Back to house-rehab project ; Dolly Sods weekend trip
(posted from home)
(This post covers October 1 – 13, 2010)
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Wednesday, 13 October-
We continued working on the rehab house today in Chambersburg. Labashi spent the day cleaning, wood-filling, and sanding cabinet doors and drawers. After working on plaster-patch around the bathroom window and wall (where I had removed the tub-surround and glued-on window trim), I spent the rest of the day outside, digging out old caulk, re-caulking and then painting the gable-ends. I had caulked the east end yesterday so went to work on the west this morning, then gave each a coat of primer and then a coat of exterior. The worst part about it was the repeated collapsing and extending the ladder and moving it every couple of minutes. By day's end I was exhausted.
We worked until 1700 and then headed home.
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Tuesday, 12 October-
This morning we continued with the carport-ceiling project. I rolled the first coat of light-blue on the ceiling and then the second coat on the cut-in sections while Labashi painted the white trim.
After lunch I worked on the gable end of the carport roof, cleaning out old caulk and re-caulking. I then rolled the final coat on the ceiling and finished off brushing the lattice-board covered seams. Late in the day I cleaned out and re-caulked the east gable-end of the house.
After supper I had a couple of errands to run so Labashi went back to deep-cleaning cabinet doors in preparation for painting. We'll also have some wood-putty repairs and sanding to to on them before the painting begins.
I needed to send an email so we drove to the nearby McDonald's for a wi-fi connection for that and to pick up our other email.
I spoke briefly with Orat, too. He'll be coming down soon to install the replacement windows we bought for the house this summer.
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Monday, 11 October-
This morning we drove to Chambersburg to get back into the rehab. I spent much of the day sanding the carport ceiling using a random-orbit sander from a scaffold which was both too high and too low. The too-high part was the higher of the two standing platforms, the too-low one the other. They need to make adjustable legs on these things. A couple of inches would have made a big difference in comfort.
Late in the afternoon we bought paint at Lowe's and spent a few minutes shopping at Kenny's Market for groceries, then returned to paint until dark. I did get the first coat of cutting-in done and almost finished the lattice-board seam covers (which have to be painted by brush rather than roller).
That evening we had an excellent cod fillet we had picked up this afternoon and then I tried to catch up the blog. I'm WAY behind.
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Sunday, 10 October-
Another nice day (weatherwise) today. After my morning patrol of the web Labashi and I cut each other's hair and then I rode the F650GS down to the Tollgate Starbucks for a cappuccino and the papers.
That afternoon I turned my attention back to the repair project on our mud-room door. I had replaced the aluminum and wood threshold with a new one and had used a construction adhesive to put it in place on the concrete entry step.
Today I took off the door and removed the sweep strip from the bottom, then installed a special sweep-and-cap strip. This aluminum strip fits on the bottom of the door and has a standard rubber sweep strip underneath. But the special thing about this one is it has a quarter-round lip sticking out which shields the sill from rain. It only sticks out about 3/8 of an inch but that's enough to keep all rain on the out-side of the sill's rubber seal.
That evening we watched a documentary on cross-country truckers called 'Big Rig', an episode of 'Art Race' (wherein two guys are 'racing' across the US but there's a catch-- they only started with $1 and they have to finance their living and travel expenses by trading the art they create along the way) and a show called 'ArtLand' where a couple tours the US in an RV, taking us to various flavors of art installations and to museums.
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Saturday, 9 October-
I was awake for a bit around 0430 this morning and noticed one of the guys camped nearby starting to re-light the fire (I could see what he was doing as he had an extra-bright headlamp). I went back to bed at that early hour but when I woke around 0715 I could see he was still over there tending the fire while all his friends slept. Where there had been two tents and one car when I went to bed, there were now a dozen tents and nearly as many cars. I hadn't heard a thing. I walked over and talked to the German-teacher-guy for a few minutes to thank him for inviting me last night and to see why he was up. He told me he's just wired to get up at 0500 every day and he likes tending fire (it relaxes him) so why lay awake in the tent?
By 0800 I was back on top of the mountain at the Bear Rocks (north) end of Dolly Sods. I found a nice viewpoint looking west and sat there for the better part of an hour enjoying my Doubleshot while the sun warmed up the van and I decided what I was going to do today.
We had another sunny day but a bit windy and cool. But the big surprise today was how many people there were. I had been here Thursday afternoon and there was one other car. But today there were upwards of 30 cars here and people everywhere, most with cameras. I had the impression there was a photography class underway but I couldn't confirm it.
I had moved away from the worst of the congestion to a vantage point I had seen the other day. It also happened to be near the trailhead of the Bear Rocks Trail. This allowed me a tempting view of the first five minutes of trail and it definitely beckoned to me this morning.
