Living Unplugged: Adventures in the mountains, off the grid

Safe for Another 500 Years?

2013-09-13T14:21:00.001-07:00

It's been feeling a lot like Seattle around here.

This bucket was empty on Monday. It has been in my yard all week catching rain. That's about 12 inches of rain. Holy cow.

This is what our creek looked like: (it's normally 2 feet across)

Some wonderful guys- Aaron Gray of IHS Excavating and his buddy, Ronnie Hicks, held a big fundraiser to rebuild our road recently. They got about $50,000 worth of donated machinery, road base, and volunteer operators to raise the road about 3 feet. They just finished last weekend. Our driveway was BEAUTIFUL. It looked like a superhighway. For 5 days.

Here's what it looks like today:

from the side

from the top

For five days, the flood waters pummeled it, and it finally gave way.

The thing is, we wouldn't have a road AT ALL if not for these awesome guys. They re-routed the water away from the road so well that only in places where the road crosses the river is there a problem. And, so, we rebuild again. At least we have a dry house. That's a lot.

Summer Neighbors

2013-08-16T15:20:00.000-07:00

I've met a few new neighbors on my walks lately:

Look closely at the dashboard of our neighbor's truck....

Here's a close-up. It's Arvin and his buddies! (Our sweet neighbors didn't think this was as cute as I did...)

This little guy kept himself flattened, hoping to not be seen.

And, one of my favorite summer birds! A western tanager.

After the Fire Cometh the Flood

2013-08-06T13:19:00.000-07:00

OK, so this is how our week went:

Sunday: Torrential rainstorm. 8/10 inch in 20 minutes. Scary flooding.

Water was running off the hill, into the yard, creating a waterfall off the rock wall and down the steps. My tadpoles were getting swept out to sea.

We could've sold white-water float trip tickets for our tiny creek. (Photos just can't capture it....)

And this truck-swallowing hole appeared in the road- one of a lot of places it washed out

Monday: Franticly scanning the internet for vacation homes for rent RIGHT NOW in Maui. OK, not really, but there was some serious contemplative assessment in action.

Tuesday: Decided we are definitely not up for making 58 round-trips of 3 hours each to get enough sand bags to protect the house(!) (All the sand-bag staging stations are far from us)

Wednesday: Rented a trackhoe...again. This amazing little beauty (with a price tag of 50 grand) can move bass drum-sized rocks like nobody's business. Just in case you ever need bass-drum sized rocks moved.

With it we built a berm. About 80-100 feet long and four feet high. And dug out the creek.

And created a diversion drainage by cutting into the creek-side hill about 5 feet deep, and 6 feet wide.

Needless to say, we've had nary a drop of rain since.

Whew.

River of Logs

2013-07-04T17:27:00.000-07:00

I haven't written in a while because we've been BUSY. The short, heavy rain we had last week (about 3/4 inch in 20 minutes) led to quite a flood in our post-wildfire property.

I knew it was coming down hard, but when I looked out the back window, I was still shocked. There was a river of black dirt 10-20 feet wide crashing down the hillside in a usually dry stream bed.

By then, water was pouring over the road.

What I didn't know then, was that it was washing down over 100 logs- heavy green timber cut in 6 foot lengths by the neighbor after the burn. (up to 24 inch diameter)

They all got stockpiled in our pond- threatening to wash out the driveway.

So, guess who got to play on a tractor all week? Unfortunately, we figure the flood carried about 600 cubic meters of ash, sand and soil to our creek bed, so it's been hard to make a dent in it. But, Paul was able to move the logs and clear a gully, so water can at least get through and not take out the road or driveway next time it rains.

Anybody got a dump truck? Or need some nice, black soil? It's free! ;)

The Alchemy of Rain

2013-06-16T13:01:00.003-07:00

We've had some great rains in the last month. The Wednesday before last, heavy rain turned our little creeks into dark chocolate caldrens. When they fury dissipated, we were left with whole new ash-sand bars and a ripped-out phone line.

But the rain precipitated (ha!) some other things, too.

rock slides (good thing I'm not wearing stilettos today!)

Salamanders! OK, I know these guys are hard to see...but they are about a foot long, green and black, and pretty happy to have a pond this year, I think! This is the first time I've seen them- probably because on a "normal" year, the pond is warmer and full of algae by the time they are romping around.

