The Wash House

In our community we can build 12 x 12 foot structures without a building permit. Here's a little 7 x 7 building that I'd like to construct for use as a place to do laundry. We may expand it to 12 x 12 and use it also as a garden shed.

I'm thinking of raising the structure about 8 feet high, then use the space below for storing firewood. If we insulated well and added a little heater we could run a washing machine off a generator or a battery bank.

Another option is to build a bunkhouse where the old garage was. That's a big project, however and our biggest construction priority is to build a barn. Perhaps we'll have a laundry room in the barn.

Living Without Electricity

Going without electricity is different than off-grid living. Off-gridders still consume electricity, there's just no "physical and symbolic connection to the outside world", as the Amish might say.

We use a little electricity - battery operated lights, radios, a cordless drill, cell phones and even a laptop. We don't have a washer, dryer, refrigerator, freezer, TV, arc welder, towel warmer, etc.

A lack of TV is certainly no hardship, at least from what I can gather. Three of my coworkers recently had a lively and mind-benumbing discussion of how awful the overhyped final episodes of Lost and Seinfeld were. They wasted their time watching this drivel in the first place and made it worse by complaining about it. (And, I'm wasting more time by writing about it!) Anyway, listening to people enthusiastically recount commercials and TV shows only reinforces my decision to go without. Good riddance.

But - a washer and refrigerator are handy. We don't seem to miss the refrigerator but we occasionally dream of having a small propane or - it must be equally silent - an electric one. However, if pressed, I'd pick a washer over a refrigerator. We overwash as much as we overeat and overdrive - we're used to wasting a lot of chemicals, energy and water thoughtlessly washing clothes. It's easy to wear a shirt or jeans once and toss them in the laundry. Often they don't really need to be washed after only one wearing.

Such are the things you notice when you live closer to the earth. Source reduction is an important strategy when you wash clothes by hand. So the first rule of living without a washing machine is rather obvious, but typically ignored: Only wash the dirty clothes!

The next rule is to limit the use of soap (we mix up our own, but that's another story). Just the average residual detergent in clothes after one washing is sufficient to clean them again without adding any additional detergent. Try it. Washing by hand - specifically rinsing by hand - quickly teaches you to use the minimum amount of soap. Otherwise, you'll waste a lot of time and water rinsing and wringing.

There are a few clever methods to hand wash. Plastic 5 gallon pails can be loaded with clothes, add a little soap, fill with water, then snap on the lid. Place the bucket in the back of the pickup when you drive into town and let the motion agitate the clothes. That's the way John Steinbeck did it when he travelled with Charley in the 1960s, and it works great today. Alternatively you could drill a hole in the top of the lid and use a plunger that has holes drilled in it. Someone actually sells this setup for $40 - minus the hole!

Wringing clothes by hand isn't advisable. It's a lot of work, rough on your hands and not efficient. The ideal solution is to get a $200 hand wringer from Lehman's and, for nearly the price of a washing machine, you can have fun with a tool that'll last forever. We're dreaming of one because we already have the washtubs - I rescued a nearly new one that someone discarded!

A less elegant approach again uses those ubiquitous plastic pails, three of them. The bottom one has a drain hole in it. The middle one has many small drain holes in its bottom. The top one is unmodified. All you do is load up the middle one, nest it in the bottom one, and use the top one (with a lid on it) as a seat so you can squeeze out the water.

One could also use a mop wringer, just smush the clothes in there and squeeze the handle. Something about that isn't appealing to me, however.

Drying is easy, just set up a good clothesline and you won't miss the dryer at all. Mother Earth News has an excellent plan for a clothesline that we can't wait to build.

As for lighting, it's also way overused. We rise and retire with the sun and have several little lamps around. When it's cold we use our propane-fueled wall lights, they are silent, put out a lot of heat and cast a nice light. I'm amused at the common practice of using a flashlight when simply taking a walk at night. A light is rarely necessary unless you are deep into the woods - which isn't too smart at night. A wide trail or logging road can easily be followed by looking up and using the treeline to guide your path. Once you get used to it, your flashlight batteries can last many weeks before needing a recharge
.