I thought I'd take a little stroll of four to five miles, probably turning back when my GPS indicated I had gone two to three miles. But once I was on the trail I loved it and didn't want to turn back. The trail was stunning. This wasn't a narrow corridor amoung trees, it was largely wide-open heath with pretty little evergreen copses spread strategically about and rising toward a plateau which promised a great view.
I continued walking until the end of the Bear Rocks Trail and then took the Beaver View Trail. At the trail intersection I was overtaken by another hiker (more on him later) and that's part of the reason I chose the Beaver View Trail as he chose the continuing Raven Ridge Trail. It was time to turn back according to the GPS but after checking my map closely I saw I could make a loop and not have to backtrack.
The Bear Rocks Trail had led me across open heath and now my trail led into pine woods for a bit, then to a wide-open vista overlooking a small valley. What a perfect campsite this would be.
The trail then led back through deciduous woods to the Dobbin Grade Trail, this one leading me into a valley with many marshy spots. Try as I might I couldn't avoid all the wet spots and soon had damp feet.
But Dobbin Grade wasn't done with me. I kept running into swampy areas, each a drainage from the slope the trail skirted. I would very much like to have had a pair of overboots.
As the trail rose a bit nearing its intersection with the Beaver Dam Trail, I met a very interesting trio from Charlottesville. This was a older (not elderly, just older than me!) couple and their friend. We struck up a conversation about the trail and somehow that led to a very wide-ranging chat about everything from the joys of retirement to the one fellow's job as a Java programmer at the university to the lady's winter she had spent in New Zealand to the other guys extensive travels to Vietnam, China, and Russia by folding bicycle and train. He would travel by train with his folding bike to an area he wanted to explore and then take off on his bicycle. VERY interesting fellow....
At the Dobbin Grade/Bear Rocks trail intersection I stopped to talk with two guys taking a break there and that allowed the same hiker who had overtaken me at the Beaver View Trial to once again overtake me. He couldn't understand how I could have gotten ahead of him but once we checked the maps we saw that he had simply made a larger loop than I did to get back to that point.
So my hike for today was 8 miles total and I had no pains, blisters, or soreness. This is great!
But now it was time to gallop for the barn. It was about 1415 and I had told Labashi I'd be home tonight.
My trip up through West Virgina took me to Cumberland (MD) and onto I-68, then I-70, I-81 (at Hagerstown) and US30. Everything went very smoothly until I ran into traffic from the weekend's Apple Festival around Biglerville. I've never seen a traffic jam there before but today we had one! It only delayed me about 20 minutes so I'm not sure that really qualifies as a traffic jam.
I made it home by dark and after a quick unloading of the van, Labashi and I watched several episodes of House, M.D.
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Friday, 8 October-
This morning I arose a bit earlier than normal and walked over to check out the bird-banding station. Labashi and I had visited it years ago and were impressed with their all-volunteer operation. And 2010, I learned, has been a record-breaking year for them. The volunteers have banded over 10,000 birds this year (!!!). I met the daughter of the man who started the bird-banding station here 53 years ago. She said this season's numbers bring their total birds-banded count to 243,000 over that time span. I asked whether they've re-caught birds which they had previously banded and she said only about 50 of them.
I didn't stay long at the bird-banding station since the volunteers were busy at their task and didn't have time to talk. The logger-lady was working quickly to band and record birds and had three grocery-bags of them ahead of her at that point (about 0730). Each paper grocery bag contained a dozen-or-so paper lunch-bags, each with a bird inside. These had been captured from the nets strung across the steep-sided valley below the banding station. The hillsides on each side of this valley fall from the sides into the middle and each has 'net lanes', or paths running across them in front of the nets (I seem to remember from last time that they're called 'mist nets'). The nets aren't high but appear to be perfectly placed since the birds tend to fly up the tops of the bushes and low trees right into the nets. As I watched I saw a half-dozen birds caught, one hit a net and bounce off, then recover and fly under the net, and several skirt the ends of the nets. The nets are strung loosely so when a bird hits the net, it tends to wrap itself into the net. After a few seconds of trying to escape, they generally just hang there until a volunteer picks the bird off the net and puts it in a paper lunch bag. After the volunteer collects a half-dozen or so, he or she takes the lunch bags to the banding station where they are examined, banded, and released.
I walked for a mile or so back the Blackbird Knob Trail and then back to the campground and finished breakfast and cleaned up a bit before heading south on PR ('Public Road') 75, the dirt road running through Dolly Sods Scenic Area and along the Dolly Sods Wilderness.
I waymarked several of the trailheads (i.e., recorded their position on the GPS) as I went. At one I struck up a conversation with a guy from Baltimore who was waiting for his friends to join him for an overnighter. 'Wayne' lives in the Timonium area just north of Baltimore and has done quite a bit of hiking in areas I'm familiar with in PA. He's a retired HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning) contractor and gave me some good recommendations for hikes at the reservoirs north of Baltimore.
