On Three Bear Road

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On the road

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Susan says:

My dad and his wife, Gail, are intent on building their own home in the mountains of Idaho. Last Fall they bought 10 acres of land covered in pine and cedar trees, and went about the process of clearing a space for dad's "garage" and the house. They were able to build the garage before the snow came, and have been living in it ever since. Dad has plans to complete the house as soon as possilbe, but at the time of our arriving the activities are primarily land-clearing (and moving some of the uprooted saplings to new locations). We're staying in their motor home and using the bathroom and kitchen in the "garage" (you'll see in pics why I have enclosed that word in quotes). We have all the basic comforts- electricity, flushing toilets, shower, and hummingbirds to watch- but no cable, mobile phone reception, or internet access. We have taken to transplanting saplings by day and watching hummingbirds in a feeding frenzy in the late afternoons. It's been a little challenging, mentally, to be this remote but I think we're managing. Only traces of psychosis so far. We have become obsessed by watching out for deer and other wildlife, but not obsessed enough to get up at 5am, which is apparently when they wander around. The rest of the day they hang out in the shade, obviously smarter than us.

The "garage"

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Debbie says:

I've not lived in a camper since i was 3 years old but it's like riding a bike....

We've been here for about 2 weeks now. It's really lovely up here and John and Gail are cool but i'm starting to crack with the lack of TV, internet and mobile phone, although the chipmonk and moose sightings are a pretty good substitute. We come into "town" twice a week. "Town" is a place called "Moscow" which is one hours drive from Susan's dads place and is the closest place to get internet and all those other new fangled inventions. We come through a tiny willage called "Troy" to get to Moscow. Last week something in Troy was torched and the smoke was around for days later.

On the bug front.... i've been biten by a yellow-jacket wasp type thing while on the 4x4's. that hurt a bit. the other bugs around here are quite well behaved but i now have a slight fear of grasshoppers and the hummingbirds have been acting totally bonkers for days now. you put sugared water in their feeders but i think susan might have got the proportions a bit wrong and it's as if they're crack addicts. i got a bit close when i was taking some pictures of them and i could see the loopiness in their tiny little eyeballs. im sure they were thinking the same thing about me since i've been drinking way too much coffee and reading too many trashy magazines lately.

The camper. We're in there.

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