I already felt guilty that we skipped a family tradition of celebrating the 4th of July with my husband’s family due to complicating factors of Covid-19 and various areas of civil unrest between our two locations. I felt even guiltier that our plans now included working from dawn till dusk on clearing out land to eventually put a shelter on. As I mentioned previously, we had been there a few days earleir, ink not yet dry on our e-docs, to clear out enough space for a tent and to bring up some supplies. By supplies I mean, tick spray, pruners, clippers, saws, gloves, eyewear all stored in a giant tupperware container.
As a side note, my husband very cleverly turned our harbor freight folding trailer into a mobile shed. The idea was to have a place to store our stuff until we have a space for a longer term shelter without having to haul it all back and forth. We had this trailer for years and have only used it a few times, by adding sides and a lockable top, it became a horizontal shed on wheels!
There were some “hitches” and glitches but once the wiring was fixed, we were on our way! We took the very long way in order to avoid the highway, I followed behind in the Subaru.
We got a later start then intended and when we arrived we needed to get camp set up.
Not very inviting, but a little weedwhacking and branch cutting helped! 
Much better, almost justifies dragging the family to the woods over the 4th of July!
I would love to show you an instagram worthy photo of our first night at our homestead. But since I only have instagram so I can pretend I know how to use it in order to monitor my teenage son’s account, I won’t do that. I would love to show you a pintrest worthy montage complete with gingham tablecloth and picnic baskets. Instead, I will show you my left-over folding chair, plastic table hot mess that we rolled into town with.
We retired after a delicous feast, we even had a luxurious bathroom facility.
The wet wipes in the photo are the last of their species, so rare that I hope to pass them down to my children’s children one day.
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I would be lying if I didn’t tell you that this first night I had some serious reservations. The first two visits to the lot we had many ticks on us, I was really worried about ticks heading into this camping adventure. I did find this spray at Tractor Supply (basically a hillbilly target and I mean that lovingly as a newly minted hillbilly.) It is made from some part of a chrysanthemum which, like baby oil to Jersey shore people, is beautiful but deadly (to ticks.) We had far fewer ticks, but there was still panic in the tent with one or both children bemoaning their fate of spending the night in our hot, possibly tick filled tent. We brought air mattresses as I knew the ground would be root laden and unlevel and the battery operated air pump we brought died midway through filling the first mattress. Que the whining about having to blow up air matresses by mouth and my husband and I attempt to put everything into our “mobile shed/ bear box.” Between the bickering, the heat, the fear of bears, the tiny battery operated fan which did nothing and the overwhelming prospect of clearing out acres of tick-filled trees Paul Bunyon style, I felt like I had made a huge mistake. I may have threatened to leave first thing in the morning and leave them with a babysitter if I ever darkened this forest again.
We all woke up in better spirits. I had not been eaten by a bear, our shed on wheels did not have claw marks all over it, there wasn’t a layer of ticks on my face by morning and it was actually cold at night. Too cold, and I hadn’t brought sleeping bags as it was close to 90 during the day. Live and learn, I did have one blanket that the kids shared. My husband and I froze. More on that later.
We set to work with chainsaw, loppers, clippers and started making piles. I am a worker and happiest when busy. The piles grew larger and so did our turning radius!
During the tree trimming/cutting we upset some winged and angry insect which resembled a larger yellow-jacket. We named it the “murder hornet” after the Covid-19 trifecta. We may have put our tent tarp on top of their nest because in the morning, we all could hear a very loud buzzing.
After a day of work, we could finally see the mountain view we had fought through ticks and hornets and lots of thorns to get to. Did I mention the thorns?
We made a lot of progess this first day.
To reward us all for this hard work, I lightly seared and then mostly boiled steaks! Cast iron cooking on a tiny propane grill is a skill. A skill I do not have.
We will discuss more about my shower in the next post, because with all of this de-thorning, cutting, pushing and pulling, we were filthy. I will finish with this beautiful sunset walk, a reminder of why we fell in love with this area. A serene evening, just before we saw the bear.