I had lunch at the scenic lookout and then drove on to Canaan Valley State Park to see the leaves. Just inside the main entrance there's a tree I call the 'tell-tale' regarding the autumn color in the Canaan Valley. In the best years, this tree is so brilliantly colored that it's unbelievable. Today it was very nice, but not the best I've seen.
I talked with the Nature Center ranger for a half-hour or so after learning she had taken a series of Master Naturalist courses in West Virginia and had taken an alligator course in Florida while visiting her sister in the Orlando area. I had learned of the Master Naturalist courses in Florida and would like to take the whole curriculum to earn certification but don't know how to make it work. The courses are generally given weekly and the way I travel doesn't lend itself to taking a series of courses. But then again, perhaps I'm making it too hard. I could take a course here and there just for the experience of it without trying to take the whole curriculum and get certified. I have no intention of trying to get a naturalist job or anything; I'd just like to take some interesting courses. I also had no idea that West Virginia has a Master Naturalist curriculum for the public so I'll also have to look into the courses for that.
After Canaan Valley State Park, I drove to the town of Davis and explored the Canaan Valley Institute's campsites along Camp 70 Road. I had been looking for access roads to the Canaan Valley National Wildlife Refuge and learned of this road running along the Blackwater River. I was pleasantly surprised to find ten free campsites along it. Very cool-- nice free campsites just outside Davis and nearby Thomas.
I then drove on to Thomas and visited 'Mountain Made', a West Virginia crafts consortium. Labashi and I visited before and found some really nice crafts and that was the case again today.
In Thomas's store-front district I went to 'The Purple Fiddle', again a place I had visited with Labashi. It's an old general store converted to a hippie cafe and music venue. I had an espresso-and-half-and-half (their version of a 'frappuccino') and a 'Fiddle Platter'--- warm tortilla wedges with small containers of feta cheese, tapenade, hummus, and fresh salsa (with mango bits!). They also had wi-fi so I checked email and afterwards had a surprise Skype-Video call with Labashi. Love it!
I then went looking for 'A-Frame Road' off Route 93. This road leads into the far side of the Canaan Valley National Wildlife Refuge. The dirt road in was okay but had some humongous potholes to dodge (sometimes more successfully than others). But once I crossed the Refuge boundary the road was good and I had an easy ride to the far-end parking area. I had a magnificent evening for a walk but unfortunately several duck hunters had beat me to the area. I thought I'd walk around behind them but started hearing duck calls and shots fairly close by and decided to call it a day since I also have a long drive to my campsite for the night. I had seen two deer driving in and saw another three on the way out.
I still had almost an hour until dark so drove back through Davis and past Canaan Valley State Park and back up the mountain to Dolly Sods. I had hoped to stay at Red Creek Campground again but it was full and I was amazed to see so many cars parked along the road-- apparently backpackers already out in the woods for the long holiday weekend. This morning all the pulloffs and parking lots were empty but this evening they are parked full.
As darkness fell I drove on to the freebie campsites I had waymarked on the way in yesterday and found the nicest one still open. I parked for the night and talked briefly with a hunter camped nearby for the squirrel season opener tomorrow. Around 2130 two young guys came in and took up another of the campsites nearby-- this one between Mocha Joe and the road. I walked over to say hello and let them know I would need to be able to drive out tomorrow morning so they'd have to avoid blocking the path. They were the advance party for a group of 15 and had started a fire. Their buddies had just left Pittsburgh at 2000 and would not be in until after midnight so they invited me to hang out around the fire and talk. One was a system administrator for the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center and the other worked as a German teacher in a Pittsburgh-area middle school (Yes, German language studies in a middle school!).
We had a great time around the fire but I called it a night around 2300.
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Thursday, 7 October-
This morning I headed out for a few days in West Virginia while Labashi stays home to work on her gardening and lawn projects. I spent much of the day driving west to Cumberland, MD, then south to Keyser, WV and on to Dolly Sods Wilderness area by 1530.
As I drove up to Dolly Sods I checked out some freebie camping sites in the Monongahela National Forest which looked pretty good but I wanted to walk yet today. But I did take time to waypoint them on the GPS for the future.
Once atop the mountain I took a two-mile walk at Bear Rocks, walking out into the sub-arctic heath. It reminds me a lot of Labrador and parts of Newfoundland in that there are flag spruce (black spruce with limbs only on the downwind side), arctic cotton, low-growing juniper and willows, and inches-thick lichen everywhere above the boggy areas. The land is mostly open with a few pine thickets. I found it useful to walk on the downwind side of the pines to give me a bit of a break from this evening's 20 mph breeze.
As I walked this evening I saw a vole, a hawk (a goshawk, perhaps?), and kicked up a grouse. I also saw cranberries and I believe some dried-up high-bush blueberries. I was hoping to see Labrador Tea but none so far.
