Real Quick Trip

This may have been the shortest stay I’ve had yet up here. I came up Friday night late and left out Saturday morning. I had the opportunity on Saturday to shadow a local (to us) beekeeper to learn about relocating colonies of bees. There are two bee colonies at our house here – one in the cable box down at the road and one large colony living in the shop wall. My intent is to relocate them into bee boxes and harvest the honey. But since I had an opportunity to learn, I figured I would take it. Also, we have a campervan trip planned for over the 4th of July. With a bit of encouragement from Oceana, I’ve decided to finish my strip plank canoe before the trip. I figure I only have 80-100 hours left on it and the trip is in two weeks. I got this!

More Lumber

Just like last time, before I came up I loaded the van with more hardwood lumber. I figure there was another 750 board feet this time. I’ve started stacking the pecky cypress and clear cypress off to the side. I’m thinking that there may be enough pecky to do one of the bedroom ceilings and there may be enough clear cypress to do the other bedroom ceiling. I should know next trip if there’s enough. I stacked the lumber in the garage and completely maxed out the lumber rack on the far side.

First thing Saturday morning I scuffed sanded and recoated the drywall in the bedroom. This was the first chance I have had to try out my new drywall sander. I have wanted this sander since it came out around 7 years ago. It is expensive and I don’t do much drywall work (which I’m quite OK with) so I never picked one up. Fast forward to about 6 months ago just after we purchased the property Festool had a reconditioned sale, which never happens, and I was able to buy it for 50% off. Woohoo!

I finally got to try it out and I was quite impressed. There’s enough suction with my vacuum attached to hang itself off of the wall. I made more dust hanging the drywall than I did sanding it. Anyways, I sanded the walls and then recoated everything. The butt joints got feathered out with a 14″ knife and the factory seams got hit with the 10″. Everything turned out pretty good so with another light sand I may be able to spot hit a few areas and be ready for trim.

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I also cleared out some of the overgrowth on the north side of the driveway. I’ve never cut this back much (yet) and it was really crowding the driveway. I say crowding the driveway, but it was blocking more than half of the driveway so it had to go. Using my trusty machete, I took it back just clear of the edge of the driveway. I really can’t wait to get a pole saw as it’s the right tool for this job. Maybe I’ll find one for 50% off. Maybe! At least when I finally get a pole saw I’ll appreciate it. No doubt about that. The picture doesn’t do it justice but at least I took a picture.

On our way up here we pass a place in Okeechobee called Okeechobee canoe and paddle company. I’ve got enough to do with my own canoe before our trip that I was looking to buy a paddle from a local craftsman so I wouldn’t have to build one. This was the first time I have driven past and the doors were open. I stopped in and chatted with the owner for a bit. Come to find out, he’s quietly retiring and closing down his shop. And he was in the mood to make deals. Unfortunately, he didn’t have any completed paddles left for sale. So I ended up walking out the door with 2 unfinished paddles, his paddle making jigs, a nearly finished cedar strip canoe (for Oceana), and two canoe stands. Score! He’s also got a massive drum sander for sanding curved parts that I’ll likely pick up my next time through.

Bee school went well. Except for it being super hot out. Nobody got stung and the colony successfully got re-homed. Although we tried, we were unable to locate the queen but given the amount of brood cells, there’s definitely a queen there. We talked about the bees up here and he made some suggestions for relocating the hives. I was glad to have had the opportunity to meet with him and learn from him. I met him a few years back when I bought a sawmill off of him. He had just upgraded to a larger machine and was looking to get rid of the old one. So this time when I was there, I ended up buying some of his old bandsaw blades and a few pieces of lumber. Maybe I have a problem with this whole lumber thing…..

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Sunday I took the opportunity to work on the canoe. I’ve been burning the midnight oil on this thing trying to get it finished for our trip. I think it’s doable. Here’s a few pics of Sunday morning float tests. This was the first time it had ever been in the water. As we won’t be up next weekend, maybe I’ll do a post on the canoe build. Ya’ll better believe that you’re going to see me out on Lake Byrd in it so you might as well know the background of it! That’s all for this weekend. Have a great week everyone!

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