Spring Time in the Mountainhood

Just thought I'd drop a note about our weekend at the cabin. It was amazing!

We (my Dad, Deb, Matt, Riley and I) arrived in the morning on Saturday. Getty had fixed the leaky pipe. Mark had fixed the furnace (some wires had melted together). We worked our bums off into the afternoon. My Dad installed a new faucet in the kitchen sink. So the water is on and all systems are go. Riley cleaned up micro-trash. Matt cleared an area for our wood pile. Deb cleaned the deck and brought out patio furniture. We swept the stone paths. We raked the yard. I sectioned off an area with stones where my Dad spread wildflowers. We chopped and re-stacked wood as well. Cory came up and finished off the last of our re-nspection to dos. So we will be calling for our final re-nspection either this week or next.

We discovered that the critters have been trying very hard to get into the cabin. They have made some significant holes in the screen doors and riped off one kitchen window screen entirely. There are also a few holes in the screened porch. We will need to get some ply wood to cover the bottom of the screen doors and buy some new screen material for the other spots. We will also have to take the kitchen screen to a window store to be fixed.

We also noticed a septic tank smell coming from the bathroom. I will be calling Rick Rich and/or Getty to see what we might need to do about this.

We have left all of the indoor cleaning for those who are going up in future weekends.

After the work was over, Eric and I had our buddies (Matt, Krystal, Ryan, and Krysta) come up for some fun. Even Scott Cornwall came over in the evening for dinner and hung with us for a bit on Sunday as well. We hung out on the deck, made dinner, went for a walk, made a fire inside then moved our gathering to the fire pit outside. In the morning we made breakfast and then wandered around the ranch. We went to the suspension bridge, discovered a zip line that we played on for a while. Then cleaned up the cabin and chilled on the deck until we dragged ourselves away (kicking and screaming). We didn't want to leave!

The river is raging and everything is beautiful!

Cabin Use Update - April 2009

We put the cabin to full use this weekend and there are a few things worth sharing:

• Getting in - it is still necessary to park at the crossroads and haul stuff in
• Furnace - the furnace is not working at all. Eric re-wired the thermostat and replaced the batteries in the thermostat plus reset the furnace based on the instruction on the inside panel...but it just won't do anything at all. We will need to have a technician come look at it when the snow melts a bit.
• Getting & keeping the place warm - even though there was no furnace we were still able to keep the cabin warm. We purchased a space heater and had the other 3 running most of the time. Add the fireplace and we were able to get the cabin to a comfortable 65 degrees (it started at 42 degrees). We also purchased 2 new heating blankets.
• Water - Steph and I arrived on Friday afternoon and cleaned buckets for drinking water and toilet water. Eric arrived on Saturday and by Sunday morning it was so warm we decided to try turning the water main on. We got everything running and even turned on the water heater. However, we discovered a leak in the pipe in the place where the ice maker hose is connected. Eric tried to fix it but was unable to get it to stop spraying or dripping. So we ended up turning off the water main just before we left. It will need to be turned on at the water main...for whoever goes up there next.
• Refrigerator - We made an executive decision this Fall to turn off all electricity to the cabin to save money. However, over time all of us have probably left a few things in the fridge. Since it has warmed up there were things in the freezer that melted and leaked and got moldy. There are also things in the fridge that may not be good anymore either. I decided to leave the power on to the fridge as we were leaving. All other electricity is off. There is a bit of a mess in the freezer that we will need to work on when it is easier to clean things (i.e. we are able to use water in all sinks)