Upper Peninsula Michigan and Auction Win Outcomes

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I was up in Wisconsin and the UP (upper peninsula) in Michigan. It was a lot of driving after launching/landing in Appleton WI. I got an item off the bucket list by driving across the "Mighty Mac". Altough it was built in the late '50s. It is still the longest suspension span in the Northern hemisphere. It is a crazy long bridge with a crazy long suspension span. It was good to see the bridge in context of the seemingly endless forests of Northern Wisconsin and Michigan. The culture in the two haves of Michigan are noticibly different as you might expect. Great time meeting with folks both in WI and MI. The tractor I won in auction, seems to have paid off. This time I beat the odds. It was a really good deal. I have the "no-key, non-running, may have hydraulic problems, unknown hours" -auction win, running well with minimal cost and time. I have some more tweaks, maintenance and minor fixes but the major risks are gone.
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http://www.okienoodling.com/


The link is a good start to learn about "noodling". Noodling is a means to catch catfish like the one shown in a previous post. That fish is real. What you do is wade around the shores of lakes and streams, reach your hand into holes in the banks under water. The catfish will consider you a threat and try to eat you. You grab the inside of his mouth and wrestle him to victory. Seems simple enough.

It is Thanksgiving again. It is about 18 degrees out and we have a few inches of snow. We have a coal fire going, switching from wood last night. The savings in getting our own wood and using low dollar per BTU coal isn't so much about saving money. I certainly waste more money on the savings on other stuff. It is about being able to take care of ourselves as we need to. Gas for the chainsaw is of course a concern.

We are going over to couzin Liz's house in Dryden today. It is so weird that we ended up living in the same place almost. She is from Maine and is part of a practice as a doctor in Ithaca. We are cooking one turkey over here. There will be about 19 people.

Here are a couple of pics from a couple of months ago. The bass was caught in our pond. I told you it was just like the one in the previous post. The llama pic was a special moment just as the sun was coming up. We are often above the clouds here. Sometimes it looks like we could walk out on the clouds. The llamas look pretty happy in the photo for sure.

I have a lot of web stuff to do and fix. I might get to it. I am in two classes now.




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Upper Peninsula Michigan and Auction Win Outcomes

-
Image
I was up in Wisconsin and the UP (upper peninsula) in Michigan. It was a lot of driving after launching/landing in Appleton WI. I got an item off the bucket list by driving across the "Mighty Mac". Altough it was built in the late '50s. It is still the longest suspension span in the Northern hemisphere. It is a crazy long bridge with a crazy long suspension span. It was good to see the bridge in context of the seemingly endless forests of Northern Wisconsin and Michigan. The culture in the two haves of Michigan are noticibly different as you might expect. Great time meeting with folks both in WI and MI. The tractor I won in auction, seems to have paid off. This time I beat the odds. It was a really good deal. I have the "no-key, non-running, may have hydraulic problems, unknown hours" -auction win, running well with minimal cost and time. I have some more tweaks, maintenance and minor fixes but the major risks are gone.
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Solon NY Water Mill

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I went and looked at the Solon Pond Mill. I was mistaken last time when I was up there in 2000. It was Summer and everything was overgrown. The mill is about an 1/8 mile from the building I thought might have been the mill. The mill is in rough shape. But everything is still there. I couldn't get underneath to see if the turbine was in good shape. I had heard that it was buried in muck. I suspect it is there, but probably in rough shape as well. It is a combination grist and saw mill, and could be restored to do exactly that. I am going to pass. I was thinking it would make a great homesite however. There is 3.9 acres (a lot for a mill) and you could build a nice house that looked period and work on getting an awesome water powered workshop out back. There is a planner, and it looks like a jig saw and I bet a few other pieces of woodworking equipment in there. All the shafting looks good. It is fun to think about the coolness of starting with logs and making furniture all out in th...
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Back South Again with More Projects

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A lot of driving. I have forgotten how much driving is involved when on the farm. Everything is far. But I also had to drive up and back twice to Syracuse to pickup/drop off Angie at the airport and a business meeting for Wisdomino in Albany. Yeah it was a lot of driving for me. All and all it was about 4000 miles in three weeks. Early in the morning I decided to check out some auctions (dangerous). I ended up being high bidder on a 2015 New Holland Boomer 33 ( "hours unknown, does not run, may have problems, no key, no battery" ) from the State of Tennessee. I figured I could swing by Nashville and pick it up on the way to Georgia. And indeed I did. It was only a couple of hours extra, maybe 4. But, it was more efficient than going to Georgia and then back and forth to Nashville. Nashville is about 4 hours from Duluth. So I was looking at a 4 hour savings. After I go through it and getting if working I will tow it up to the farm in NY. I wasn't prepared for a trac...
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I got the bobcat going again and I have almost all the holes drilled. I will be taking the auger back Monday morning. I still have to assemble the fence, fashion 4 gates and generally get the job done. I am gaining on it. It is amazing what you can get done when you are not studying for a class and working a full-time job. We have our new llamas, two females named Rosey and Ultima. They settled in with the herd right away. The current animal count: 7 chickens, 6 llamas, and 2 cats. Click pic for video
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Summer Starting to End on the Farm

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It has been good spending time on the farm. I really had forgotten how quiet and dark it is here. It can actually be a bit unnerving. The leaf doodle bug was put to work in the forest. However, it looks like the car will be going back on the road. We can say it failed field trials,but that would only be partially true. The better utility value at this point is more suited to getting a teenager back and forth from high school. The mycological aspects of the farm did not disappoint. The pics of these shrooms are not photoshopped. The coal stove (very heavy) is loaded on the truck. It will be rebuilt in Georgia if I can save it. Coal stoves are increasingly out of production. When they are gone they are gone. The small wood stove is now in its place. The pic of the red sky in morning was indeed a warning of weather. We had strong storms and tornados in Upstate NY. Although I was travelling much that day in the area, I missed the worst of it.
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