Paddling around the Noyo River harbor and two more days at the cabin. 04-13-15

 

Bob and I left the cabin around 11:30 and drove down off the hill to Highway 128 where we turned west and headed for Hwy. 1 and the coast. When we got to rout 1 we went north. We crossed the Albion River, Little River, and Big River and came to The town of Fort Bragg and the Noyo River. 

We stopped at the local McDonald’s to use their wifi to post our blogs.
Couple of nerds eh?

We got on the water around 2:30 and paddled down stream.

 

On our left is a high metal wall. It took me a little time to figure out that the wall was protecting a large marina. 
Paddling along the wall; we could see boats and buildings ahead of us.

We got to the end of the wall and turned left into the marina.There were lots of large and small fishing boats stored here and they were well protected behind their metal wall.

We left the boat yard and continued down stream through the harbor.

This harbor is a pretty busy place with lots of boats coming and going. You see everything from Kayaks, a wooden double ender being rowed by a gang of women,

and gigantic diesel powered fishing boats like the Jesse Ann

There are pristine well taken care of boats like this crab boat.

Then there are some boats that have had a harder life like this old scow.

The mouth of the Noyo River

We continued paddling down stream until we came to the Hwy. 1 bridge where we stopped for a while to watch boats coming in from the ocean.

The channel is pretty deep here and the boats come charging into the harbor. Right at the bridge they cut there engines back and drop their speed to 3 mph.

Here is one of the boats coming in.

There are several restaurant’s along the harbor. This sign caught my eye. Apparently you can call this number, order your food and pull up in your boat and be served.
Kind of cool eh?

 

Seals and Sea Lions

We spent the day just paddling around the harbor watching what was going on.
There were lots of seals and sea lions feeding around the docks.

The sea lions had the water in front of  one particular fish processing place staked out.
Apparently the processer throws fish remains in the water and the sea lions feed on it.
I saw several times where a sea lion had a sizable piece of fish in his mouth but of course I never got a picture of it.

One sea lion surfaced right in front of my yak but all I got was  a picture of the swirl of the water when he dove again.

Unloading fish etc.

We watched a couple of boats being unloaded.
Here are some guys unloading baskets of sea urchins.

Here are some guys unloading a large plastic gondola of fish.

Eventually after spending hours in the kayak my butt was hurting so we started back toward the boat ramp.
On the way we noticed this old landing craft that had been converted to a work boat.

We passed the stern of this old boat and I wondered if the missing “S” in the name might be because the owner found out after buying the boat that he got sea sick. 

Eventually we got back to the ramp and got off the water.

It was a fun day.

 

Saturday at the cabin.

Friday night we decided that on Saturday we would cut down a couple trees for firewood. The trees we wanted to cut where going to fall on the road so we would have to clean them up right away.

After breakfast I split up some firewood for the cabin; by the time I was finished with that my back was telling me that, that was all the fire wood I should mess with today. so I canceled the tree cutting. I still have a month or so to cut down the trees.

I the afternoon Bob and I went up the hill to rough in a new trail that will connect the
“cabin loop trail” to the cabin.

You can see the top of the dining hall from one place on the trail.

We got the trail pretty well defined, now all I have to do is grade it so I it will be flat enough to walk on. 

Sunday:

Bob and I were sirring out in front of the cabin discussing where to  put a trail to the bench.
After a much discussion Bob said “Ah, hell just get the tool and we can make the trail in a few minutes.”

I got the tool

and in about 15 minutes we had a trail up to the bench.

Bob Left shortly after we finished the Trail to the bench.

Moving the barrels to the spring.

I wanted to take the barrels up to the spring but like my friend Jerry says “any time you want to do something you always have to do something else first.”
This time I had to remove the shelf from the back of the jeep.

That turned out to be easy just 2 bolts and it’s out.

The barrels didn’t really fit very well but a heavy duty bungee will take care of that.

 

I took the barrels up to the spring.

After delivering the barrels I split some firewood for the evening fire and goofed off for the rest of the day.

Monday:

Today I am going to Ukiah to do some shopping, laundry and to publish this blog.

When I got to Ukiah I found a laundry next to a gas station and a deli. That worked out quite well as I was able to top off all my gas tanks, Have lunch and get my washing done all within an hour.

Now I am at a McDonalds trying to publish this…

First day’s at the cabin. 04-08-15

 

Patti and I spent the morning putting the last minute items in the jeep and checking that Patti had everything she needed in her backpack. We spent the last hour just killing time until we could leave for Patti to catch Air-Porter bus.

After seeing Patti off on the Air-Porter; I went to the gas station to top off the tank in Clifford then I drove through town and got onto 101 heading north. I made a stop in Windsor to get the water heater from Dave. We shot the breeze for a while and then I got back the highway.

It was another beautiful drive on Hwy.128.

I was driving so I couldn’t take any pictures but here is one from the archive.

 

I stopped at the Boonville General store for a couple of last minute purchases and continued the drive through the valley. I arrived at the cabin around 1:30 and to my surprise Bob was already there.

We didn’t do any work today except for moving some firewood and doing some cleaning of the cabin and installing the shower in the bath house.

Bob made one of his awesome stir-fried vegetable and chicken dinners. It is always a treat when Bob comes up because he can’t eat any of my food due to his corn sensitivity.
Therefor, he cooks what he can eat for both of us and it is always very good.

After dinner we sat around and BS’ed for a while, until I was falling asleep in my chair and we went to our beds.

Thursday:

It was pretty cold last night but it is a beautiful morning.

  Bob is still asleep in his van.

Bob got up around 9:00 and we sat around for a while drinking coffee. Eventually we decided to take a walk and check out the trail we started last year.

We got in the jeep and drove up the road to the bear spring.

