Saturday, Sunday, and Monday

Twelve years I've been here and weird stuff happens all the time. So much so, that it doesn't seem weird anymore. Now when it happens Linny and I just look at each other and smile. I don't know about here but I'm thinking "I can hardly wait to see what happens next."

Jax and I didn't go hiking Saturday or Sunday morning. There was just too much outdoor maintenance and repair that I'd been avoiding to slack anymore so I had to get a bunch of that out of the way before the heat came. So on Monday morning we did a long one. Hiking out by the road to where we could see the Pot Ash plant and then hiking back along the river cliffs.

Lot of smoke in the air so fire somewhere. Even when they have the big ones out west the smoke hits us about two to three days later. Maybe it's that. I don't pay attention to the news to know.

On Saturday evening a guest emailed to say they were leaving town around 7pm. Good, I'll look for them on top of Hurrah around 8pm. Around 8pm I look up on Hurrah and see two vehicles. Good, they made it. They should be here in about 20 minutes or so. I go back to feeding critters, watering, and working on the garage. At 9pm I go inside and the phone rings. It's the guests. They say they got to the top of Hurrah Pass and met some people coming up who said there was nothing down here so they turned around and went back to town. That's the 4th or 5th time that has happened in the last couple months. I tell him whoever they talked to was obviously wrong. He says they'll drive back out if I can meet them at the Kane Creek Canyon and Hurrah Pass intersection and then follow us back.

Linny, Jax, and I drive half an hour over and down Hurrah Pass and meet them at the intersection. While the guy and I are talking there's a meltdown in the car. I can hear crying and the like. He says "Sorry." Gets in the car and drives back to town. Linny, Jax, and I all look at each other and drive half an hour back to the lodge.

Michelle calls and says she wants to come see her dog and she's leaving Sunday morning at 3:30am? I say great. Kobae is out of food and you'll save me a drive to town here's a grocery list for Kobae. On Sunday morning there's an email from our guests wanting to know if I can meet them on top of Hurrah Pass at noon? Ok, sure, whatever. I call Michelle to make sure she got Kobae food and she says she's leaving right now. I say "It's 10am, you said you were leaving at 3:30am." She says "That was the wishful thinking me, this is the reality me."

Linny takes a side by side and I take the truck since neither of us knows what's going to happen better to have more vehicles probably. When we get to the top guests are waiting and so are eight jeeps packed to the hilt saying they're going down Lockhart Basin. I talk to them and tell them when they get to the first obstacle where they have to get out and walk it to pick a line to then walk another eight hundred feet so they can see what's coming. I didn't go with them and I don't know if they made it. Guests put their kids in the side by side with Linny and followed me back down. What nice people.

Michelle shows up with a girlfriend in her pretty new Jeep, drops off Kobae food and says she's leaving to go show her friend around. Two minutes later Michelle's jeep comes back up the driveway. I'm picking up fox scat around the yard to make sure they haven't eaten one of the skunks or ringtails and I ignore the Jeep. It turns around and starts back down the driveway. That's weird. I look up and it's not Michelle or here girlfriend. Same make, same model, same year, but it's a different Jeep. I ask if I can help them and they tell me about a broke down side by side with five people in it way out in Jackson Hole and they need help and can I give them directions to Chicken Corner.

I call Linny who's working next door on the walkie and tell her I need the truck back right now. There's a nasty storm coming and I need to do a rescue in Jackson Hole before it gets to them. I get canteens, walkies, head lamps, and Linny pulls up five minutes later and half hour later Jax and I are loading them in the truck for the journey back to Base Camp. I hit the bottom of the truck hard on something and it's making a terrible noise so there's a price for rescuing so many people eventually. I called the rental company before I left and I send their stranded people down to the beach until the rental company people show up. While it's a not fun experience for the stranded people they have so much fun at the beach each time they don't seem to even mind it. They're all smiles when the rental companies get here.

Few more vehicles come up the drive way asking for directions and or to use the rest room and darkness begins to descend. The foxes are gathering and I can hear the raccoons under the porch. There's a skunk head sticking out of the hole and a ringtail waiting in the rafters above me.

Friday Hike to Two Trains

I had forgotten how spectacular the hike is.

Thursday Bedlam

In the morning Jax and I hiked with guests.

Thursday afternoon one of the funnies things I've ever seen happened. I was sitting in the office working and Jax was sleeping on the couch next to me. I had the air conditioner turned off and a slight gap in the window next to it to get a little breeze coming in. A rock squirrel was snooping around on the bench just outside the window ledge, saw the crack open in the window and came inside. I didn't move. The rock squirrel jumped down onto my desk and then onto the couch where Jax woke up and Jax and the rock squirrel were eye to eye staring at each other about a foot a part. I think Jax thought he was having a dream as he just stared at it and then he realized he was awake. For the next 30 minutes it was bedlam in the office knocking over lamps, my computer, unplugging the internet and wifi, knocking down things off the shelf as the squirrel tried to go high to avoid Jax snapping at it. I had to pull out the couch and sleeping bags and all kinds of stuff when it would run behind them. Jax got a roll of toilet paper wrapped around him and it was unraveling as he was chasing the rock squirrel around the office. I finally caught it in a trash can and took it outside where Jax chased it under the porch. Jax was exhausted as was I. It took a half our or so to put the office back together.