...and LOTS of flowers!

The Big Bear Caper

2013-06-06T17:58:00.000-07:00

I always wondered why, when I'm at the top of a mountain ridge, I never see any wildlife. It doesn't make sense. I see the elk, deer, cougar and bear scat on the ground. But, when I'm hiking and look down on a distant meadow, they are always empty.

Except this one time...

We were hiking up a steep, rocky ridge near our house, and when we reached the top, as usual, I scanned all the open meadow areas for critters. Nothing. Then- ah! Some movement! As I squinted to see what it was, it came right out into a clearing. A bear! A BIG bear!

I was so excited, until I realized that it was making a bee-line for our neighbor's house. Now, these wonderful neighbors are retired. They feed half the hummingbirds migrating through Colorado, I'm sure of it. They normally have 8 feeders out, and by July, every feeder has a bird at every station. It's a wonder no one has gotten an eyeball skewered walking around their porch, there are so many birds swarming.

On this particular day, our neighbors had mentioned that they would be in town. I knew their feeders would be out (they go in at night) and calling that bear like a honey-lullaby. I also knew he would break every one in the process of drinking them, worse, associate humans with food. So, quick as we could, we scrambled down the steep rocks and grassy slope, jumped in our good 'ol truck and drove up to the neighbors.

When we got there, 10 minutes after we saw the bear, our neighbor came out smiling.
"Hi! What are you two up to today?" She said, blissfully unaware.

"Rescuing your hummingbird feeders from a huge bear because you're not home." I replied.

He was probably sitting up the hill listening to us and planning a midnight raid, but we'll never know. None of us saw that bear again that day.

Black holes and Miracle Plants (Wildfire Part 4)

2013-05-25T13:26:00.001-07:00

Here's how the burn area looks today:

Holes created form burn-out tree roots made walking in the snow interesting...
some of them are big!

pioneer crocus flower - taking the lead in forest restoration

the meadows are coming back fast

bluebells also taking the lead

Things that go Bump in the Night...

2013-05-22T09:35:00.000-07:00

We had a visitor last night. I awoke when our motion-detector light went on outside the bedroom. Even half asleep, I registered that I had not heard the noisy dog-door...it wasn't a dog. I listened....silence. Then, 'boom, bang, clatter!' By the time I got to the window, I could see a huge paw wrapped around a tree, then a big face turned toward me. A bear was shimmying up the tree to reach our hummingbird feeder! The feeder is strung 15 feet above the ground and between trees, so despite his best efforts, it was out of reach.

In the time it took my husband to get kitchen pans for the farewell party, the bear shimmied down the tree and checked out the pond. No fish. Only puny tadpoles. Bummer.

I wanted to throw him a bag of dog food. Poor guy must be hungry. But I never would. "A fed bear is a dead bear"

I wasn't fast enough to get a photo of him, but he left this behind.

Raging Wall of Fire (Wildfire part 3)

2013-05-16T18:58:00.002-07:00

There was no stopping it. Driven by 60 mile-an-hour gusts, the wall of fire consumed everything in its path. Almost.

We had been evacuated and living with friends for 3 weeks (generous friends!) when we got the news. I could tell by Paul's tone of voice... after three weeks of moving in all directions around our house, the wildfire had finally devoured our home. The firefighters wisely fled to get out of the way of the inferno. They told our neighbor that the fire was so hot and so fast, no houses could possibly be left up there.

We found out two days later they were wrong.

Another 10 days of waiting and we returned home. It had, indeed, swarmed everywhere on our property. It burned several outbuildings to the ground. It kissed the house on all sides. A birdhouse two feet outside the living room window was reduced to a pile of ash. Scorch marks, like war tattoos, adorned the legs of our deck and nearby trees. But the house was fine- not even smoke damage.

A Fire "tornado": shovel handle (above) burned, along with the rocks, but the cardboard two feet away is untouched!

Incidentally- there really IS such a thing as a fire tornado!

Colorado Pantanal

2013-05-04T11:11:00.002-07:00

We've had around 40 inches of snow in the past 3 weeks. Which was, mostly, fun.

Here's the progression from the latest dump:

May 1- Snow? really? It's supposed to be "April fools", not "May fools!"