Consumerism and Simplicity

In more innocent days, before We the People were transformed into Consumers, the government actually encouraged people to be economical - save gas, save money, buy bonds, plant gardens, recycle metal - even fat! These were considered patriotic things to do. Much of it was necessitated by a wartime economy - but we've been fighting wars of one type or another my entire lifetime, so one can argue that we're still in a wartime economy.

It certainly felt like war after September 11, 2001. But our politicians, instead of urging sacrifice, urged most us to 'go shopping' (...while a few others were requested to go off and fight the war).

Things were different decades ago. Corporations weren't running the government to the extent that they do today. A corporation has to grow to survive and growth relies on unbounded consumerism. Consumerism was given a huge boost by the advent of television and its symbiotic relationship with propaganda-based advertising (commercials). Corporations ended all pretense of independence by essentially putting our elected representatives on their payroll.

A Seattle politician once stated that if Boeing "wanted us to bulldoze Mount Rainier so their planes would take off easier, we'd have done it". The City of NY gave two profitable sports teams, the Yankees and Mets, nearly $2B in subsidies to build new stadiums. Such events are so commonplace today that they are barely newsworthy.

Our government, essentially an obedient servant of corporations, now encourages wasteful consumerism. Gardens, clotheslines and even chickens are commonly banned by ordinance. Here's a typical example of a clothesline ban in NY:

"Laundry poles, lines and the like outside of homes are prohibited, nor may any laundry be hung in any manner whatsoever outside of the home." 

Debt is encouraged, even among students who often graduate with unmarketable degrees and a mortgage-sized debt before even landing their first job. Wasteful practices, such as the 'cash for clunkers' program, whereby the government paid people to trade in serviceable cars (which were scrapped) for new ones - and new debt.

The Unsustainability of Stuff

Getting rid of  TV was a huge step in simplifying my life. I became indifferent to consuming. I grew up during the Cold War and readily accepted that the US is a free and democratic society with the government accountable to the citizens. Eventually I learned that my vote or opinion isn't important, but I can vote with my dollars. So I buy sparingly and locally. When I eliminated the main propaganda conduit (TV), corporate influence suddenly became obvious. I began to wonder why taxpayers must pay for a billion dollar baseball stadium...for millionaire players and billionaire owners. And because I don't watch the commercials, I don't vote for the politician who spends the most on advertising.

Our Discovery of Simple Living

Voluntary simplicity is a way of life that is gaining popularity. Our introduction to the concept began during our first visits to WL. It was astounding to learn that we could survive overnight without electricity, or even a week without refrigeration. Soon, we not only learned to survive but we thrived on it - the sound of birds and frogs instead of noisy electrical appliances (just listen to your refrigerator!) and traffic. We also felt the euphoria and satisfaction of being independent.

A week or two without television inspired us to cut the cable; it was then a small step to rid ourselves entirely of television. That was one of the most eye-opening experiences of my life. Within a few weeks, I started to notice the non-stop marketing to which we're exposed. When the TV is on most of the time, marketing becomes part of the everyday surroundings - and there are branches of psychology that provide corporations with techniques to influence non-conscious consumer behavior. That's why video is full of priming events - ideally these are seemingly unnoticed by a consumer. But the non-conscious mind is storing these events away for retrieval in, say, Wal-Mart. 

Does this sound conspiratorial? NY University and others offer advanced degrees in Consumer Psychology. NYU's program "explores the social and cognitive factors that influence consumers’ purchasing behavior". The research in this area uses state of the art technology (for instance, functional neuroimaging - PET and fMRI scans) to get you to buy stuff. This is a well-funded (by corporations...) branch of Social Psychology. It seems unethical to 'prime' someone's subconscious with urges to buy things they don't need (or candidates who have opposing values) - but that essentially is a definition of advertising.

Once we began eliminating our exposure to the incessant marketing and realized how much we can live (happily!) without, a new world opened up. This is the world of simple living, the rejection of consumerism and materialism, and it's a giant step towards happiness.

Materializing a Hope

(Here's a post from last March by S. She hoped that we'd be living at Woodman's Lee in March of 2014...and we are definitely on track to do that!)

March 28, 2013: Last Snow of the Season?

