10/12-15/20 I went up to Camp Serendipity for 4 days: Monday through Thursday.

The first substantial snowfall of the season had occurred since my last trip. There was no snow on the road, but there was at higher elevations. Dirtyface had a nice snow cover on top and there was even snow on Nason Ridge.

I arrived at 11:10. The weather was cool and damp. I brought my gear up in one trip, hoisted the flag, and then had my lunch and a nap.

When I got up, I split some firewood, practiced the piano, and then got a start on some serious writing. I have a nice, comfortable setup for my laptop using the big easy chair on the first floor. I posed for a picture in it.

Robert called and said that he might be over this week with his loader.

On Tuesday morning, it was 30 degrees and raining cats and dogs. There was a skiff of snow that had fallen overnight on the ground and on the truck. It did not melt very fast in spite of the rain because the temperature was so low.

At 7:40 AM, there was a brilliant bolt of lightning nearby and the power went out instantly. Fortunately, the power came back on at about the same time as the thunderclap arrived. There was no more lightning or thunder after that, but it kept raining most of the day.

Working in the crawl space, I started spreading plastic out and cutting it to fit against the Grid B2 and C2 column pads on the northeast sides. As I worked my way over to the Grid D2 column pad, I discovered a new spring that had emerged on top of the bedrock outcrop between Grid D2 and E2. I had thought that that outcrop would always be high and dry, but I was wrong. Water was seeping out at the top of it and it was trickling down and pooling in depressions in the rock.

I could see that when the pools overflowed, the water was going to run toward the Grid 3 direction. I wanted it to run toward the Grid 1 direction because there was a drainage channel just a foot or so in that direction.

To get that to happen, I got out the Bosch Bulldog roto hammer with a rock chisel bit, and cut a channel in the bedrock that went alongside the Grid D2 column pad and into the drainage channel. I took a picture of the outcropping and the finished channel.

That will solve the problem, but I learned that I will have to cover that outcrop with a piece of plastic to keep the moisture contained. That will be no problem.

After lunch, Robert called and warned me that we might be in for a violent windstorm. After we hung up, I took my nap.

When I got up, the rain had stopped for a time, so I went outside and split and stacked a bunch of firewood.

On Wednesday morning, I was down in the crawl space fitting plastic up against the Grid D2 column pad when the roofing contractor in Seattle called. He said he wanted to install the gutters on the garage on Friday, so I decided to go home on Thursday in order to be there during the work.

Shortly after that, Robert showed up with his loader. He parked it near the jammer and said that he planned to use it to load the jammer onto Mike's truck later so that it could be hauled away. He wasn't sure exactly when they would do that, but it might be Friday this week. I told him I wouldn't be there. He said that was OK because he wouldn't need my help. He had brought a helper with him and the two of them went up to the cabin with me and looked at my steel scaffold frames.

Robert was planning on borrowing some, or all, of them and the two of them did some planning on how to use them and figuring out how many they would need. I offered to set the frames outside in case they wanted to take them on Friday when I wasn't there, but he said that wouldn't be necessary.

After lunch and a nap, the weather was sunny and beautiful. I took the opportunity to winterize my irrigation systems. I disconnected and drained all the hoses, wound up the hose down at the lower roadway, and brought in the three buckets I had stationed in the sequoia grove so that the snow wouldn't smash them. I checked on the springbox and was pleased but not surprised that there was a fairly substantial flow of water out the overflow pipe.

I was dismayed to discover that one of the redcedar trees I had transplanted looked dead except for one lone branch at the bottom. I don't know whether it will survive or not.

On Thursday morning, Dave called first thing and we had a great conversation. Then after breakfast I practiced the piano, listened to the radio, and didn't do any work. I left for home at 12:45 after another fun, but shorter week.