Another Blizzard

I hope this is the last blog about the weather out here we do. We are looking at plane tickets back to our boat we call home. We bought a little house out here on the prairie but our boat is still home. Going back to the Rio Dulce river in Guatemala. We just went through another Blizzard out here in Kansas with the worst after the snow falls, the wind blowing. Snow drifts everywhere. Yesterday we needed to go to town. Pam had a follow up on a check up at the doctor’s office. “She ‘s fine.” It had been 3 degrees during the night, now it was 5 degrees. We have our son’s old truck he just keeps around because it’s old. 1972 old Chevy 6 cylinder service truck. It wouldn’t start. Just too cold. Couldn’t get the hood up, froze down. Went for the battery charger and a screw driver to pry the hood up. Pam calling to say we were on the way but maybe late. The ride into town in the early morning with the blowing snow and it this cold should have been upsetting but Pam and I were laughing with her saying, “The adventure goes on.” This cold, blowing snow and this old truck. Taking roads we hope we could get through. Yesterday we went over to our son’s house and there a snow plow was plowing snow drifts where some of the dirt road was bare and then 4 foot snow drifts where the snow could blow across a field. Old truck again, slowly driving along not in any hurry looking for what animals might be out there. There in a clear spot about 20 pheasants were feeding under a cedar tree in a neighbor’s yard. Just like chickens in the yard back in Guatemala. When we got out of the truck at our son’s house the snow geese were flying over head, honking away. For some reason we haven’t seen any jack rabbits but cotton tails are every where. Here you can see where they have come to check out the pan Pam has been feeding the birds in.

Rabbit tracks

This has been an adventure but like all things it’s about over for this time. See all our boat friends soon.

Pam always takes a bag with heavy bibs, gloves, socks and hats when we leave to go anywhere in these conditions.

 

Still in Cold Kansas

We only have a short time to be here in Kansas now and we will be going back to our boat in Guatemala and it’s snowing here again. Why are we still here? “Money” or the lack of it. We wanted to come out here for Christmas and a plane ride takes money. We live on Social Security and have learned to live on very little over the years living on a boat and mostly living off the grid. We live on a strict budget and wanted to live out here for three months after paying to get here. We bought this little house just in case we have to leave the cruising world someday and go to our next adventure. This has been a great adventure with hunting, site seeing, driving our son’s old truck, even dealing with the snow. The little house we bought is small and needs work but has been here on the prairie for over 60 years. This means the little house was built for this weather. Most every thing is made worse by the wind out here. Very few trees. Our little house sets on a large corner lot and we were warned about our neighbors being difficult. We used our skills we have learned in our long life to get along with a difficult neighbor and found a fence being taken down for free and now we have a fence.

Our New / Old Fence

Bad neighbors out of site out of mind. We reworked it as we put it back up like I said. A skill we have used a lot. Find what we need some one is throwing away, rework it and we can live on less money. Even our two outboard motors on our boat have decals that say Honda Frankenstein. If some one ask where we got them I say I’m not sure. What part are you talking about? If you see the cup half full even the snow out here has some value. I have been taking some time off to draw, paint and hang my art through out our little house. Pam is always trying to feed something where ever we go. She has birds coming every day now.

Happy Birds

Some Of My Drawings

 

Rabbit Gum

If you wonder what this is in this drawing. As a young boy living out on the farm all young farm boys had a rabbit trap during hunting season. Using live traps you see today rabbits are hard to trap. Live traps made with wire you need something to get them to go in, maybe food. It’s hard to find food to lure them in but the old time rabbit gum is irresistible to a rabbit. It’s the hole and what’s inside. They can’t help themselves. They just have to go in and look around. Getting old now there is a lot you don’t see any more. Being out here we can keep some of the old ways alive. We can get what we need to make home made sausage, cure ham or a short trip to town to get what I need to build anything. Not that way in the Caribbean. Here is a quick recipe you can use almost anywhere. To keep the old ways alive if you can carry sage with you, you can usually find pepper and chicken almost anywhere. Use a piece of chicken de-boned with one third the amount of sausage you are making in white bread for your fat. You need one third fat to make good sausage. Grind in a meat grinder with sage,peppers and a little salt. How much spices, start small and make your own family recipe. It’s best with pork and pork fat but de-boned rabbit will work too.