As darkness neared I returned to Mocha Joe and drove to nearby Red Creek campground for the night. I had a sumptuous supper of beef stew and then made up a Starbucks Via coffee with St. Brendans Irish Cream for dessert. I'm livin' large on Dolly Sods tonight!
Before retiring for the night I walked over to talk with two guys camping nearby. I asked whether the bird-banders were still working and learned tomorrow is their last day for the season.
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Wednesday, 6 October-
This morning I cut the cross-member to block up the sagging joist but could not fit it into palce due to interference from pipes. I decided the only way would be to use several 2x4 pieces rather than one 2 x 10 piece for this and went ahead and cut and prepared them for installation. I then chased down a floor jack and 4x4 post and jacked up the sagging joist. I'll have to wait for joist-hangers to finish this but its pretty straightforward now since everything is lined up and ready.
I spent the afternoon replacing receptacles and removing an old fluorescent fixture over the sink while Labashi worked on kitchen cabinet doors (getting them ready for paint).
We headed home after 1700 and stopped in Carlisle at Chili's for supper. Afterwards we shopped at the next-door Home Depot for a tub-surround and vinyl floor covering. I think we've found the 'right' surround but we're disappointed in the options for flooring.
We made it home by 2130 and watched a bit of television before falling into bed exhausted.
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Tuesday, 5 October-
Today was my first day on new blood-pressure meds and as expected I noticed some light-headedness when exerting (tearing up the underlayment). And at one point I came very close to fainting when I jammed a lauan splinter into my thumb and had to pull it out. But by afternoon I was feeling pretty much normal.
I spent the afternoon planning and then executing a series of cuts to remove a 12 x 15 -inch plywood section (of the bathroom floor) which had rotted, apparently due to a water leak sometime ago.
That evening, as Maypo and I looked at it from below we noticed a sagging joist. I'll have to install a cross-piece and joist-hangers to fix that.
That evening we had supper with Maypo-and-family at Norland Pub.
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Monday, 4 October-
I had a bit of a scare last night, or rather early this morning. I woke with a nosebleed. I had been feeling that my blood pressure is higher than normal and was shocked to find it in the 150/100-ish range around 0430 this morning. And though it settled down into a more normal range, I went ahead and called my doctor and got in for an appointment this morning. There's no apparent explanation for the nosebleed but we decided I'd go ahead and start a very low-dose blood pressure medicine.
We had intended to leave for Chambersburg first thing this morning but my doctor's appointment and picking up the bp medicine delayed us until afternoon.
We arrived at the rehab-house around 1500 and took a short tour to remind ourselves of all the projects we still need to do. We decided to start in the bathroom so I spent a few hours ripping up the old tile and I started tearing up the lauan underlayment.
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Sunday, 3 October-
Today I spent a few hours installing the new aluminum threshold at the mud-room door. This should have been an easy replacement but with the old one out of the way I think I see why it rotted. The concrete step it lies upon is uneven and caused the aluminum threshold plate to tilt backwards a bit, which probably funneled water to the wrong place. Using a two-pound hammer and a cold chisel I leveled off the high spots and then used the construction adhesive to install the new threshold. With rains due tonight I also had to seal off the doorway with duct tape and plastic sheeting so the water doesn't ruin the adhesive.
In mid-afternoon I rode the GS to the Tollgate Starbucks for a coffee and Times.
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Saturday, 2 October-
This morning I decided I need to take advantage of the good weather to work on rotted threshold of the mud-room door. This is an aluminum threshold but it has an underlying wood frame which was in contact with the concrete step and apparently water was getting into it. In any case, it has to be replaced.
I tore out the old one and then drove the Miata in to Lowe's for a replacement on this very nice, sunny day. I had intended to replace it with an all-aluminum or fiberglass threshold but the only thing that fits without a lot of hassles is another aluminum one, again with the underlying pine. I bought some copper sulfate to treat the pine and a tube of construction adhesive to install it (since the door frame the other one was attached too also rotted away). I also bought some Great Stuff sealant to plug the various voids left behind when I removed all the rotted wood.
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Friday, 1 October-
Today we shopped at Home Depot and Lowe's for items to restart the house-rehab project we had started this summer. After the weekend we'll get back to it.
I also pulled the F650GS out of the barn and took it, the Miata, and Labashi's car up to the gas station to check the tires and I drove them a bit to get the accumulated rust off of the disk brakes.
That evening we watched the first disk of the history-of-Quebec DVD set I picked up for a quarter at the Marystown, Newfoundland library. I'm not too sure about this one. It looks like the provincial government collected various unrelated art projects which happened to have something to do with the history of Quebec and put them all on one DVD set. The individual pieces seem to be unrelated to each other. But we do like seeing the old footage and photos of Quebec City.