I was surprised by a blanket of snow when I gazed out the window first thing this morning! The last few days it has warmed--melting the ice on the stream and making our road a mushy mess in places. Last night we parked the truck only half way up the road rather than to continue and damage the road bed. As this day has worn on most of the snow has melted and F has been out thinning trees. W and I wandered around some and I noticed more variety in the bird song chorus as well as one lone duck or goose (didn't have binoculars) flying slowly in circles--quacking. It sounded to me like a mournful call, perhaps seeking its mate?

Nearly a week has passed since my last writing which is part of my natural pattern. I get here and want to write it all down, then I get wrapped up in events and the blog gets pushed to the back burner. We will soon be returning to South Carolina and for me, leaving here is akin to leaving a dear friend. I so look forward to the day we will return knowing we can remain as long as we choose or God declares.

The man who was going to drill our well lost his brother to cancer last week, so we focused upon another job--replacing the old Franklin stove. F had researched wood stoves and knew what he wanted, so we found a dealer and purchased it (a Jøtul) two days ago.

The installation went quite well. The hardest part (aside from wrestling the Jøtul inside and onto the hearth) was constructing a pedestal to raise it 6" so we could run the pipe from the back of the stove to the chimney, rather than out the top of the stove. We were able to find brick and some thick stones which matched our hearth so it turned out well. The old Franklin was dismantled so it was handily removed. The new stove is much smaller--giving the hearth area a more spacious look. It will be nice to no longer have to use the Kerosun to support the Franklin's deficiencies.

Compared to others, this has been a fairly relaxing vacation. We mostly hung around the cabin except for a trip last week to Lake Placid and our visits to the stove dealer in Plattsburgh.

We went to Lake Placid for groceries and laundry. They have a "deluxe" laundromat right next to the Hannaford so we could shop while the clothes wash and dry. We had stopped at the Starbucks beforehand and was going to stroll along the store fronts for a while but F reminded me that I had failed to purchase a parking pass and W and the Tundra could be towed or, (at least) ticketed, as I window shopped. I picked up the pace, but we did manage to catch a glimpse of a pack of dogs pulling a sled around Mirror Lake. It reminded me of a Currier and Ives print.

While at the laundromat it began to snow steadily. It was truly beautiful, yet, I heard a cashier at Hannaford lamenting that she thought it was all over with and "now look at it"! Maybe when I live here throughout the year I will understand how she feels, but raised a Floridian, I am always enchanted by snowflakes. I have yet to get my fill of the Adirondacks!

When we returned from Lake Placid, F made a delicious tomato basil soup and salad. He has cooked some wonderful meals during our stay. That evening close to dusk the coyotes started yipping and they were at it a good minute or two. W, who was resting on the futon, raised her head, a curious look on her face.

We have enjoyed some evenings filled with bright moonlight! One night I was awakened. I got up and went to the window and it was so bright out I could have easily walked from here to the beaver pond and back without the aid of a flashlight. At the time, the moon appeared about 2/3's full. When I returned to my bed there was moonlight on my pillow. I wonder if that is what awakened me in the first place. I crawled back under the covers and watched through the front window as it slowly set behind the mountains.

The only other sign of civilization from Woodman's Lee is a light from a dwelling on a ridge miles away. For many, many years this light has been on nightly--we always notice it as we check the latch on the front door.  I have not seen it illuminated once during this visit. At first, I thought I couldn't see it because of the weather--we had a few nights of snow but the last few have been quite clear---still, there is no light to be seen. Just sayin', not complainin'.

As I sit at the table on the sun porch, the sky is greying. While W and I were out earlier, I was certain the snow we got last night would be the last of the season; now I am not so certain. What I do know is I heard more birds this morning and as I walked with W I could smell that wonderful earthy scent that so reminds me of spring.  Maybe as early as tomorrow she will entice the trees to put on their bright green leaves and a cloud will rise from the mountains as their snow melts. Sadly, I will miss another spring here in the high peaks...maybe next year.

Departure Planning

Our new life of peaceful independence and simplicity will begin around the end of March when we 'pull up stakes' here in South Carolina and move up to the Adirondack mountains. It's fitting that it coincides with the beginning of spring.