Wednesday Morning Hike

Front end loader tracks up on the hill. Don't know what Doug is doing other than the new hogan.

Another day of picking up trash on the trail.

Shadow of The Saddle

Jeep and Stuff

I ask Jeep to give me a thumb drive of the pictures they took here on the property when they did their April unveiling of all the 2019 models. What I got was some photo shots of it looks like the Hell's Revenge trail but they're still cool pictures. Not as cool as the purple rocks here, but cool.

On Monday I sent guests out on a side by side and shortly after they had left a voice came on the walkie talkie and said "Hello, hello, help." The guests had run across a rental side by side broke down and they didn't have cell coverage as most don't so I drove out, got them in the truck and sent them down to the beach to wait for their ride from the rental company coming out to get them and tow the vehicle in. I think this is the 4th or 5th rescue in the last week.

I see a guy broke down at the sand hill in a big truck. He says he's out of oil. I give him eight quarts, he says he'll come by and pay me for them, he doesn't. Three days later I see him out driving around and he says he forgot but unfortunately he doesn't have his wallet on him but he will. He hasn't.

Then when you're starting to lost faith in the world I get this email from Eric.

Tom,

Thank you again for giving me directions to Chicken Corners, when I was on my rented ATV a couple days ago.  I can only imagine how bothersome us tourists are to your little slice of heaven down there.  But I wanted to take a moment and thank you again, it was greatly appreciated. 

That said, I took a look around your website, and I’m going to try to figure out when to come back and stay at the lodge.  It looks like an absolutely lovely place to stay, and I’m going to make an effort to plan a future visit and stay. 

Take care, and again, my thanks.

Eric

But his point is right on the button. Four to eight times a day people pull up for directions, water, the bathroom, and curiosity. More on weekends. It's time consuming. Last week Linny and I went to town and went around to some of the larger side by side rentals companies to go over their maps that they give out and show them all the things that are wrong to hopefully cut down on the number of people that pull up. It can take a couple hours to clean a room with a constant procession of vehicles coming up the drive way for directions.

The day after going in and talking to side by side rentals agencies about what's wrong with the maps they give out and what are we going to do about people going off the roads and tearing everything up I see a vehicle at the bottom of the drive way just sitting there. After five minutes it drives over to the Last Hurrah gate and sit there for five minutes. I get in the Polaris and drive over to see what's going on. As I drive up I hear a guy say "I told you it was him. That's the guy we saw in the shop when we were checking out the side by side and he was saying he was tired of people driving up his drive way and asking for directions. I'm not asking him no matter what."

I say "Can I help you?" They both stare at me. "You want to know where you got lost and what went wrong?" He says "We don't want to bother you." I gave them directions to the Wind Caves and Chicken Corner and showed them what was wrong with their map. They were very appreciative.

I get back to the lodge and another side by side pulls up for directions. I ask who they rented it from and it's another one of the companies we went and visited and they haven't made any notations on their map and are still sending out bad ones. I give them directions and them them to tell the guy behind the counter it wasn't necessary for them to get lost if he would have given them the changes I made. He says he'll pass it on.

Three jeeps, three dirt bikes, then two more dirt bikes, all pull up and ask for directions. Then two side by sides pull up and stop at the pump house as at least one vehicle does every day. A lady jumps out and runs to the door. I yell "Please don't shit in my well. Use the bathroom in the lodge." They pull up and of course since I swore it turns out they are all part of a church group touring the back country. One after the other they file in and use the bathroom.

Tuesday morning it's check out time for the guests that tore up their vehicle and hiked six miles to get here. Linny and I, Jax, the couple, and their two large dogs all pile into the truck. In town Nations doesn't yet know what other damage there might have been besides the three flat tires. Lots of things are torn up but they don't see it perfecting performance, maybe just aerodynamics. We check with a rental agency, I drop them at a use car dealer, and then get a call from Nations saying they think if they had three more tires that they could make it home so we run over and buy three tires and head back to Nations. They fix them up and they're on their way.

Tuesday afternoon I get a text from the guests who's vehicles was mostly destroyed when they took a wrong turn getting here and had to walk six miles in the dark with two big dogs and no water.

"Thanks for all your help. We made it back in the car. We had a blast."

Land of the Skinny People

On Monday morning Jax and I and one of the guest hiked out to Land of the Skinny People.