************** END OF POST ************
(posted from home)
(This post covers October 1 – 13, 2010)
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Wednesday, 13 October-
We continued working on the rehab house today in Chambersburg. Labashi spent the day cleaning, wood-filling, and sanding cabinet doors and drawers. After working on plaster-patch around the bathroom window and wall (where I had removed the tub-surround and glued-on window trim), I spent the rest of the day outside, digging out old caulk, re-caulking and then painting the gable-ends. I had caulked the east end yesterday so went to work on the west this morning, then gave each a coat of primer and then a coat of exterior. The worst part about it was the repeated collapsing and extending the ladder and moving it every couple of minutes. By day's end I was exhausted.
We worked until 1700 and then headed home.
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Tuesday, 12 October-
This morning we continued with the carport-ceiling project. I rolled the first coat of light-blue on the ceiling and then the second coat on the cut-in sections while Labashi painted the white trim.
After lunch I worked on the gable end of the carport roof, cleaning out old caulk and re-caulking. I then rolled the final coat on the ceiling and finished off brushing the lattice-board covered seams. Late in the day I cleaned out and re-caulked the east gable-end of the house.
After supper I had a couple of errands to run so Labashi went back to deep-cleaning cabinet doors in preparation for painting. We'll also have some wood-putty repairs and sanding to to on them before the painting begins.
I needed to send an email so we drove to the nearby McDonald's for a wi-fi connection for that and to pick up our other email.
I spoke briefly with Orat, too. He'll be coming down soon to install the replacement windows we bought for the house this summer.
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Monday, 11 October-
This morning we drove to Chambersburg to get back into the rehab. I spent much of the day sanding the carport ceiling using a random-orbit sander from a scaffold which was both too high and too low. The too-high part was the higher of the two standing platforms, the too-low one the other. They need to make adjustable legs on these things. A couple of inches would have made a big difference in comfort.
Late in the afternoon we bought paint at Lowe's and spent a few minutes shopping at Kenny's Market for groceries, then returned to paint until dark. I did get the first coat of cutting-in done and almost finished the lattice-board seam covers (which have to be painted by brush rather than roller).
That evening we had an excellent cod fillet we had picked up this afternoon and then I tried to catch up the blog. I'm WAY behind.
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Sunday, 10 October-
Another nice day (weatherwise) today. After my morning patrol of the web Labashi and I cut each other's hair and then I rode the F650GS down to the Tollgate Starbucks for a cappuccino and the papers.
That afternoon I turned my attention back to the repair project on our mud-room door. I had replaced the aluminum and wood threshold with a new one and had used a construction adhesive to put it in place on the concrete entry step.
Today I took off the door and removed the sweep strip from the bottom, then installed a special sweep-and-cap strip. This aluminum strip fits on the bottom of the door and has a standard rubber sweep strip underneath. But the special thing about this one is it has a quarter-round lip sticking out which shields the sill from rain. It only sticks out about 3/8 of an inch but that's enough to keep all rain on the out-side of the sill's rubber seal.
That evening we watched a documentary on cross-country truckers called 'Big Rig', an episode of 'Art Race' (wherein two guys are 'racing' across the US but there's a catch-- they only started with $1 and they have to finance their living and travel expenses by trading the art they create along the way) and a show called 'ArtLand' where a couple tours the US in an RV, taking us to various flavors of art installations and to museums.
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Saturday, 9 October-
I was awake for a bit around 0430 this morning and noticed one of the guys camped nearby starting to re-light the fire (I could see what he was doing as he had an extra-bright headlamp). I went back to bed at that early hour but when I woke around 0715 I could see he was still over there tending the fire while all his friends slept. Where there had been two tents and one car when I went to bed, there were now a dozen tents and nearly as many cars. I hadn't heard a thing. I walked over and talked to the German-teacher-guy for a few minutes to thank him for inviting me last night and to see why he was up. He told me he's just wired to get up at 0500 every day and he likes tending fire (it relaxes him) so why lay awake in the tent?
By 0800 I was back on top of the mountain at the Bear Rocks (north) end of Dolly Sods. I found a nice viewpoint looking west and sat there for the better part of an hour enjoying my Doubleshot while the sun warmed up the van and I decided what I was going to do today.
We had another sunny day but a bit windy and cool. But the big surprise today was how many people there were. I had been here Thursday afternoon and there was one other car. But today there were upwards of 30 cars here and people everywhere, most with cameras. I had the impression there was a photography class underway but I couldn't confirm it.
I had moved away from the worst of the congestion to a vantage point I had seen the other day. It also happened to be near the trailhead of the Bear Rocks Trail. This allowed me a tempting view of the first five minutes of trail and it definitely beckoned to me this morning.
