2/8 A Rainy Day

It poured last night and when we woke up, we discovered that the power was out – not just at the camp, but also all over the top of the mountain. Fortunately, the stove is gas so we were able to make our hot cereal and cocoa for breakfast. Katie and the staff had a meeting with someone from the Nature Conservancy so the volunteers worked out in the outdoor plant nursery for the morning. We transplanted seedlings of many native plants and repotted some of the bigger specimens into gallon-sized pots. The whole nursery area looked so much better and more organized after we were finished. We were going to eat lunch out on the picnic table, but it started raining again. Apparently, the camp gets 90 inches of rainfall annually. Just 3 miles down the road, the annual rainfall total is 45 inches and down on the coast in Waimea, the annual total is just 12 inches. At any rate, the power was back on and we all came inside to eat. A neighbor came by as we were finishing lunch and said that a pair of hunting dogs was loose in the area (actually we saw them yesterday as we were loading up the vans) and they had killed two young pigs that belonged to his next-door neighbor. They were able to catch one of the dogs, but the other got away. As it was still pouring out, we couldn’t go out to the field to put herbicide on the ginger as it would just wash away. Katie called the head of the museum and she found some work to do on one of the 3 other buildings on the property that are not in use. One of them is almost done – it is to be two huge bunkrooms with large bathrooms on each side. The one we were working on is also divided into two sides, but is intended as a wood working shop. The dream is to teach children to use the invasive woods to make items of use or items that can be sold in the museum. We scraped and plugged holes on once wall. It was quite a job. Alastair, meanwhile, worked in the first building using a razor to scrape paint off the windowpanes and then washing the windows. This whole camp was built by 100 boys hired by the CCC (Civil Conservation Corps) in 1934. They were paid $30 per month and had to send $21 home to their families. We quit working at 4:00 (it was getting hard to see and we had no electricity in the building) and jumped in the shower. We will make dinner soon and may have another movie night, as I don’t think people are as tired as last night. The photos today are of Dave and Alastair sitting outside due to the power outage. Dave is finishing his cocoa and Alastair is repairing the knees of his jeans. The patches let go from crawling on the forest floor yesterday. Somehow I got the hibiscus in again instead of the photo I wanted. I will try again on tomorrow's post.