Living in the Montana Rockies 8

Hello!

 

It's been quite a while since I've had an opportunity to sit at the computer and write.  The problem should be solved in a few days, when the laptop my son helped me buy arrives.  Wireless, cordless, Pentium 4.  I can hardly wait!  A notebook and pen just isn't cutting it.

 

We've been having unusually warm, sunny winter days.  Our average daily temperatures are 70 degrees warmer than the same days last year.  I love sunshine, and the sky is so beautiful, so I have been drawn out to the woods every day.  I can't just sit there all the time, though;  I like to keep busy.  So for three weeks of the past month I have been working at our homesite.  I have cut down several dead trees and cut them up for firewood and brought the logs up to our Pole Gulch house with the ATV and a trailer.  The ATV has snow chains that have sharp metal v's that grip the road, even on ice.  We still have about three feet of snow on the ground.  The sunshine melts just enough snow on the roads to make them icy  when the sun goes behind the mountain and the temperature drops.  It's a gravel road, but the gravel is under the snow, and driving on the road packs down the snow and ice into a thick, slick layer.  The ATV wheels dig in and I drive back and forth from the Pole Gulch Road property to the Spring Valley property, which is a lot of fun!

 

I have also been stringing a line and setting fence posts along the North property line.  I started at the road, next to the driveway.  I put posts 10' apart east along the driveway and west across the road where I hope to keep a horse.  But where the driveway curves away from the property line,  and the line climbs the mountain, I put posts 50' apart.  They're all strung together using dollar store 50' clotheslines.  I try to set one or two posts each time I go up there.  It's a lot of work, climbing the mountain with a post, a rope, branch loppers, heavy post pounder, and sometimes the small chainsaw as well.  I have to cut and hack my way through the woods a little at a time, and when I can pull the line straight in line with the rest of the posts, I pound in another one and tie the line to it, then start hacking my way to the next target 50' farther up the side of the mountain.  When I am ready to put up the wire, I plan to use three strands of barbed wire.  I'm only going to enclose the house and surroundings, so the cows don't get near, bringing the smell and flies with them.  Rumor is that the cows won't be back, but sheep will instead.  The entire 10 acres may never be fenced, but I will know where my fenceline is.  I never knew where my boundary line was on my Banks property.  After the boundary war with my neighbors in Banks (they wouldn't take yes for an answer when I tried to cooperate!), I just have to know.  I'm glad our friend Steve helped us locate and mark the property lines.  One person couldn't have done it alone.  Hills and valleys and forest will not allow for a clear sight from end to end--at least not on the long side, which is 1,320' by air, but much further by land.  The one line that is completely visible is across the road from the house on a hill above the meadow which will become my pasture.  I am not fencing in the hill.  I will fence only the field, which will be 330' long, and various depths along the base of the hill. 

 

At the moment, there are a couple hundred horses released on the Ranch!  All different shapes, sizes, and colors!  I only saw one that I liked a LOT.  He is big!  I want a big horse.  Of the five horses I've owned, my big buckskin gelding, Donald, was my favorite.  I rode him from dawn to dusk.  He was strong and gentle, didn't spook easily, and would go over any terrain and through water.  That's what I want in a horse.  I still want a mule as well. 

 

I finally went riding with our neighbor, Victoria, on one of her horses.  Riding in the mountains, in the forest, with more mountains looming around every bend, some covered in snow, some brown and warm in the sun, the sky so blue, with puffs of white clouds suspended over the peaks - the beauty truly is unbelievable; it really does make me intake-of-air gasp, wide-eyed awed!  Oh, whoa, look at that!  The 3-year-old mare I rode had energy to spare!  I had such an awesome time!

 

I have not used my saddle yet.  Barry's horse-the one I rode-has a custom-made flexing saddle because Munchie has no withers.  I also learned that Barry is a farmer.  Victoria said I can learn to trim the feet, and Barry will put shoes on my horse.  She and he will also be looking out for a good big horse for me.  They know enough cowboys and ranchers that they come across good horses for much less than I find in the ads.  They paid $500 for their 3-year-old mare.  Prices in the paper start at around $1,200.

 

"Oh, give me a home, where the buffalo roam, where the deer and the antelope play..."  I think of this every time we pass by a huge herd of antelope that hang out on one of the ranches about ten miles up the road. They're usually scattered, but once they were just standing in the field as a group, all facing the same direction. They have big, fluffy white tails flared out across their backsides which stand out bright in the sun.  Yellowstone is in the process of reducing herds of buffalo.  They are sending hundreds to slaughter, and the skins and meat are given to Indians and food banks.  I wondered why there was no protest from animal rights groups and was told that it's because buffalo are considered another kind of cattle here.  Meat on feet.  I think of cows that way, but I consider buffalo special, a part of our American History.  They're so huge, dark, and fierce looking.  I couldn't kill them just to exterminate them.  I would rather they were relocated to wilderness areas and let them live.  It probably isn't cost effective.

 

Oh, speaking of Yellowstone, one of the neighbors on one of these mountains around here somewhere, I'm told, gets his water from an aquifer warmed by the Yellowstone geysers.  For some reason, the water suddenly got so hot that his PVC pipes melted and he had to replace all his plumbing with copper pipes.  The water has been steaming out of his faucets!

 

The only thing in the sky that can ruin a beautiful day is jets criss-crossing the sky with chemical trails.  On the most beautiful clear days, the trails blend together and obscure parts of the sky, and the humidity gets raised, and we wonder what we are being poisoned with?  Someone told me that they are testing chemicals for killing foliage, and that we have been targeted because there are too few of us to fight them.  I don't know about that, but I thought it was an interesting, if not paranoid explanation.  Someone else said it's weather control.

 

Friends and relatives have offered us good advice from their experiences living "off the grid."  It does take a lot of work and planning to have water, power, communication and t.v.  We now have three generators (one for the house, and one for each of our workshops).  We also have two solar panels that keep our 8 batteries topped off so we don't have to run generators on a sunny day.  At the suggestion of a friend, Robert researched hydro power, and we have ordered a micro-hydro generator.  Since the spring is uphill from our property and the water flows at 4.3 gallons per minute, we will be able to generate enough electricity for modern appliances...we now have purchased a used washing machine, a new propane dryer, a new propane refrigerator/freezer, and a new propane kitchen stove and oven for our mobile home, which has a brand new forced air gas heater.  We have spent almost every day this week shopping in Billings, Manhattan, Four Corners, Three Forks and Bozeman for our new metal roof (Dark Brown), insulation for the walls and roof, two-by-fours for furring the roof and over the existing exterior walls, and 10' cedar planks for the entire exterior.  Still to be decided on and purchased is a new shower, toilet and sink for Robert's bathroom, and new tub, toilet, and sink for my bathroom.  I saw some really nice, inexpensive, gently used fixtures and cabinets at the Habitat for Humanity outlet yesterday.One of the secrets of an enduring marriage is "patience and separate bathrooms," according to Billy Graham's wife.

   

I should be able to send photos soon!  My son, his girlfriend and his dad pooled resources and sent me a Kodak digital camera/video recorder.  It will fit in a shirt pocket!  As soon as I can, I will send photos to my friend, Mike, who also set up a blogspot for my letters, and ask him to post them.  http://kathleeninthewoods.blogspot.com/

 

Well, Robert wants his computer back, and Penn just showed up to ask for help...he slid off the icy road going 5 mph, and his truck rolled.  He's okay.

 

Just another day in paradise!

 

Kathleen:-)