I thought I'd take a little stroll of four to five miles, probably turning back when my GPS indicated I had gone two to three miles. But once I was on the trail I loved it and didn't want to turn back. The trail was stunning. This wasn't a narrow corridor amoung trees, it was largely wide-open heath with pretty little evergreen copses spread strategically about and rising toward a plateau which promised a great view.
I continued walking until the end of the Bear Rocks Trail and then took the Beaver View Trail. At the trail intersection I was overtaken by another hiker (more on him later) and that's part of the reason I chose the Beaver View Trail as he chose the continuing Raven Ridge Trail. It was time to turn back according to the GPS but after checking my map closely I saw I could make a loop and not have to backtrack.
The Bear Rocks Trail had led me across open heath and now my trail led into pine woods for a bit, then to a wide-open vista overlooking a small valley. What a perfect campsite this would be.
The trail then led back through deciduous woods to the Dobbin Grade Trail, this one leading me into a valley with many marshy spots. Try as I might I couldn't avoid all the wet spots and soon had damp feet.
But Dobbin Grade wasn't done with me. I kept running into swampy areas, each a drainage from the slope the trail skirted. I would very much like to have had a pair of overboots.
As the trail rose a bit nearing its intersection with the Beaver Dam Trail, I met a very interesting trio from Charlottesville. This was a older (not elderly, just older than me!) couple and their friend. We struck up a conversation about the trail and somehow that led to a very wide-ranging chat about everything from the joys of retirement to the one fellow's job as a Java programmer at the university to the lady's winter she had spent in New Zealand to the other guys extensive travels to Vietnam, China, and Russia by folding bicycle and train. He would travel by train with his folding bike to an area he wanted to explore and then take off on his bicycle. VERY interesting fellow....
At the Dobbin Grade/Bear Rocks trail intersection I stopped to talk with two guys taking a break there and that allowed the same hiker who had overtaken me at the Beaver View Trial to once again overtake me. He couldn't understand how I could have gotten ahead of him but once we checked the maps we saw that he had simply made a larger loop than I did to get back to that point.
So my hike for today was 8 miles total and I had no pains, blisters, or soreness. This is great!
But now it was time to gallop for the barn. It was about 1415 and I had told Labashi I'd be home tonight.
My trip up through West Virgina took me to Cumberland (MD) and onto I-68, then I-70, I-81 (at Hagerstown) and US30. Everything went very smoothly until I ran into traffic from the weekend's Apple Festival around Biglerville. I've never seen a traffic jam there before but today we had one! It only delayed me about 20 minutes so I'm not sure that really qualifies as a traffic jam.
I made it home by dark and after a quick unloading of the van, Labashi and I watched several episodes of House, M.D.
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Friday, 8 October-
This morning I arose a bit earlier than normal and walked over to check out the bird-banding station. Labashi and I had visited it years ago and were impressed with their all-volunteer operation. And 2010, I learned, has been a record-breaking year for them. The volunteers have banded over 10,000 birds this year (!!!). I met the daughter of the man who started the bird-banding station here 53 years ago. She said this season's numbers bring their total birds-banded count to 243,000 over that time span. I asked whether they've re-caught birds which they had previously banded and she said only about 50 of them.
I didn't stay long at the bird-banding station since the volunteers were busy at their task and didn't have time to talk. The logger-lady was working quickly to band and record birds and had three grocery-bags of them ahead of her at that point (about 0730). Each paper grocery bag contained a dozen-or-so paper lunch-bags, each with a bird inside. These had been captured from the nets strung across the steep-sided valley below the banding station. The hillsides on each side of this valley fall from the sides into the middle and each has 'net lanes', or paths running across them in front of the nets (I seem to remember from last time that they're called 'mist nets'). The nets aren't high but appear to be perfectly placed since the birds tend to fly up the tops of the bushes and low trees right into the nets. As I watched I saw a half-dozen birds caught, one hit a net and bounce off, then recover and fly under the net, and several skirt the ends of the nets. The nets are strung loosely so when a bird hits the net, it tends to wrap itself into the net. After a few seconds of trying to escape, they generally just hang there until a volunteer picks the bird off the net and puts it in a paper lunch bag. After the volunteer collects a half-dozen or so, he or she takes the lunch bags to the banding station where they are examined, banded, and released.
I walked for a mile or so back the Blackbird Knob Trail and then back to the campground and finished breakfast and cleaned up a bit before heading south on PR ('Public Road') 75, the dirt road running through Dolly Sods Scenic Area and along the Dolly Sods Wilderness.
I waymarked several of the trailheads (i.e., recorded their position on the GPS) as I went. At one I struck up a conversation with a guy from Baltimore who was waiting for his friends to join him for an overnighter. 'Wayne' lives in the Timonium area just north of Baltimore and has done quite a bit of hiking in areas I'm familiar with in PA. He's a retired HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning) contractor and gave me some good recommendations for hikes at the reservoirs north of Baltimore.
