"I seem to be standing in a clearing in the woods somewhere between Allerton Abbey and Ant Village.
The snow partially mutes everything, helps make the distant road noise sound a little bit like the ocean.
The blue sky is just visible through puffs of white, pink, and gray clouds. A few snowflakes are lazily spinning, floating, and falling towards the snow-covered earth. The trees all around, mostly doug firs with a few ponderosa pines mixed in, wear floppy berets and chef hats of snow, and some of them are bowing under their snowy burden.
A network of paths criss cross through the clearing. Turkey tracks, deer hoof prints, rabbit paw prints, and my own boot prints. Long dried up and frozen, a scattering of knapweed plants boldly hold their seed pod heads above the snow.
Near the tree line, where the snow is less thick, some grasses and small shrubs, maybe snowberry, are visible. Not far away, a mature saskatoon shrub, more of a small tree really, stalwartly bears the weight of its snowload even as it sits in the shade of towering evergreens that monopolize the limited winter sunlight.
The sun has long since set behind the mountains, and the sky has lost it's pink tinges of sunset, leaving only shades of light grays overlaid on the swiftly darkening blue."
And here's another:
"I seem to be standing outside in the darkness of the night.
The sky above is moonless, starless, a steely gray. The earth below is pale snow reflecting the grayness. Black trees divide sky and earth.
The air is crisp and cold and sharp. My breath, clouds of steam, flows forth from my nostrils like smoke from a dragon.
I shine a light that pierces through the darkness and the snow explodes into glittering crystals, a field of sparkling stars."
And another:
"I seem to be standing on top of a hill somewhere in Montana in the middle of winter.
The sun has set behind the mountains, but across the valley higher peaks are catching the last of the evening light.
Thousands of tiny insects, black specks, hop around in the snow just in front of me. I'm always amazed that these little guys can survive in this weather.
Mullein and lamb's quarters and knapweed plants stick up out of the snow, having done all they could to spread their seed. Some deciduous shrubs, maybe saskatoon, and the evergreen trees are taking a longer view."
I didn't follow the schedule very closely, and I didn't even earn all the achievements I was planning. Still hoping my sour kraut turns out all right. Maybe next workshop we'll cover knot-tying, plant identification, and sharpening in a bit more depth. Also I didn't finish crafting the achievement medals, (it seemed a little silly to give them to myself,) but I did practice some archery.
This 40lb bow was a gift from my Dad, (thanks Dad!) and it came in handy this summer and fall supplementing Sir Chops' diet with fresh chipmunks. I'm down to 4 arrows, so I just based the archery achievement around taking 4 shots at a time.
The Amateur Archer Achievement: Hit an 18"x12" target at least 4/4 times at 15ft, 3/4 times at 30ft, 2/4 times at 45ft, and 1/4 times at 60ft. (Worth 1 Sheep)
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bullseye from 15 feet
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60 feet away, lucky if I can hit the target at all
Thank you, Jocelyn, for supporting Ava on Patreon! And thank you again for a delightful dinner! Getting a super gourmet meal and the opportunity to shower once a week hugely improves my quality of life!
Beef stew, salad, and fruit salad, and also Sharla made banana muffins! So good!
Paul donated some more firewood for the upcoming Abbey thermal inertia experiment. Thanks Paul!
I finally finished hanging the rest of the pork. It's been buried in salt for a while now and waiting for me to hang it up. These cuts weren't as pretty, but they'll sure be pretty delicious in a couple years when we get around to eating them.
I read from day one till now in the past 24 hours.It was a real pleasure.I have to give being a gapper a go after reading your experience at wheaton labs. hopefully i will be to the labs sometime around may if the gapper program is still up and running! thanks for all of your posts i hope they do you as much good as they did for me.
Justin Rhodes 45 minute video tour of wheaton labs basecamp
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