There's much to do, but we've accomplished a lot already. We've downsized - we bring a load of stuff to Goodwill every few days, and we mail packages to the kids every week. We've packed many boxes, I've lost count, but we typically pack up a box or two every day.

And we've designed our garden. It's a work in progress, this is V2.0, courtesy of My Smart Garden:

We have three cars and I need to sell one of them. I've been delaying that because I like the one we must sell, a Subaru. We can't aspire to a simple life with three cars - even two seems like one too many.

I like the philosophy of dividing the day into three parts - four hours for me, four hours for chores, four hours for community. I hope to incorporate that into my daily routine.

S has decided to drive up with me, around Mar 21. She had planned to go to Florida first and ensure the horses are prepared for the journey north. But she's willing to entrust that to the people who have been caring for them for the past 3 years.

Our first order of business will be to unload our stuff and consolidate nearly all of it into a storage facility. We are moving from a 1200 sq ft townhouse with a single car garage into a 600 sq ft cabin - and it's not empty! So there's very little space for anything we bring with us. Eventually we'll move what we don't continue to downsize into the attic of our new barn.

Gardening in the North Country

One of our first projects upon arrival in March - only a couple of months away - is to build a raised bed garden. S has been poring over the seed catalogs and we've been reading everything we can on gardening. We're confident that we'll be successful, given S's experience and our ability to tend to the garden instead of scheduling it between a job and other distractions. 

The best construction guide I found thus far is on Sunset's site. Our beds will be 4 by 8 feet and will look something like this:

Smartgardener.com is a good website for determining the location of the plants and it has many other functions, such as an automated planner and to-do list. We're using it as a guide, knowing we'll iterate a bit once we get started. 

We have to carefully consider fencing, both perimeter and at the base of the bed. Deer and moles are just two of many critters who would love to devour our plants.

Another Post from last November's Visit...

...this one written by S from her blog, "New Eyes for Old Things".

Home for the Holiday

Twenty hours of straight through driving to Woodman's Lee. We arrived around 4 PM Friday with just enough daylight left to unpack the truck and get a fire going in the wood stove. As we drove up our road 3 deer gazed at us from the lower pasture.

An hour after arriving the temperature outside was 36 degrees--inside 48. The wood stove was blazing and all the propane lamps were lit. The National Weather Service warned of unseasonably cold temps, forecasting a low of -1 on Sunday night. We'll see...

We spent yesterday cleaning the cabin, though it was quite clean when we arrived. Still, there were a few cobwebs and the floor had become gritty from our travels back and forth hauling water, wood and luggage. F made pistou for lunch which was perfect for a cold day. Afterward we went for a walk and thought we would tag a Christmas tree to take home but found only one along our path and F wasn't too impressed with it so we'll have to go deeper into our woods.

The beavers have blocked our culverts but at least our road isn't flooded. We decided to go back to the cabin to retrieve the potato hoes to clear them out. During this time, W had disappeared and was ignoring my command to return. F soon found her on the other side of a small hill. She followed me back to the cabin but would not go inside--Ugh! I bent down to pick her up and she rolled onto her back in protest! After a bit of a wrestle, I was able to gather her into my arms and deposit her onto her throne--the futon.

As I approached the pond I could hear the ice cracking. F had cleared the big culvert and the water was flowing quickly. We were caught up in watching the ice crack as the water level dropped. Though it was cold it was also quite beautiful out and we were happy to be down by the beaver pond again. As we worked to unplug the other culverts it began to snow lightly.

A Honking Song

Geese honking overhead

Their song is a reminder I shall not dread

To bring in wood and walk the dog

To fill the buckets and stoke the log

To slide the latch as darkness falls

Is like down to resist a winter squall.

 

No geese tonight. It was dark before 5 PM. As we read by the wood stove the wind came howling up the rise and made little thumping sounds as it struck the cabin and blew around us. It was 22 degrees out but inside we were bathed in a glow of golden lamp light and toasty warm.

Hiking

You don't go to the Adirondacks to stay inside the cabin all day. There are many outdoor activities but we gravitate towards hiking.