I had lunch at the scenic lookout and then drove on to Canaan Valley State Park to see the leaves. Just inside the main entrance there's a tree I call the 'tell-tale' regarding the autumn color in the Canaan Valley. In the best years, this tree is so brilliantly colored that it's unbelievable. Today it was very nice, but not the best I've seen.
I talked with the Nature Center ranger for a half-hour or so after learning she had taken a series of Master Naturalist courses in West Virginia and had taken an alligator course in Florida while visiting her sister in the Orlando area. I had learned of the Master Naturalist courses in Florida and would like to take the whole curriculum to earn certification but don't know how to make it work. The courses are generally given weekly and the way I travel doesn't lend itself to taking a series of courses. But then again, perhaps I'm making it too hard. I could take a course here and there just for the experience of it without trying to take the whole curriculum and get certified. I have no intention of trying to get a naturalist job or anything; I'd just like to take some interesting courses. I also had no idea that West Virginia has a Master Naturalist curriculum for the public so I'll also have to look into the courses for that.
After Canaan Valley State Park, I drove to the town of Davis and explored the Canaan Valley Institute's campsites along Camp 70 Road. I had been looking for access roads to the Canaan Valley National Wildlife Refuge and learned of this road running along the Blackwater River. I was pleasantly surprised to find ten free campsites along it. Very cool-- nice free campsites just outside Davis and nearby Thomas.
I then drove on to Thomas and visited 'Mountain Made', a West Virginia crafts consortium. Labashi and I visited before and found some really nice crafts and that was the case again today.
In Thomas's store-front district I went to 'The Purple Fiddle', again a place I had visited with Labashi. It's an old general store converted to a hippie cafe and music venue. I had an espresso-and-half-and-half (their version of a 'frappuccino') and a 'Fiddle Platter'--- warm tortilla wedges with small containers of feta cheese, tapenade, hummus, and fresh salsa (with mango bits!). They also had wi-fi so I checked email and afterwards had a surprise Skype-Video call with Labashi. Love it!
I then went looking for 'A-Frame Road' off Route 93. This road leads into the far side of the Canaan Valley National Wildlife Refuge. The dirt road in was okay but had some humongous potholes to dodge (sometimes more successfully than others). But once I crossed the Refuge boundary the road was good and I had an easy ride to the far-end parking area. I had a magnificent evening for a walk but unfortunately several duck hunters had beat me to the area. I thought I'd walk around behind them but started hearing duck calls and shots fairly close by and decided to call it a day since I also have a long drive to my campsite for the night. I had seen two deer driving in and saw another three on the way out.
I still had almost an hour until dark so drove back through Davis and past Canaan Valley State Park and back up the mountain to Dolly Sods. I had hoped to stay at Red Creek Campground again but it was full and I was amazed to see so many cars parked along the road-- apparently backpackers already out in the woods for the long holiday weekend. This morning all the pulloffs and parking lots were empty but this evening they are parked full.
As darkness fell I drove on to the freebie campsites I had waymarked on the way in yesterday and found the nicest one still open. I parked for the night and talked briefly with a hunter camped nearby for the squirrel season opener tomorrow. Around 2130 two young guys came in and took up another of the campsites nearby-- this one between Mocha Joe and the road. I walked over to say hello and let them know I would need to be able to drive out tomorrow morning so they'd have to avoid blocking the path. They were the advance party for a group of 15 and had started a fire. Their buddies had just left Pittsburgh at 2000 and would not be in until after midnight so they invited me to hang out around the fire and talk. One was a system administrator for the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center and the other worked as a German teacher in a Pittsburgh-area middle school (Yes, German language studies in a middle school!).
We had a great time around the fire but I called it a night around 2300.
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Thursday, 7 October-
This morning I headed out for a few days in West Virginia while Labashi stays home to work on her gardening and lawn projects. I spent much of the day driving west to Cumberland, MD, then south to Keyser, WV and on to Dolly Sods Wilderness area by 1530.
As I drove up to Dolly Sods I checked out some freebie camping sites in the Monongahela National Forest which looked pretty good but I wanted to walk yet today. But I did take time to waypoint them on the GPS for the future.
Once atop the mountain I took a two-mile walk at Bear Rocks, walking out into the sub-arctic heath. It reminds me a lot of Labrador and parts of Newfoundland in that there are flag spruce (black spruce with limbs only on the downwind side), arctic cotton, low-growing juniper and willows, and inches-thick lichen everywhere above the boggy areas. The land is mostly open with a few pine thickets. I found it useful to walk on the downwind side of the pines to give me a bit of a break from this evening's 20 mph breeze.
As I walked this evening I saw a vole, a hawk (a goshawk, perhaps?), and kicked up a grouse. I also saw cranberries and I believe some dried-up high-bush blueberries. I was hoping to see Labrador Tea but none so far.
