Are we moving the ball forward?

This is what my mind was pondering this past weekend. We spend an unexpected amount of time managing the property instead of progressing forward with the property. I am always one to say "it is the journey, not the destination, that is important". But at times I grow frustrated. This is the pessimistic side of me coming out.

The derecho event of 2020 and severe winter damage of 2022-2023 have really taken their tole on us. We have trees down in our forest, and trees piling up on trees. We have oak wilt killing our oak trees at the front (east) end of the property. We have a mess at the water where a pine tree, that fell from the bluff due to snow weight, blocked all trees/limbs/branches/twigs/etc. flowing downstream and left us a big pile of debris in front of our boulders.

It is easy to look at our shortcomings and inability to keep up with it all. I tend to not get too stressed about any of it, because getting stressed does not solve a single problem. But we'll come back to this later.

I had a planned trip with Dave, Bryan and Lance the weekend prior, but some family issues caused me to cancel. So, Lorraine and I decided to make a trip on Memorial Day weekend. We left home around 7:30 and landed in BRF around 11:30. I had a new 30-gallon water tank to allow us to haul water to the camper that is now always at the property. Brad likes his showers, so we need to have water unless I want to drive to the campground to shower.

We filled up our water tank and headed to the property. It had not been mowed yet, so all I could see is a large tick-village. Mowing keeps the ticks in check a bit. There was part of a tree laying on the driveway near the building. We have six to ten dead oak trees, two that worry us that they could fall on our building.

We de-winterized the camper and sterilized the water system. We drove into town again to get a new fill of water in the water tank, stopped by Hansen's to get a few salads for our supper, and then back to the property to drain and fill the water tank.

I then took off with the atv to pick up debris. We had a few small trees down just past the fire lane, so I cut them up and hauled them back to the building. I checked my phone to find that my mower had called me to see if we were there. I texted back that even though we were there, we would be fine if they came and mowed. I did not hear back, but then a van pulled up and it was them. So they did get their mowing equipment and head back to mow the property. I was SO happy for this, but it caused us to have to quickly get the large part of a tree, that was near the building on the driveway, cut up before they returned. We got it done just as they started mowing.

Supper was our home-made Big Macs with the salads from Hansen's. Good stuff.

Relaxation at night... burning debris which is what we always seem to need to do.

It was a good night of sleep, and I was up around 6:00 AM, doing some final burning of the prior days' debris. Once Lorraine awoke, we had our breakfast burritos, and I went into weed-whacking mode. We need to keep the area southwest of the building clear so we can lay rock to give us a good runway into the building for backing the camper into. I also went down to the water to weed-whack that area also.

We then decided we should go down to the water to work on the pile of trees on our boulders. I could put on waders and work from the water, while Lorraine could work from the boulders. We made a very large dent in the work to do. I had the goal of working until my chainsaw ran out of gas, and then we would quit.

By the way, I am very conscientious about doing my best not to pollute the water when running a chain saw near/in the water. I use canola oil instead of dirty bar oil to keep my chain lubricated. Friends of the Black River use vegetable oil when they are cutting in the water. Canola, vegetable.... either is more natural and NOT petroleum-based.

In any case, we probably eliminated over 50% of the mess on the boulders with no injuries, and I was happy with our progress.

We are used to the flea market occurring during holiday weekends in Hatfield. But evidently, someone bought the property where they held the flea market, so it no longer is in existence. Instead, it has moved to Hixton. We decided to drive to Hixton to check out the flea market.

Hixton is 10 miles northwest of Black River Falls. We don't venture towards the north very often, and I had forgotten how beautiful this section of the Driftless Area was.

We travelled back to BRF and stopped to get some supper at the street taco place; good food. Then it was back to the property for chillin' out by the fire. To bed, up early, and on the road for home.