In the High Peaks, that means bagging a summit, preferably one (nominally) above 4000 feet. If you climb all 46 major peaks then you are an Adirondack Forty-Sixer.

Stephen and I climbed Giant, Wright, Porter (I think), Whiteface and Cascade. The photo below was taken at the trailhead to Esther, but we didn't get far that day.

The next photo was taken at the summit of Giant. These aren't easy hikes but the views at the top are incomparable, typically there is unbroken wilderness as far as you can see.

Hiking can be dangerous if you don't know what you are doing. The weather can be hazardous and unpredictable. A warm and clear October day at the trailhead can turn cold, windy and rainy at the summit leaving the unprepared at risk for hypothermia. I suppose that happens all too often but I think a more common risk is simply getting injured by falling or slipping on the trail.

I'm not concerned about getting lost because the trails are well marked. I also carry a map and compass to back up a Garmin GPS. We also carry spare water, matches, extra clothes, cell phones and food. I've learned not to trust my life to anything electronic after watching my GPS fail. I've heard of hikers who carry nothing except a cell phone, just in case they have to call for help (good luck!). Halfway up to Giant we were overtaken by a couple with no water and no packs, they just drove by the trailhead and impulsively decided to do the hike. They asked me how much farther they had to go and didn't like my answer of a few hours, with the unsolicited advice to turn back. I was relieved to see them headed down a little while later. These are the people who get themselves - and rescuers - in trouble. If they don't get the cell phone wet, and they remembered to charge it beforehand, they would be fortunate to get a usable signal.

T
he Adirondacks are deceptively dangerous. Even experienced hikers are one misstep away from a very bad day. I read a recent article involving a group of hikers who had to be rescued, all were quite experienced and one of them was a paramedic.

But I digress. Here's Stephen getting a GPS fix at the trailhead to Giant. 

Responsible hikers stay on marked trails to minimize the impact to the wilderness, especially alpine areas. They always bring a map and compass (and learn how to use them!). I'd recommend bringing the cell phone - in a Ziplok bag.

The definitive High Peaks trail guide is published by the Adirondack Mountain Club. The trail descriptions are, I think, a bit understated ("moderate grade" would be more accurately defined as "just slightly less than vertical") but if you are going to hike the High Peaks you should buy it. You also need a good backpack, I don't know anything about overnight hiking, so I'm referring to a day pack. An excellent addition if you have a lot of money is a personal locator beacon.



PLBs are still pricey but the price has dropped in the last few years. The one on the right was $450 in 2008. But the one on the left is about half that today. They are nice to have in an emergency, especially for solo hikers. They will transmit a message with your personal contact information and your location anywhere on earth, anytime, to satellites that relay the data to rescue personnel.

I guess you can pack a weather radio, that's overkill in my opinion, but if you have a small one, may as well bring it.

Notes from Our Last Trip

I've been writing about the history of Woodman's Lee in the last few posts. This post is about our most recent trip.

We drove up to WL from South Carolina for Thanksgiving (Nov 2013).

When we arrived it was simply beautiful, even if the cold took our breath away - or makes us inhale less deeply. It was hovering around zero F, unseasonably cold.

In the mornings the beagle (W) and I would amble down to the depleted beaver pond and check the all-important water level. It remained down a couple of feet, after S and I cleared the culverts with the potato rakes.

Unless I had a face covering it's too cold to press on to the road so we'd typically return to the cabin, where it was usually a bit under 70F. W burrowed into the futon and I'd begin the morning chores.

We had a nice Thanksgiving dinner at WL (I made pistou). We boycotted Black Friday as usual and we didn't venture out all weekend. When we did, the world seemed so large - but it was only tiny Jay. How we quickly become accustomed to our surroundings and then notice the differences when we reenter 'normalcy'.

I'm not concerned about our ability to survive up there. I think we can do it without going broke or crazy or killing ourselves. We've proved out the wood stove and well water so we have heat and water. I think we can build a nice barn, put in a garden, get a tractor and improve the property. I don't mean improvements as defined by developers and greedy people. I want to take care of the land and heal it. I'd like to remove the scrub and give the trees space to grow. We won't build much, we don't need the space and the increased taxes.