 

We walked around the area a little then got back in the jeep and drove down the hill to the trail head.
I parked the jeep and off we went down the trail.

We walked all the way to the end of my trail and followed the old lagging road for an other couple hundred yards. Here the logging road splits up on the hill above the cabin. We are looking for an easy way to get down to the cabin from here but it is all very steep so that may take some doing. We split up here; Bob wanting to continue around the bole to see if hi could make it back to the Homestead road and I headed back to get the jeep.

I took my time walking back on the trail looking at a couple of spots where I need to take some of the hill out of the trail. I eventually got back to the jeep and drove down the hill to the cabin.

It took Bob a while to get back to the cabin; about a half hour after I did.

He said he couldn’t find a good way to get to the bench on the Homestead road. We will just have to keep walking around the hill side until we find a good rout.

After some lunch and a break we took a ride over to our neighbors place to say hi, return the key he lent me last time and get a little more acquainted.

Jerred is a energetic young man with lots of plans for his place. In the year that he has been there, he has built a couple of buildings and is working on putting in a olive grove.
There are a couple of springs on his mountain and he has put in a 150 ft. well so he has good water. The property is on a high hill and fairly open so he has solar power and the possibility for wind power. All in all he seams excited to be living here and isn’t afraid of hard work.

We left Jerrid to his work and headed back to the cabin and another great stir-fry dinner.

 

Full belly, warm fire, oops! Fell asleep in my chair again…

I am at the McDonald’s in Fort Brag CA. Bob and I are posting our blogs before going kayaking on the Nnoyo River.

You can read about that in a few days when I get another chance to post my blog.

Ready for another adventure. 04-07-15

 

Patti and I are leaving tomorrow.
She is going to visit her daughter Becki in Redmond, OR and I am going to the cabin until a day or so before she comes home.

I have the jeep pretty much loaded with food, cloths, tools and supplies for my time in the woods.

 
Tomorrow I will take Patti to the air-porter stop and put her on the bus to SFO so she can catch a plane to Redmond. Then I will top off the gas, drive to Windsor to pick up the water heater for the shower and be on my way to the cabin.

I didn’t pull up the apple tree today.

Jim, who does our lawns and other yard work was going to help me pull up the apple tree today.

But what  with the rain and other commitments he wasn’t able make it so I didn’t pull up the apple tree today.

We were going to document the tree removal for everyone’s approval but I didn’t pull up the apple tree today.

In the morning I went to cut its one remaining branch off.
I tried it with my little cordless chain saw.

I cut some small ones

and then a couple larger ones

 

but by then the saw wouldn’t cut at all.

I had to finish the procedure with my trusty Husqvarna, I left some of the tree for leverage.

When I was done with the cutting, I wrapped a chain around the stump just below that interesting burl.
Now I’m all set to pull up the apple tree today.

It was around two in the afternoon, between rain squalls, when a knock came on my front door.
When I went to answer, his hat in his hand, stood Jim at my front door.
He said “I’m awfully sorry, it could not be helped”
But I can’t help you pull up the apple tree today.
Jim said that tomorrow would be okay.

I replied “that’s okay Jim but you see I‘m going away Jim and won’t be here to help you on the morrow

Jim said “that’s okay, you go ahead and play, I’ll just pull up the apple tree my self tomorrow”. 

Okay that’s it for now. For the next three weeks you will no doubt notice a lessening of the quality of the photos and prose in this blog since my photographer and editor Patti,  will not be with me this time.

I will try to do a post whenever I go to Ukiah for supplies and to do laundry;
about every five or six days

Talk to you later.

A ride to the cabin and a visit with Bob. 04-05-15

 

On Friday Patti and I took a ride to Boonville.

I wanted to take the barrels for the spring, the bedding for the cabin, the batteries for the fridge and some tools up to the cabin. I had everything in the van and around 9:30 after getting gas we headed up 101.

When we got to Cloverdale we left the freeway

and headed west on Hwy. 128 toward Boonville.

It is always a nice ride to Boonville; there are lots of vineyards and green hills.

 

There was a little road work being done but it wasn’t to bad.

There are several old barns along the way.

We stopped at the Boonville market to get a couple sandwiches for lunch.

We left Boonville and got onto the road that goes into the hills where the cabin is.

When we got to the gate we found that the combination had been changed.
As it turned out we didn’t have the owners phone number with us so we had to call Joanne to get it. We called Peter and got the new combo. We were in!!

While we were at the gate one of our new neighbors came up the road so we stood around and shot the breeze with them for a while.

Once we were at the cabin we unloaded the van and had lunch. The starter or the battery is giving us trouble on the van so after we unloaded it I backed it up the hill alongside the cabin so it could get a rolling start if the starter didn’t work. As it turned out the starter worked when we were leaving.

Some of the bulbs that Patti planted last year have bloomed; unfortunately we missed most of the blooms

 

but there are still a few.

There were several blossoms on the cheery tree.

After lunch we took a walk up to check out the spring that I will be working on later in the week.
The wild Iris’s are just starting to bloom along the trail.

When we got to the spring we noticed that there is a good amount of water coming out of the overflow.

 

Back at the cabin; I set the cow scull that I found in the desert up on the big stump.

 

On the way home we stopped at Joanne and Dave’s for dinner. When we went to leave I had to jump start the van. Fortunately I had parked in Dave’s driveway and it has a good slope to it so I just rolled back a little and popped the clutch and the van started up.

Visit with Bob.

Yesterday I went to Guerneville for a visit with Bob. We sat in his yard  BS’ing for a while. We made plans for him to come up to the cabin next week. I am going to take a kayak with me and we are planning to do some Kayaking on the Noyo River one of the days he is there.