My Picture Summary Of 2004
Sedona, Arizona also trip to Montana drive
The first months of cold were not so bad, and there is nothing more beautiful than a blanket of snow topping the red rocks around Sedona, Arizona.
As spring came, what better to do while Tim was away? Get some baby chicks, because, um, they grow up and make eggs…. right! The chicks were said to have been born April 1st. They had 5 kinds, so well, 2 of each! The first night one of the chicks died, but the other nine were happy. The house came with a Chicken coop, so no problem other than we needed to move it because it would be better in the corner of the bigger sized property instead of what used to be the edge.
The coop was not build well, it was big, moving it made it fall to pieces. So then begins the construction of the western style chicken saloon, a real hen house, with a chicken porch!
As the new coop was getting closer to completion, one of the aricanas was killed by the neighbors dog, not like the dog that would hang out with the chickens, but an evil mormon dog. While I was in california, Tim went and picked up another aricana chick. The chick was so lonely that is screeched the entire night, so he went back the next day and got another one. Well it turned out that it was half something and half Guinea hen. Once they were older we also learned how difficult it is to put young hens in with older, the pecking order. They actually ended up being growing up inside and became house trained, mostly. We finally split the coop with some fencing till they all got happier. Then found out that the first aricana was a rooster.
It was beautiful. It would crow. It had to go.
The store I bought feed from said she knew an older Indian guy the lived in the middle of who knows where that would take it not for fighting, but to keep the snakes away. Good enough. There was peace in the coop, and I could sleep.
Had great fun with the vistors during the year, gary, tim, karen, miranda, mark, and brian came in november after we took a multistate drive in october.
The trip was Montana Steam where a train was to be pulled for three days across Montana by the SP 4449 from Portland Oregon, the Daylight train. We drove north making some stops at the Old Faithful Lodge in Yellowstone on the last night of the season before they started the restoration project on it. Then spent some time in the park before heading up to billings where the train would depart, then a night in Bozeman, then the next in Missoula. The train terminated in Sandpoint, Idaho where they bused us to Spokane for the night.
I woke up with a horrible horrible cold, but we had to pick up a rental car and tim had to drive the whole way back that day to the car in Billings. We headed over to South Dakota to see facerock (rushmore), to wyoming to see close encounter rock (devils tower) and through nebraska to denver to visit my uncle bob and tina, and aunt sharon was there also at the same time. Then back to Sedona through monument valley.
December 28th. A nice day, sunny, completely blue sky. We were doing yard work when the neighbor came over and said there was a major flood warning for the next day. Right. A check on the computer said the same, and the radar show big rain in southern california. We had had some flooding in the middle of summer which wrecked the garden and the lawn, but we knew where it flowed so we covered all the new deck wood. Finished stacking the wood pile to keep it out of the previous flood area. They were giving out sand and empty sandbags up the hill at the school so we went up and got the truck filled, then shoveled them up. It got dark, chickens asleep, went to bed.
December 29th. 3 AM the rain on the roof was unbelievable. I had never heard is raining from inside, It was so loud, could not sleep until sleep finally took over. What felt like moments later at 8:30 was Tim pounding on the door telling me I had to get up. The flood had started. I got up and looked out the back at the “creek” and it was wide and moving. The rain had melted the snow off the mountain in flagstaff and the water had to go somewhere. And that was the back yard.
Within 15 minutes it went up another foot, a foot below the chicken coop but still behind the raised irrigation ditch. The chickens staring at the now river had to be let out to run while throwing as much stuff from the garage that was on the floor into the house. After rounding the chickens into the garage, had to cut to perfectly fitting pieces of plywood to seal into to of the doorways for the room that was not above flood level and put them in place, then finish putting the sandbags stacked in front of the garage, move all the cars up to high ground, and take pictures and film as it first went over the banks.
Not knowing if the garage was safe enough for the chickens, they had to all be put in a bathroom which luckily was tiled half way up the walls. At this point the flood water was all around and under the house flowing at amazing speed. Stepping down into on the cement driveway it came up to the top of the rubber boots and I could only move slowly without falling down from the pressure without falling in. We hung out on the road and watched to torrent of water at 20000 cubic feet per second go by in the back while it still rose in front and under the house which was built on piers.
When getting nearing to watch, the wire fences began to snap and fly so had to get away and get a hotel. There was no way of getting in to the house or even know if was going to be there the next day.
The house survived, everything was covered in sand, the garage got a foot of water which was an inch below the doors to more of the house. The Chickens stunk up the bathroom something bad. The coop hadn’t got washed away but was unusable til cleanup since the it was now filled with part of the wood pile, and 1 1/2 feet of sand. the water had been up 3 feet at the coop from the ground, which was now and would stay at that 1 1/2 feet higher. They would be spending time in the garage since it now had a dirt floor also. The sandbags did save it.
New Years eve was a bit, disturbed.
