12/29-31/21 I went up to Camp Serendipity for three days: Wednesday through Friday.

On the way I stopped at Paula's and then Marilyn's to drop off some gifts. I arrived at Camp Serendipity at 12:30. The temperature was 13 degrees and the driveway had been nicely plowed. I parked heading out at the foot of the concrete stairs. Then using the aluminum scoop that I had just waxed I scooped off the stairs and then stomped out the trails to the cabin.

When I entered the cabin, I heard all 3 of the smoke alarms screaming and beeping. I tried to shut them off and didn't know how. So, I went to the loft where I could reach the alarms and unplugged them and took the batteries out. That shut them off and it also quieted the one in the bedroom.

I had just gotten back to the back door intending to hoist the flag and bring up my gear when I heard a knock at the door. It was Shirley bringing over her annual gift for us. We had a short visit and then I walked down to the flagpole with her, hoisted the flag, and continued down with her to the truck. She left and I brought my gear up in two more trips.

As I had feared, the big heater in the living room was not working and it was 40 degrees in the cabin. I think that's the coldest it has ever been in there. I took the broken baffle out of the wood stove and decided to light a fire without the baffle. I built a roaring fire but it didn't seem to heat the cabin very well.

After lunch I went out and split and stacked a bunch of firewood. I kept the fire going in the stove, but the temperature never got above 60 degrees until after dinner when it finally got up to 67 degrees. I had burned a lot of firewood and I had turned on a space heater, but it wasn't enough. The temperature outside got down to 5 degrees, so I set up two more small space heaters and got them running. I left all three heaters running overnight.

On Thursday morning the temperature outside was 13 degrees. Inside the cabin it was 60 degrees. Those three little space heaters evidently made a 20 degree difference. Before I started a fire in the stove, I straightened the baffle the best I could by standing on it and bending out the bulge. I got it more or less flat and put it back in the stove and started a fire. I could tell immediately that it worked much better. Within an hour the temperature in the cabin was up to 70 degrees with no auxiliary heaters running.

I practiced the piano, listened to the radio a little and then went out and split and stacked a bunch more firewood. After lunch and a nap, I did some writing, and then I replaced the three batteries in the smoke alarms and put them back.

On Friday morning the temperature outside was 10 degrees. Inside, the temperature was 65 degrees because I had left the three auxiliary heaters running all night.

After practicing the piano, I shoveled off the concrete stairs and dug the truck out and started it up. Then back in the cabin, I did the usual preparation to leave for home. I decided to leave two of the space heaters running over the weekend while I was gone. I hope that works out. I left for home at 12:30 thinking about the problems of heating the cabin. Ellen had done some research and found a wall heater product that sounds like it will work as a replacement for the Convectairs.