Woo Hoo A Day in Town!

Hi all! I know it has been a while since I have done a post. I could give you all kinds of "reasons" but the bottom line is I was pretty down for a while and just didn't feel like it. It was easier to just let Roger do it. Anyhow I am doing better and so I thought I would at least do a short post.

I actually got to go to town yesterday! We left here about 8 am and headed in to the landing. Got there about 11 and I headed for Wasilla to do some grocery shopping and to look for a desk chair at the resale stores. I stopped on my way in at 3 Bears which is like a store between Costco and Walmart in the quantity and sizes of what they carry. I like to go there first that way if they don't have something I want I know and can look for it when I get all the way in to Wasilla. Anyway I got done there and headed the rest of the way into town. Hit the resale stores and was totally bumming cause neither of them had any desk chairs at this time. Decided I would check new ones at Walmart and Fred Meyers but all of them they had were EXPENSIVE! Most of them were also leather and I didn't want a leather one as I tend to get sweaty in those as well as I knew the cats would jump up and down from the chair and their nails tend to leave little marks. I did find a few other little items I had on my list but no chair. :-(  I have found myself not working on my craft stuff very much as the chair I have been using is very uncomfortable and so I avoid sitting at the desk.

I finished the grocery shopping, picked up some MORE parts for the snow machine and decided it was time to head back out to the landing. I had gotten done what I set out to do in town which was to get the groceries, and hopefully a new vacuum and a desk chair. I had struck out on the chair but I did manage to find a vacuum. I have been using a shop vac with attachments the past few weeks as the little vacuum we had brought with us had quit working properly and there was no more repairing so into the trash it went. Ugh!!!!!!!!! Have you ever tried to get up animal hair from a rug with just a shop vac? It takes forever and then some. About the only way to get enough suction is to use the crevice tool and go back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and then do it some more. So I was happy to find what I hope will be a decent vacuum for a reasonable price.

So I am driving on the Parks Highway heading for Deshka Landing and see a sign for Big Lake Road. Hmmmmm there is a resale / pawn shop in Big Lake. Check the time, Yep got time to stop. Walk in the store and lo and behold they have 2 desk chairs. Yippee, and all that good stuff. Checked them over and bought one. It is a heavy son of a gun and you should have seen me trying to lift it into the bed of the pickup. I couldn't get the tail gate open so had to go over the top! Sure was glad it is an older truck and I didn't have to worry about "scratching" it!

I got out to the landing and looked around to see if Roger was back from the snow machine tour he had done for Craig. Didn't see him so I headed for where our sleds were parked and started to load the groceries and stuff into the totes and cooler for the trip home. In the winter you use a cooler for the stuff you don't want to freeze. Luckily a friend had told me this when I said something last fall about putting the coolers away for the winter, she laughed and said "No you will want to use them in winter for the stuff that shouldn't freeze". Another learning experience.

Anyway Roger got there and we finished loading, ate some subs that I had picked up and we left for home about 7 pm and got home about 10. Took care of what absolutely needed to be handled, sat and checked email and went to BED! I am not used to riding that many miles in one day and I am feeling it this morning that is for sure. And I get to ride again today as I am going to go spend a couple days down at Yentna Station while Roger goes to town for his Coast Guard class so that maybe he can do some guiding this summer.

Well that is it for now, sorry no pics but I need to transplant some seedlings for the garden, finish putting away the groceries and get things around for me and the boys to go for a couple days. Oh yeah and make sure that the cats are set for that time period. I will try to post a little more frequently in the future.