May 2 - Sun's Out!

Frost Anemones!

Icicle stalactites by the waterfall

May 4 - happy moss...

Colorado Pantanal

What Would You Take? (Wildfire, Part 2)

2013-04-26T08:05:00.000-07:00

(photo courtesy Jeff Stahla)

We had only minutes to decide. A wildfire was headed our way. We had time enough to
take whatever would fit in our two cars. So, what to take? The answer surprised me.

Some things were obvious: my harp, music-in-progress notes, computer, favorite photos, toothbrush and a change of clothes. Then other things...the chain saw, in case trees fall over the road and we can't get in/out; my small file cabinet, which has important papers (like proof of house insurance!); our passports (I'm a travel addict).

The next day, we were allowed to return, briefly, that day to get our truck. Naturally, we thought, "We'll load it up!"

Here's where it got interesting: We got to the house, looked at each other and said, "What do you want to take?" Walking around the house, we couldn't come up with much. I love my books and plants, but, they are all replaceable. Ditto for almost everything else. We realized there was nothing else that we cared about all that much. In fact, it occurred to me that it would almost be a relief to NOT have most of our stuff. (And we're not talking about a lot of stuff....our house is just over 1,000 square feet.)

Einstein once said something like,"Each of my possessions is like a stone in my pocket, weighing me down." I feel inclined to agree- and it was interesting to have such a visceral experience of it.

We didn't get long to ponder this. As we were loading a box of paintings (irreplaceable-painted by friends and family), a wall of smoke engulfed us. Time to go. Having no way to know where the fire was, we had to assume it was close. So, we left with an almost-empty truck.

It's true that, without insurance, we would have been urgently motivated to take necessities - cooking pots, blankets, clothes, and so on. And I don't for a moment dismiss the deep pain and loss suffered by many people who did lose everything in that fire. My prayers go to them daily. I just found it interesting to observe that the idea of less stuff was so liberating to me.

What do you all think? If you had an hour to pack your car, what would you take?

Bang, Bang, Lights Out (Wildfire, part 1)

2013-04-18T18:15:00.001-07:00

The explosion of sound hit me with such force I thought the windows of the house might shatter. I sat bolt-upright in bed, my heart leaping out of my chest. I had been sound asleep when the lightening strike connected, but its bellow would wake the dead. The lights that were on in the next room - my partner was still up - went black. When I realized what happened, my first thought was..."Oh, no, I hope our (newly upgraded) solar system didn't just get fried."

Little did I know, this was the LEAST of what was to be fried.

That lightening storm ignited the spark that ultimately caused over 130 square miles of Colorado to burn.

Three days later, our neighbor, a veteran fire fighter, stopped by. He pointed to the fluffy cloud beyond the hill. "You see that cloud?" Yeah, we saw it. "It's not a cloud, it's smoke from a fire. I'm packing up my car and getting out of here."

As luck would have it, we were having a new propane cooking stove delivered that day. Right after the neighbor left, I called them to suggest they postpone our delivery. No answer. Minutes later, the delivery guys came walking up the road.

"Hi. Sorry we're late. Our truck broke down just a short way down your road."

You mean in the section that's one-lane? Where there's a rock wall on one side and trees on the other and only room for one car?

"Yeah."

Seriously bad timing. The next hour was spent helping the guys move the truck so we and the neighbors weren't blocked in. They brought the new stove up, via our truck, and installed it. In the two hours those guys waited for their replacement truck to show up, we became buddies. Since it was already evening, we threw sausages and potatoes on the grill for everybody and sat in our 'patio' furniture, to watch that cloud that was not a cloud.

"Sure is quiet up here." One of the guys commented.

Little did we know it was the quiet before the storm....

The Croak that Heralds Summer

2013-04-12T15:29:00.000-07:00

A few days ago, I heard the first froggy-dude of the summer! This brave boy was not afraid to sing, despite the still-freezing nights we are having. Given that our nearest pond is only a few feet from the house, and I was bringing in firewood when I heard him, you'd think I could catch a glimpse of little Romeo....but, no.

As a veteran frog hunter, it's embarrassing to admit that it took me quite a few years to glimpse one these little guys. It was one of those early- 2000 summers and we were in drought. Our giant pond dried up. Completely. And it was only June. The poor Romeos were hopping around, not sure where to go or what to do. (It did finally rain enough that there were tadpoles that year.)

