#28 Requiem for a ground squirrel...

So, we took off right after work on Friday and got up to Rawlins at about 9:30pm.  Not too bad considering the traffic on I-25 going North through Denver.

Anyway, it was pretty windy in Rawlins and it smelled like a BBQ.  Apparently the Seminoe and Ferris wild fires  (caused by the lightening strikes 2 weeks ago - see previous post!)were still in full swing and the smoke was rather heavy; so much so that there was a warning sign on the highway leading out to the Great Divide Basin of reduced visibility due to smoke.

No kidding!  As we came over the Continental Divide, it looked like the fog had rolled in, and as we drove out on our road, it was like driving through a cloud.

On the upside, this is what the moon looked like:

Mostly full and deep orange.  The pic doesn't do it justice.

Anyway, we got on the property and unloaded a few things so we could settle in and have stuff ready to go in the morning for stuccoing the outer kitchen wall...

Which brings us to this poor critter:

We found this little guy in one of our water buckets when we got up Saturday morning.  Apparently he had jumped in and the small amount of water in the bucket was just enough to stop him from jumping back out and also just enough to drown him.  : ( 

Sorry Mr. Squirrel. 

We've started covering any buckets that have water in them if we leave them out overnight.  No more wildlife deaths by misadventure.

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One of the things we were anxious to see was how well Jeff's under-bed storage frame would work out.

Essentially it's a captain's bed made of slotted plywood assembled into sections with a top for the bed to rest on.  We'd hoped that would help organize our stuff and lift the bed up about a foot, giving us better visibility out the windows at night.

It worked fabulously!  Really comfy, kept our stuff organized, and it can be taken apart in about 5 min with no tools and can be stored along side any bigger stuff we need to cram in.

Other notes of note:

The flies were TERRIBLE this time.  They were all over the place and we had a hard time keeping them off of us and out of the van.  In fact, they seemed to loooove the van - there were swarms all over the outsides all. the. time.  Yuck.  And Bitey.  Ouch.

When the smoke finally cleared out in the middle of the night, the full moon lit up the landscape in such a way that you could literally read a book outside.  Surreal.

We spent a lot of time and energy plastering the walls, so our progress was largely invisible; other than to us.

Here's a butterfly that the wife almost stepped on:

And some handprints:

Overall a good trip.  We used up all of our H2O, all of our cement and all of our bottles.  Covered a great deal of the wall.  And still got back pretty early.  And stayed productive even when we got home.

Can't wait until next time!