Thanks for sharing our adventures.
Blessings, Myra

Another Milestone

It is a great day! We finally have internet at the cabin /house! After many delays and frustrations our internet was installed yesterday. They finally got it up and running about 11:30 pm last night. Roger is actually taking the installer over to the airstrip right now to be picked up.
Anyway we have been busy as usual. There is so much to be done around here that some days it seems like we are chasing our tails. It also is time consuming to go to town and get stuff. That is definitely an all day deal at the least. Thursday we left here at 8: am and went in to get parts for one of the ATV's, a tire fixed for it and a few groceries as well as some more tools and the ladders from the trailer that is sitting at Deshka Landing and we didn't get back here til almost midnight again. We did stop at Yentna Station Roadhouse going both ways (which was well worth it on the way home, Thanks again for the good food you guys).
We will do some more posting later, time to heat water and do the dishes so I can fix supper tonight. Love to all, Myra

Well we are still in town (Wasilla). As usual everything took longer than we thought.
Oh well. Anyway I am going to try and post some of the pictures I have taken (not many yet) so hopefully I can figure that out.
Just to bring things up to speed at the cabin:
Day 1: Our river guide Dan met us at Deshka Landing and we followed him to Yentna Station Roadhouse which he and his wife Jean own and operate. We had met them in February when we were on our snowfari and immediately hit it off with them. We all had lunch and then Dan led us the rest of the way up river to our new "home". It ended up being a little farther up river than we had figured by about 8 miles but you will have that. Dan and his son unloaded the stuff of ours they had on their boat and headed back towards their place. OK here we are, now we have to get to the cabin. First trip we took the animals and ourselves and that was enough. There was barely a trail to get through the 4 foot high weeds etc and only that because Roger had walked it about 5 days prior.
OK we made the cabin. Now to get some of our stuff from down by the river (about 600' from cabin to boat landing. Left the cats in the cabin and headed back to boat. Carried as much as we could to cabin. We decided to take a break, catch our breath for a minute. As we were sitting in the cabin talking we heard a strange rubbing type noise on the outside of the cabin and felt the cabin wiggling a little. Roger looked out the kitchen area window and told me to get the camera THERE WAS A BLACK BEAR RUBBING HIS BACK ON THE EDGE OF THE CABIN!!! Anyway as you will see I didn't get much of a picture as the bear heard us and took of into the weeds. (you can barely see his butt in the lower right quarter of the picture).

Since that first day we have made a few trips into town to haul more of our stuff up to the cabin as well as 2 ATV's (One at a time on the boat). Along with that there has been a lot of weed wacking to clear the area around the cabin to cut down on them giant skeeters they have up here and also to make it easier to see bears before they get to close! Roger did have one come to check him out one day while he was outside burning trash, running the generator and some other stuff. He heard a noise and turned around and the bear was about 30' away. He yelled at it and it took off back into the woods but needless to say we now make sure we have ours guns anytime we are outside.

Roger has also been working on jacking up the cabin to put new pilings under it and I have been busy helping when needed with that stuff and also with cleaning the inside. We have done a lot already but we have a lot more to do before winter hits. We still need to cut wood and dig a root cellar.

One of the biggest time eaters right now is coming to town. It takes 3 hours to get from the cabin to the landing where we park a truck and then another hour to get to Wasilla to shop. And we have had to take care of some stuff in Anchorage and that is another hour from Wasilla. Twice we have done a one day trip of coming into Wasilla, getting some groceries, loading some of our stuff on the boat and heading back to the cabin. This makes for a very long day. Oh well we are gaining on it and we are loving it overall. Working our butts off but it is worth it when you see the eagles in flight, the wonder of the snow capped mountains, and on and on.

Time to call it a day, we need to be up and moving in the morning so we can head home as early as possible. Still got to load the boat in the morning and take care of a couple other little things. Blessing to all.

June 30, 2010

OK so we are going to give this a try. I hope it works. I have been doing facebook but it really drives me nuts when I do an update and then am told it is TOO LONG! When you get going on some thought it is hard to count the characters you are using. So I will see if I can do a blog. I will try to post some pictures when I get on next time, don't really have time to today. We need to empty out a storage unit in Anchorage today, get the truck cleaned so we can put it up for sale and then load the boat and head back to the house which is a 3 hour boat trip. Hope to have internet at the cabin within the next couple of weeks so doing updates will be easier, won't have to come into town to do. Anyway we are loving life in "the bush" for the most part, Some adjustments are easier than others, more on that later, but overall we are loving being here in God's country.