Finally, I understood why they were so hard to spot. Chorus frogs are tiny- no bigger than the last segment of your thumb! Naturally, they are mud colored, too. By May, we often have dozens singing all around our house. Their chirpy song is delightful- and its a good thing because the vibration of that chirp carries for miles.

(Photo curtesy of wiki- I did not have my telephoto that day!)

This, in contrast to the Titicaca water frog- which lives in the high, arid borderland between Bolivia and Peru in Lake Titicaca. (I just learned about them through my work with Idea Wild) These sumo-frogs weigh around 2 pounds, and measure up to 20 inches. They spend most of their time at the bottom of the 300-foot deep lake, and breathe predominantly through their skin! Over-hunting* and pollution, along with introduced trout that eat their tadpoles, have left these frogs critically endangered.

*Roughly 5,000 indigenous people live on islands of the massive Lake Titicaca, which measures 180 miles by 50 miles. Most are subsistence farmers and fishermen. They traditionally eat both fish and frogs. Some (the Uros people) have created their own islands, with floating reeds, on which they live.

I wonder what the Lake Titicaca frog sounds like? Probably not chirpy.

Downside of Solar Power

2013-04-04T20:19:00.001-07:00

When we moved to our little house with solar power, we thought we were pretty hip. How cool is that, to generate all your own power? It didn't take long for us to realize it wasn't ALL sunshine and roses- we were initiated our first night in the place.

For starters, very few people are well versed in solar power systems and no two solar power systems are the same. So, when something goes awry, there's no one to call.

This leads to one of two things:
a supreme sense of self-empowerment, knowing that we can take care of ourselves, or
a sense of impending doom and the smell of rotting food in the second (electric) frig. (The primary frig is propane)

So, when something starts beeping, flashing, or everything shuts down, I hit the off-on button. If this doesn't work, I look to see if everything is still connected right. If it STILL isn't working, I go and do some other chore (haul wood, clean the woodstove, clean the skunk spray off the dog, it varies...) and call my husband. He's pretty handy. But, if we're both stumped, well, we do the only thing we can do - just keep trying things until something works. This can take days...

Oh, and one more thing- when it snows and the snow sticks to the solar panels, blocking the sun, like it did recently- guess who gets to go sweep them off? (How DOES the snow stick to them when they're almost perpendicular, anyway?!)

Still, the up-sides are huge. Besides being less polluting than many other forms of power, I have an excuse to go out and play in the BEAUTIFUL new, untouched snow!

Now, seriously, does anyone know why snow sticks to panels sitting almost perpendicular to the ground?

What Lurks in the Darkness?

2013-04-01T16:10:00.001-07:00

Yesterday, we had a visitor. “Sarah” is a biology teacher at a local, experiential high school. She and her kids are documenting the natural restoration of the forest and the return of wildlife to a wildfire-burned area. Since we live in one of the many hundreds of square miles of Colorado that burned in recent years (more on that later), she has set up a handful of camera traps (motion activated cameras) and video feeds near our property.

One of the camera traps is set up next to our neighbor's spring. The other night they got this photo of a lion saddling up to the "bar":

Since the said bar is only a few hundreds yards from our house, we were intrigued.

And now I've got confirmation that the tracks I found the other day were, indeed, of the feline persuasion.

HOW do you turn on the lights?

2013-03-21T20:43:00.001-07:00

We were starved and exhausted. We'd been moving into our bohemian mountain cabin all day, with the generous help of friends, who had just left. It was a warm November evening, and the twilight was fading fast.

I put some left-overs in the microwave that the last owner had left, and turned it on. The microwave hummed, and then....silence. The lights went out. We were sitting in total darkness, surrounded by piles of boxes.

This was our introduction to our solar power system.

Oh, for a flashlight! Which box were they in? And...had we damaged anything?

It turns out, we hadn't done any damage- solar systems just don't do well with microwaves- at least ours doesn't. (This works for me, because I don't use microwaves any how) They draw a lot of power- more than the system can handle, unless it's fully charged.

So, here's our set-up:
These are the panels. They commune with the sun and, sort of like a plant, make energy!

(I hope you're OK with a LOW tech explanation...)

