So I headed out Saturday, June 30th for a week at the Cabin near Hurricane and had a productive and enjoyable trip even with the rain and mud.
Plan was to head in Saturday, make a few runs in with some supplies, a refrigerator, more materials and wait for Dean to come down and help. All went as expected with only a few bumps as it were. It has been a rainy summer and the trail was wet and muddy to say the least and I had to winch 5 times in the first 3 out of 4 trips I made on Saturday.
I made one more trip on Sunday and then decided to start working on inventorying all the materials at the site. Figured it’d be good to know what I did have on hand and the piles of lumbers got a bit disorganized when we were working on the walls and such. So I spent most of Sunday hauling materials out from under the cabin and organized them into nice piles and then hauled it all back under the cabin after I counted everything, man what a chore. But at least I now know I have enough to finish the main cabin and get a start on the generator shed and furnace room.
Monday morning was nice, a bit cloudy but not rainy, so I figured I’d start doing some brushing on the upper trail, this will bypass about 90% of the mud holes and cut down my travel time to the cabin from the parking area. Using the GPS I located the waypoints I needed to stay within the access right of ways and started brushing the Willows. This stuff is thick, 12 feet tall and like a jungle you can hardly squeeze through. All was going good for about 150 feet or so when I looked down and realized I had just stepped in one big pile of poop, I mean this was one huge pile of poo. Thinking that the bear that made that pile was way bigger than any bear I wanted to run into stuck in this thick brush all alone, with my rifle 150 feet away sitting on my ATV, I made an executive decision and decided that I really ought to be working on the cabin and this Ol’ brushing project could wait a bit, may until August when I know most the bears are down at the river trying to catch some fish.
Tuesday I had to make another run out to the truck to get some more of the supplies I had hauled down and to see when Dean was coming in. Well the good news is that I didn’t get stuck, bad news was Dean had to cancel out due to vehicle issues, no biggie, I’ll just keep on trucking and get done what I can. Only thing on my mind during these trips in and out was all the fresh dung I kept seeing, every trip in and out I’d ride over the bear poop with my ATV tires and every trip I’d find a fresh pile with no tire marks. I was beginning to think the bears were doing it on purpose, just to see if I was paying attention.
Wednesday I figured it’d be a good idea to get the wood stove going. Problem is I didn’t have the stove pipe I wanted to make this happen. But heck it’s Alaska right, so a little ingenuity and I had the stove going and a small fire to help dry out my wet gear. One little problem, I had to sort of modify a 45 degree pipe and it didn’t quite hold up. Ooops, smoky cabin, dig out the burning wood, open the door and air the place out. Oh well, guess I’ll keep using the temporary furnace a bit longer, as long as my fuel holds out I’m OK. One good side effect, I didn’t have any bugs for a few days, even with the door left open.
By Friday I had finished the inventory, sheathed half of the front wall, installed the front door and hardware, placed the exterior foam board on 60% of all four walls, did a little brushing on the upper trail, worked on brushing out the area for the generator shed, cut and stacked some firewood and filled in some of the muds holes in the trail close to the cabin. I was thinking that on Saturday I’d do some more work on the front gable or stairs and start cleaning up for a Sunday departure back home.
Friday night was the worst rain storm the whole week. The tarps on the roof are holding up as far as keeping the rain out, well, at least in all but one little spot. Unfortunately this little spot just happened to be right above my cot. I woke at 1:00 AM thinking I must of peed in my bed, I was soaking wet, my sleeping bag was soaking wet, I got up and was wondering what the heck, when I noticed this drop, drop, drop coming from the roof onto my cot, man oh man, what a way to wake up.
Change of plans, move sleeping location, dry out sleeping bag and cot and try to go back to sleep. The heck with it, so I started cleaning up and packing and went home a day early.
I left the cabin around 10:00 AM Saturday morning thinking It’d be an easy ride out, nope, hardly got 300 yards from the cabin when I got stuck. Hum, OK, no biggie, get the winch cable out and winch a few feet and keep on trucking, hum, you’ll note in the video that right after I hooked the winch cable up there is a slight delay, this is the time it took me to realize the reason I was stuck is because the trailer rolled on its’ side. So lift the trailer back onto all four tires, winch and all is good.
So ends another trip to the cabin. I hope I can make it down in August, if not, for sure in September after hunting. Maybe I’ll get some more of the upper trail cut while the bears are out fishing….
Video of the trail out
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