11/17-19/15 I went up to Camp Serendipity for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

I knew that a storm had moved through that morning but I figured that if they didn’t have the road plowed before I went over the pass the worst that could happen would be that I would have to follow a snowplow over, so I took off. On the way, I stopped and played a game of checkers with Uncle Charles. I was able to beat him fairly soundly this time.

Between Index and Scenic there was evidence of trees that had fallen on the roadway but they had all been cleared. It was raining lightly and there was some fog so the visibility was not good. Fortunately, I was able to spot a dark shadow on the road ahead of me just as I entered the Baring straight-away. I slowed down in time to avoid hitting a tree that had fallen across my lane. There was no oncoming traffic so I was able to drive around the tree with no problem. I pulled over in Baring and reported the tree to 911. Then I proceeded on over the pass. Little did I know that I was just about the last person to drive that road for the rest of the week. The water level had risen after I went through and it damaged a bridge at milepost 52.

There was snow in the ditch from Skykomish on but the road had been plowed and was bare and wet. I had no problem driving the rest of the way to Camp Serendipity. When I arrived at 12:15 there was about 4 or 5 inches of snow on the ground, but in 4wd I had no trouble driving in and parking. There was a lot of mud under that snow. The temperature was 28° and it was raining.

It was 58° inside the cabin so I started a fire in the stove right away before having my lunch. I skipped my nap because I wanted to make sure to stay on my one-tread-per-week schedule. I put my work clothes on and went out to work.

I chose the other half of the slab I had used last week and set it on sawhorses. Then I used my new planer to plane both the top and bottom surfaces. The planer works great so the job went quickly.

Then I mixed up a batch of Board Defense, poured it into the sprayer, and sprayed it all on the slab. Since it was raining cats and dogs, I knew that the tread would not dry out overnight even if it were under the eaves. So I carried it into the cabin and set it across two 5 gallon buckets a few feet away from the wood stove. That would dry it out nicely overnight.

In the evening, when Ellen called, I learned that Highway 2 had been closed in both directions shortly after I had passed through. There was no estimated time for re-opening. That didn’t concern me because they described the problem as being simply clean up after a storm. I was sure they would have it cleaned up by Thursday.

On Wednesday the rain turned to snow at about 6:00 AM. I took the nicely dried tread blank outside and built the supporting structure to suspend it over its intended location in the staircase. I got it nicely leveled and positioned and then calibrated and aligned my scribe. I got about half of the scribing done when Bill called.

He had heard news of road closures on Highway 2 and was concerned about me. I assured him that I had gotten through with no problem and that I was sure that by the time I left for home on Thursday that the road would be clear again. The weather was supposed to improve and Thursday was going to be sunny. We had a nice chat until I noticed a car in the parking area below. We hung up and I went out to greet Mike Pearson. He had told me that he planned to come up and visit me at 11:00 and he was right on time.

He wanted to help me somehow and not interfere with the work I was doing. That was a nice offer so I took him up on it. I told him that I would like to finish the scribing and there was nothing he could do to help me with that. But if he wanted to, he could split some more firewood for me. I had used up nearly all of the wood I had split so that was a job that needed to be done.

I was amazed at his eagerness and his strength. While I finished my scribing, he split nearly every round that I had stockpiled under the front eave. Even though it was about noon, he was eager to keep working so I suggested harvesting some more wood from the big log up by the privy that the loggers had left me for firewood. Mike agreed to carry the rounds to the cabin as I bucked them.

I gassed up the chainsaw and the two of us went up to the log. I bucked up six or eight rounds and Mike carried them down to the cabin just about as fast as I could buck them. There is now a nice new stockpile of wood for me. I was extremely happy about that.

We went in for lunch and during lunch had a stimulating discussion on various philosophical topics. We continued our conversation for a while after lunch and then Mike left shortly before 3:00.

I didn’t really feel like working but I went to work anyway. I wanted to stick to my schedule. I took the scribed tread blank down from the suspension structure, set it up on sawhorses, and cut the notches with the chainsaw. Then I notched the two stair stringers.

When I tried the fit for the first time I was fairly pleased. It was close enough so that it didn’t look like it would take much rasping. When I tried rasping I was so exhausted that I decided to put it off until morning. That is consistent with my schedule. All I want to achieve on the middle day is to get a fairly close fit.

When I talked to Ellen that evening, she told me that there was still no predicted time for the highway to open and that there had been some damage to a bridge. That was more ominous. We agreed that before I left for home on Thursday I would find out the status of the highway and in the worst case, either come home over Blewett Pass or stay another night.

On Thursday morning I finished getting the tread to fit properly by about 11:00. Just about then Marilyn called and told me the bad news that the road was going to be closed indefinitely until a team of engineers could assess and repair the damage to the bridge. It was clear that I needed to return home via Blewett because Highway 2 might be closed for several days or more.

I hurried to finish the tread installation including the staining of the tops of the last three treads since this was a nice sunny day and the treads were all dry on top. I finished in time to leave by 1:30. The drive over Blewett was no problem, but I-90 got more congested as I approached Seattle, and I-5 was a virtual creeping parking lot. I didn’t get home until nearly 6:00. If I have a choice I won’t do that again. That evening I learned that the highway won’t be open until Nov 25 which is the day before Thanksgiving. Rather than drive Blewett again, I decided to skip my trip next week.