The energy gets sent to the batteries, where it's stored.

Then, when we turn on lights, or use any power, the inverter converts the DC power from the batteries to AC power that can run our lights and appliances.

There's a charge controller in there, too. Anybody want to guess what important function it serves?

How much, how fast, and how well all depends on how big your system is. There are a gazillion ways to configure the system, and we found it well worth the expense to pay an expert to help- they have all the tinker toys to be able to make sure the system is streamlined and as efficient as possible.

In the end, we made peanut butter sandwiches and went to bed early, since we were so tired and didn't know how to bring the lights back on anyway. Tomorrow would be solar 101 lesson day.

Bear-y-go-round

2013-03-14T14:34:00.000-07:00

I was running one summer day not far from my house, when my 90 pound german shepherd-mix, Kota, excitedly bounded past me. His buoyant enthusiasm warned me something was up, so I watched. As I came up a rise, near a large pond, I saw an adorable baby bear scurry up a tree - followed closely by Kota.

Kota stopped to look up at the little bear, disappointed that he didn't want to play.

Then mama bear showed up. Clearly she DID want to play. Round and round the pond they went, Kota's tail ringing around in glee.

Meanwhile, I stood above the pond, yelling at the top of my lungs at dog ears that could not hear. Until they did hear. After five or so revolutions around the pond, Kota began to run directly to me. I knew immediately- I was now "home base," safety zone. I bent down in my scanty summer running togs, picked up a rock in each hand, and yelled something I won't type here. I think that was the first time the bear noticed me ... and, you know, she stopped. Then looked at Kota like he was the stupidest coyote she'd ever come across, turned and disappeared.

Now, we still had to get home, and baby bear was in a tree near the road. I didn't fancy another encounter with mama bear, so we took the high road, up and over and around to get home.

Kota was so pleased with himself.

Klepto-puppy

2013-03-06T15:03:00.002-08:00

I often can't find my jeans in the morning. Klepto-pup has commandeered them. She doesn't take my nice clothes. Only work clothes that smell like dirt, plants, firewood...which all lead to her to sweet dreams of going for a walk! (I have to whisper those words...)

She looks just a little guilty, doesn't she....

Lions on my Door Step

2013-03-03T09:59:00.000-08:00

Living with mountain lions is a part of rural life- and I hope it always will be. I consider it a privilege and an honor to see them and do my best to respect their presence by not letting my dogs run wild and not throwing out scraps that might attract them. Nevertheless, in sharing the same habitat, we inevitably meet.

It was the dogs that first drew my attention to the lump of pine needles. They were TOO excited by it.

It was a lovely winter day. We'd been out for a walk and were nearly home when we stumbled on it. All I could see was a large mound of pine needles and dirt. Maybe 6 feet across. As I approached the mound, my curiosity piqued, I was taken aback to realize it was a deer...that had been partially BURIED. It had several large bites taken out of it's gut.

What had buried it...and where was the hunter now...?

I slowly backed away, simultaneously scanning the nearby trees. I knew instantly that I was being watched. No doubt. He was there, watching all of us. Soundlessly. The hair on the back of my neck stood up. I couldn't see the lion in any trees near me, but I knew he was close. A lion never abandons a kill. And this one was fresh.

I walked down the hill backwards, calling the buoyant dogs after me. Home was only a hundred paces away, but it felt a mile.

Of course, I couldn't keep the dogs from investigating the lions progress with the carcass. I tried, but within a few days, I well cleaned skeleton was dragged into my front "yard," where the dogs proceeded to eat the entire thing. Oh, happy dogs.

2013-02-01T12:44:00.003-08:00

Our off- grid toaster:

Solar Laundry

2013-01-09T10:17:00.000-08:00

It's breached freezing this January day - time for laundry!!

No one would believe these stories

2013-01-01T12:53:00.000-08:00

No one would believe the half the things that have happened to us since we moved to the mountains, off the grid, and off the proverbial cliff.

I told a few stories. Peoples' eyes bugged out.

"Why do you stay?" they ask.

"Because my soul has become fused to the land," I answer.

But the questions keep coming. So, I decided to share some of our adventures and way of life via this blog.

May it bring a smile to your lips, warmth to your heart, and appreciation for your dish washer.

(More to come!)