More Time In Kansas

Our time out here in Kansas is coming to and end for now. Pam is missing our boat more everyday. Why would we even be out here in the cold with a boat in the Caribbean? We are getting old and know someday our way of life will change and we want be able to stop it. I heard a man say one time life after 70 is like an old tire with a slow leak. Maybe Pam and I have done little with our lives, “but we did try”. I quit school in the ninth grade to work on the family farm. My parents sold it and then I lied about my age and went to work in a textile mill at 16. Later I met Pam and her parents wouldn’t let us date so we ran off and got married. She was 15 and I was 17 by then. Pam told her parents we would run again if they tried to get our marriage annulled. A year and a month later we had a baby. It stared before then, every one saying we were going the wrong way with our lives but here we are now going on 55 years married in just a few days. We are out here where our only child lives. In some way it’s sad that now we have a lawn mower again and a house. Like most things we buy with our little money and good credit we bought a fixer upper. Pam says we bought a garage and the house went with it. I stay in the garage a lot building stuff. Maybe this is just a new chapter in our life. We will just have to see. What have we done with our life up till now. I got a pilot license very early in our life but with out a degree or even finishing high school and all the pilots coming back from the Vietnam war back then getting a job flying was out. I’m still proud of my tail draggier endorsement. Dragging your tail and flying with a stick is still fun. This is the only thing I have that Pam doesn’t but she was always there doing the navigation and “helping me fly she called it.” I call it, “back seat flying.” We drove big rigs cross country together and she did get her license to drive big rigs. Always had boats. Built a log cabin by hand and raised our son down on a lake in South Carolina living in a real log cabin. We went to Southport NC, drew the plans and built the boat we live on now ourselves and have traveled on for over 20 years now. Our old boat has been in the movies and the Great Schooner Race in the Chesapeake and has been featured in a lot of print as we traveled. We still have our old motor bike we have cruised the back roads of the US on for years setting here now in the garage. Is our cruising life over? I hope not but we are setting up for the next chapter in our life anyway. If there is a lesson in how we have lived our lives our way, it’s not the destination people always judge you by. It’s life’s trip and how much you enjoy it. I hope now the trip is still going on. Ether way we are still enjoying life. Be back in the river soon on our loved old boat back there in Guatemala.

Open Prairie

Farmers always wanting to show us there animals. Very interesting

Snow Day. The road is in there somewhere.

Cold

Still in Kansas. If there is one thing I have learned in life, the biggest factor in great things happening is just showing up. Last week here it was the lunar eclipse. This week it has been the arctic blast. On the lunar eclipse thing it was as they say spectacular but what I didn’t hear was it was some what scary. I could not help but think what this would have been like when the earth was still seen as flat and every odd thing that happen was a sign from the heavens that we were doing something wrong. It stared as a shadow slowly covering the moon. At the end the moon was covered and glowing red. Can you just see Pam and I in old times with her going outside our hut for the last time that night to do her business before we crawled in bed between our animal skins and her coming back trying to tell me what was happening to the moon. One thing I have learned to hate in the many years we have been together is that scream. As for as the arctic blast. It was not that bad this time for us but it was cold. Remember out here 10 degree Fahrenheit below with the wind can drive the chill to 50 below. The problem is always the wind out here. Remember the only trees out here have been planted around houses. The little house we are at has been here a long time so we have trees and building around it. It has a propane furnace and my favorite a wood pellet wood heater. The wood heater is of a modern design. It has a smart electric panel that tells it what to do. You load the top of the heater with wood pellets and an auger turns and carries the wood pellets into the fire box. You set the speed and a fan blows out hot air. You can watch the fire through a glass door.

This is how we survived the blast. Remember 10 blow zero and 50 miles per hour winds you just “stay in” cook, eat and watch the fire in the heater. Another thing that happen this week was on the news. Some one near here shot a mountain lion. Cut off one of its paws and just left it. Every one was outraged. Why is this important? Two summers ago Pam and I were riding our old motor bike out here and a mountain lion jumped out of a wheat field and then ran a long way down the road in front of us. On the news a man said at any time there is only maybe 20 mountain lions in Kansas. Like I said some times all it takes for something great to happen is just being there.

Sorry it we don’t have a picture of the mountain lion but it is impossible to make one going down the road on a motorcycle and Pam shouting “Look!” Also we don’t know how to make a picture of arctic blast cold.