Oreo

Oreo was our first dog at Woodman's Lee. Her ashes are buried there, under a little stone marker.

Our neighbors didn't want Oreo so they offered her to our kids who were thrilled to get a replacement for our beloved Labrador who recently died. I didn't share the thrill, voted 'no' but I was overruled. She was a mutt, which is fine, but she was also part pit bull, which wasn't. Pit bulldogs are obedient and loyal to their owners, but they cannot be completely trusted to behave around kids or animals.

She was an intelligent dog, probably the smartest one we'll ever have. The focus of her existence was eating, which seems to be the standard job description of our dogs. We let her roam around the property but she stayed close to us. I think she was afraid of deer and I know she was afraid of thunderstorms.

Oreo would bring you her dish when she was really hungry and although she's guarding this particular toilet, she would never drink from one. She also liked to go for rides into town or to get water from the spring near Stickney Bridge.

One day we bought a couple of packs of extremely cheap hot dogs at the Grand Union in AuSable Forks that turned out to be nearly inedible. Oreo ate an entire pack, 8 hot dogs, one right after another. Although I got in trouble for it, I think that was the happiest day of her life.

Scenic Squalor

In those early days, a decade ago, the inside of the cabin was even worse than the outside. The walls were stained and covered with a black mold. There was a filthy and disgusting carpet. The kitchen floor had a springy feel to it where it wasn't rotted away entirely. The bathroom floor was missing and the tiny basement below it was partially submerged in water.

The place had an unfamiliar odor, but that's because we didn't know what mouse poop and urine smelled like. Suzy cleaned, organized, bought a table and beds at thrift stores, ripped out the carpet and we started our own landfill with junk and debris removed from the inside.

Even though we spent many hours cleaning and repairing, it was still a squalid mess. There's no electric service (there used to be, but that's a story for later). We had no running water but the drains seemed to function. We could wash dishes using hauled water from the creek, which wasn't unpleasant and taught us about water conservation.

We also had the luxury of a functioning indoor toilet, except when it cracked because we forgot to put antifreeze in it.

Fixing the Driveway

After days of dam busting and driveway restoration, this is as far as we got. The driveway was still hopelessly impassible and, once we left, the beavers would restore the dam-age in only a few nights.

Our neighbor to the north is a genial, self sufficient, Adirondacker. Suzy suggested that we contact him for advice and offer to employ him to clear the driveway. He had several ideas and he shared our reverence for wildlife. We'd coexist peacefully with the animals, after all, this is their home and there's plenty of room for everyone.

The beaver lodges were large structures and built to resist dismantling with anything besides dynamite. You really felt as if you were in the wilderness when observing one, especially with the mountains in the background. The ponds attract lots of wildlife, especially frogs (it sounds like there are thousands of them at night) and all kinds of birds. Our beaver ponds were so large that they supported fish and attracted fishermen, too.

Our neighbor added a culvert, graded and stabilized the driveway with a few truckloads of rock. Eventually we learned to keep the culverts clear and the driveway is usable again.

Beavers!

While we were busily improving the cabin, the wilderness was taking our measure and preparing to enforce Article 14 (the 'forever wild' section of the NY state constitution). The wilderness would do so on its own terms and at a time of its choosing.

That time arrived in June, 2003.

Here's a view of our driveway, you can see the rutted areas filled with water, dead-ending at a new beaver dam. A big one.

The next photos show the size and construction of the dam. These pictures were taken by our neighbor in the winter.

We drove up for an extended trip and discovered that our driveway was overgrown and under water. The beavers which we were thrilled to have on our property multiplied like the rodents they are. They worked like, well, beavers, cutting down hundreds of little trees and building amazingly sturdy dams all over the place. One of them bisected our driveway. That meant that we'd have to wade through water and hike a half mile from the road to the cabin, hauling everything such as drinking water, groceries, tools and laundry.

Knowing virtually nothing about what we were up against, we decided to breach the dams and restore the driveway. The 5 of us would work for hours busting up dams and clearing the driveway and the beavers would restore most of it overnight. Here's a picture of Stephen standing in the middle of what used to be our driveway and our adopted dog, Oreo, enjoying yet another swim.

