Took half a day off of work on Friday and loaded up 20 eighty pound bags of Sackrete, the new furnace, water tank and 3 drums of fuels, and a 100 pound tank of propane for hauling into the cabin.
The drive down was excellent, blue bird skies and dry roads all the way, couldn’t ask for a better drive. I should have known something had to go wrong, it was just too nice of a drive. So we get set for a parking spot and off load the sleds and that was when I noticed the Bearcat suspension didn’t feel right. Sure enough a nut and bolt fell out. Dang nabit, I just got the machine back from the shop and had new shocks installed. I drove it on the trailer on Monday, off the trailer Friday when parts started falling off.
04_06_13_Cabin
Hauling materials into the cabin, mainly concrete, fuel and water tank
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This is Alaska and ingenuity is a main stay of any Alaskan’s life, so Jake who was along for the weekend to help, starting picking his brain for options, hum that bolt on the trailer’s jack looks just about right, so off comes the trailer jack bolt and were back up and running.
Friday we ran two trips into the cabin taking food, gear, and fuel. An easy day and after Jake cleared the air lock out of furnace fuel line we had heat. Way to go, now to get some R&R in with a nice dinner and a couple of stiff drinks.
Saturday morning started a bit later than expected, I think those stiff drinks had an affect that neither of us planned, small hangover oops. Well we got all the concrete and materials hauled in around 3:30 and 5 trips and it was another great day of blue skies and great snow. Heck we felt so energized we decided to go cut some firewood.
The wood we were burning wasn’t all that dry yet, but it was all I had, so we did some riding and exploring and visited one of our neighbors trying to find a decent place to get some dry standing firewood. Ended up riding some miles and finally found a few nice dry standing spruce trees on what is better known as the summer trail. Ha, this should be easy, well if you like standing in four feet of snow while falling down old dead trees that looked like the tops were ready to come down on you and no way to move if they did, it was great..
Four trees and three sled loads later we were done for the day and pretty whooped. At least it was Rib Eyes and salad on the menu for dinner. Have to say that those dry standing trees sure do burn a whole lot better than that green spruce I was using, man you could actually feel the heat from the wood stove, what a concept.
Woke up Sunday morning to cloudy skies, fresh snow and flat light well shoot. So the day was devoted to getting the water cans filled, packing gear and heading for home.
The drive back to Fairbanks wasn’t as nice as the ride down. Mostly snowy and slick roads, but we did make pretty good time and got home by 3:30. So ends another weekend of hauling in materials, now I just need to get down there and start stuffing some insulation in the ceiling and walls.
On a side note, that airport baggage cart you see sitting in the snow on the pictures is about 5 miles in from the road, it appears one of our neighbors had the idea of hauling this thing in and using it for a generator shed. Well all I can say is “daa”, since he left the tires and undercarriage on it is now a snow anchor. Maybe he’ll figure it out and get the darn thing to his place, maybe…
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