As darkness neared I returned to Mocha Joe and drove to nearby Red Creek campground for the night. I had a sumptuous supper of beef stew and then made up a Starbucks Via coffee with St. Brendans Irish Cream for dessert. I'm livin' large on Dolly Sods tonight!
Before retiring for the night I walked over to talk with two guys camping nearby. I asked whether the bird-banders were still working and learned tomorrow is their last day for the season.
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Wednesday, 6 October-
This morning I cut the cross-member to block up the sagging joist but could not fit it into palce due to interference from pipes. I decided the only way would be to use several 2x4 pieces rather than one 2 x 10 piece for this and went ahead and cut and prepared them for installation. I then chased down a floor jack and 4x4 post and jacked up the sagging joist. I'll have to wait for joist-hangers to finish this but its pretty straightforward now since everything is lined up and ready.
I spent the afternoon replacing receptacles and removing an old fluorescent fixture over the sink while Labashi worked on kitchen cabinet doors (getting them ready for paint).
We headed home after 1700 and stopped in Carlisle at Chili's for supper. Afterwards we shopped at the next-door Home Depot for a tub-surround and vinyl floor covering. I think we've found the 'right' surround but we're disappointed in the options for flooring.
We made it home by 2130 and watched a bit of television before falling into bed exhausted.
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Tuesday, 5 October-
Today was my first day on new blood-pressure meds and as expected I noticed some light-headedness when exerting (tearing up the underlayment). And at one point I came very close to fainting when I jammed a lauan splinter into my thumb and had to pull it out. But by afternoon I was feeling pretty much normal.
I spent the afternoon planning and then executing a series of cuts to remove a 12 x 15 -inch plywood section (of the bathroom floor) which had rotted, apparently due to a water leak sometime ago.
That evening, as Maypo and I looked at it from below we noticed a sagging joist. I'll have to install a cross-piece and joist-hangers to fix that.
That evening we had supper with Maypo-and-family at Norland Pub.
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Monday, 4 October-
I had a bit of a scare last night, or rather early this morning. I woke with a nosebleed. I had been feeling that my blood pressure is higher than normal and was shocked to find it in the 150/100-ish range around 0430 this morning. And though it settled down into a more normal range, I went ahead and called my doctor and got in for an appointment this morning. There's no apparent explanation for the nosebleed but we decided I'd go ahead and start a very low-dose blood pressure medicine.
We had intended to leave for Chambersburg first thing this morning but my doctor's appointment and picking up the bp medicine delayed us until afternoon.
We arrived at the rehab-house around 1500 and took a short tour to remind ourselves of all the projects we still need to do. We decided to start in the bathroom so I spent a few hours ripping up the old tile and I started tearing up the lauan underlayment.
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Sunday, 3 October-
Today I spent a few hours installing the new aluminum threshold at the mud-room door. This should have been an easy replacement but with the old one out of the way I think I see why it rotted. The concrete step it lies upon is uneven and caused the aluminum threshold plate to tilt backwards a bit, which probably funneled water to the wrong place. Using a two-pound hammer and a cold chisel I leveled off the high spots and then used the construction adhesive to install the new threshold. With rains due tonight I also had to seal off the doorway with duct tape and plastic sheeting so the water doesn't ruin the adhesive.
In mid-afternoon I rode the GS to the Tollgate Starbucks for a coffee and Times.
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Saturday, 2 October-
This morning I decided I need to take advantage of the good weather to work on rotted threshold of the mud-room door. This is an aluminum threshold but it has an underlying wood frame which was in contact with the concrete step and apparently water was getting into it. In any case, it has to be replaced.
I tore out the old one and then drove the Miata in to Lowe's for a replacement on this very nice, sunny day. I had intended to replace it with an all-aluminum or fiberglass threshold but the only thing that fits without a lot of hassles is another aluminum one, again with the underlying pine. I bought some copper sulfate to treat the pine and a tube of construction adhesive to install it (since the door frame the other one was attached too also rotted away). I also bought some Great Stuff sealant to plug the various voids left behind when I removed all the rotted wood.
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Friday, 1 October-
Today we shopped at Home Depot and Lowe's for items to restart the house-rehab project we had started this summer. After the weekend we'll get back to it.
I also pulled the F650GS out of the barn and took it, the Miata, and Labashi's car up to the gas station to check the tires and I drove them a bit to get the accumulated rust off of the disk brakes.
That evening we watched the first disk of the history-of-Quebec DVD set I picked up for a quarter at the Marystown, Newfoundland library. I'm not too sure about this one. It looks like the provincial government collected various unrelated art projects which happened to have something to do with the history of Quebec and put them all on one DVD set. The individual pieces seem to be unrelated to each other. But we do like seeing the old footage and photos of Quebec City.
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posted by Bezabor&Labashi | 23:59
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