meet at 8:15 AM with a local contractor to get an estimate on building a rock wall on lot 4, from our yard level down to the road level, which currently is just a weed infested steep slope. Well ... and also ... except for the sunburns we both have. HA HA HA !
Today was sunny and hot. After my early morning meeting with the contractor we headed out to Princeton, about an hour west on Highway 3. For the Princeton "International" Air Show. And what a surprisingly good air show it was. Princeton is a small town, with a "two Cessnas" airport. My expectations were low. But it was a really good air show. And well choreographed ... "on the fly", so to speak ... since some of the scheduled aircraft did not arrive due to yesterday's bad weather near here. Even Joanne liked the show, especially Kent Pietsch's performances in his 1941 Interstate Cadet. WOW ! What a versatile aircraft, especially for one that is now 71 years old ! Or maybe it's just the pilot that's that good ? ! ?
See videos at www.jellybelly.com/sports_sponsorships/kent_pietsch.aspx
BUT ... < sigh > ... DUH ... we got sunburned ! Pair of dumb asses ! On our way home we took Old Hedley Road instead of Highway 3, so that we could collect a load of copper rocks for Joanne to use to build a new herb garden border along one side of our new home. Between Hedley and Riverside RV Park Resort we stopped on the side of the road to look at an osprey nest with binoculars. There was one baby osprey visible in the nest. I think ospreys reproduce only one per year. It was a goofy looking, gangly, fuzzy little thing we could see. I'm still haunted by the memory of watching a baby osprey flutter down from this nest and onto the highway right in front of me a few years ago. 2007, I think ! YUP ... you may recall ... SPLAT ! ! ! End of one baby osprey's life !
We also stopped to pick some wild apricots. Evidently this was not a banner year for wild apricots. Our favourite / "secret" wild apricot tree had less fruit than other years, and it was not quite as good looking fruit as before. We picked, but haven't tasted them yet, so I don't know how the quality is. They're still a few days away from being completely ripe. Even if they're less than perfect, it's still a wonderful treat to pull a bag of BC wild apricots out of our freezer in January in Arizona to be used in baking or mixed with yoghurt.
DSK
No comments:
Post a Comment