Our ambitious plans to work on the cabin were ruined along with the driveway. We couldn't haul building materials up there anymore. But we were able to stay there, living in squalor but enjoying the wilderness.

It was becoming quite apparent that we weren't going to be able to transform this place into anything suitable for visiting, and we certainly wouldn't be able to retire here. By destroying our access, the beavers also destroyed the property value, provided we could even find anyone interested in buying it at all. Despite our hardships (which also included a failed transmission on the Suburban) we managed to have a good vacation.

And Suzy had an idea...

New Roof

A trip in October, 2001(no longer referred to as a vacation) involved a removal and replacement of the back roof. The existing roof leaked and there was a lot of damage to the floor and substructure. The roof wouldn't survive another winter snowpack without collapsing so I tore it down to the rafters, and replaced a few of those also. Stephen and I did all the work without power tools and the roof is still in decent shape today.

We began to notice a change in property values following the 9/11 attack. For some reason, the Adirondacks became a more valuable place than it used to be.

Negative Return

Suzy and I finished up our first paint job on that first visit, in summer of 2000, in just a few days. The results were worth the effort and our kids (Stephen, who was 11 and Katherine, who was 13 when this was taken) were even impressed with the transformation.

However, I had second thoughts about buying the property. I realized that we sacrificed a family vacation and a lot of money for a place that was still unsuitable for occupation. I anticipated having to repeat this many times in the years to come.

Our simple paint job not only improved the cabin's appearance but it changed my attitude towards the place. With a few more visits, and a lot more effort, perhaps we could tolerate an overnight stay or two. Maybe we didn't make a mistake.

On the other hand was this really worth the effort? Did it make sense to sink our time and money into this place? The Adirondacks can be a brutally harsh place: the weather, the insects, the lack of utilities, the feeling of getting in over one's head and not knowing what to do next. The North Country challenged us, and it took a while to learn the value of patience in responding to nature's provocations.

Regardless of what I thought or learned, Suzy wouldn't consider selling the place. In the rocket launch business, that's known a 'negative return'.
Our only choice was to persist and prevail.

Soap!

Coconut oil soap scented with lavender, drying on the rack.

One of our homesteading skills is making soap. In this case it's pure coconut oil soap. We plan to make all our bath and laundry soap at WL. It is easier on the environment, cheaper, and much higher quality than store bought soap.One also feels comfortably self sufficient using things made entirely by hand.

I suppose we can dream about scaling up our enterprise and selling soap at farmer's markets and to speciality stores. The market is probably there, considering that Lake Placid and Burlington are nearby. Who knows, maybe we can start a little business!

I also make the little boxes. S ties the ribbon!

A collection of gifts for our friends.
I made that dovetailed walnut box
(and the walnut table, it's sitting on!)

Our First Visit - Summer, 2000

View from the front pasture

South View

Here's what $50,000 got us in April, 2000. We paid cash because no mortgage company would consider financing it (those were quaint times where one had to actually 'qualify' for a mortgage!). I had some decent profits in the stock market and it was time to take some off the table. Shortly after that, the market crashed so I was glad we traded a little stock for real estate.

This view is the west side of the cabin which overlooks Whiteface Mountain. Most of the paint had peeled off but it had a new roof except for the porch and the poorly constructed addition in the back.

North side, with an open window in our sleeping loft.

We rented a house nearby when we drove up for our first visit as owners. Fortunately it had a well stocked garage and among other things, I used their ladder to repaint the place. There is a creek nearby so after scraping I was able to wash off the siding just by tossing buckets of water on it. Then I primed and painted. The ladder wasn't quite tall enough to reach everywhere but I was able to compensate by rigging up a makeshift extension to the paintbrush. Here's a photo of me painting the south side.

We worked on the place every day then we drove back to Florida. Although that was supposed to be our family vacation, all we did was work. But the place looked much better when we left. I had to temporarily repair part of the back wall of the addition, but it was obvious that the entire addition would have to be demolished and properly rebuilt. That temporary repair wound up lasting another 4 winters.

East (back) side, unrepaired.

East side with temporary repair.