Monday, August 12

Beautiful day. Post office (my 6th Etsy sale), Dollar Tree, St. Vincent (found fabric), and the library to donate more books. They have a sign up that they are not taking any more books--only magazines and audio books--but Cary talked them into it! We also drove out by the lighthouse to check the water; the tide was in as expected. Since we were so close and we never had stopped, we decided to investigate the S.S. Emidio Historical Landmark.

Military history records show that the 6, 912-ton tanker was the first casualty attributed to the Imperial Japanese Navy's submarine activity on the California coast. It was attacked on December 20, 1941. 

Saturday night we watched a video called The Lightkeepers with Richard Dreyfuss. It was set in a lighthouse in Cape Cod and actually had some faithful representations of a lighthouse and keeper's duties. The banjo clock shown here doesn't look exactly like the one at Battery Point, but I am sure this is the real thing. It also showed a 4 order lens and the lightkeeper lighting it. Interestingly enough, it is not a Cape Cod style--the house is separate from the tower.

Saturday and Rain

Starting sometime after 1:00 a.m. I could hear the rain really pelting the trailer. The area really needs the moisture, but I was thinking of yard sales...it was still raining when we got up for breakfast. I got these pictures out two of the trailer windows.

Cary went for a newspaper to check for possible yard sales just in case. Only two were listed, but the rain had abated somewhat, so we headed out. The first was not only not ready for us, but we wouldn't have stopped there anyway. Pretty scuzzy looking. At the second I picked up a few things for our little girls.

Since we had lots of time and nothing else going on, we headed up to Smith River for more sales, then Harbor and Brookings. We each found a few odds and ends, but this was probably the highlight. The owner of the 1940 Ford insisted Cary sit in it and have me take his picture. He agreed!

Cary owned a '40 Ford when I met him.

By then we were hungry so we decided on Pancho's for lunch, stopped by Fred Meyer's for fuel and came home so Cary could work on the hot water heater. The rain stopped; the sky is blue. Very nice day.

Friday, August 9

This is a Coast Guard buoy tender. It was closer than it appears in this picture.

Just two hours, but one incident made the day seem a lot longer. Two young Asian men (one did not speak English) brought in a young boy about three who apparently had either never been taught how to behave or did not have the skills to behave for a medical reason. Regardless, he had no business in a facility such as the lighthouse/gift store running around screaming out of control and grabbing things. A few people walked out, declining to be in the same room with him rather than take a tour. I tried talking to just the three of them when one of the young men said he could control him. After 30 seconds it was obvious he could not. I could not talk over the child and the older men could not hear anyway. The boy got away from them, ran out of the designated tour area, even tried to go up the stairs...I had to ask them to leave. I told them they were wasting their money. As they were going out, the man asked if he could buy one of the little ships. Mia told him, "We don't reward bad behavior." If this was a medical issue such as autism, it seems they should have known this was not something the child could handle. If it was just behavior...those guys (or one of them anyway) really need to learn some lessons in discipline.

It was a beautiful day, lots of blue sky. The lighthouse is just open one hour tomorrow and we are not on the schedule. I hope there are a few yard sales!

Mia found this starfish this morning. Pretty nice!

I took this before we started work. The window on the left is over the laundry room. Mia and Dave sit at a table to eat and look out the window on the right, watching the ocean and wildlife.

Picnic table outside the back door where we enter before the tours start. You can see it is another beautiful day; this was taken about 11:45 a.m.

This evening I made my fifth Etsy sale of the trip--third piece of fabric, this one going to Maine.

Four-Hour Day

          (compare these photos to some of the ones below that I took on foggy mornings)
Another blue sky and sunshine day, so at first we didn't think we would get many visitors to the lighthouse--too nice outside to schedule time inside! Eventually people did begin to show up; we had folks from Italy, Macau and Japan and even a few from Crescent  City who had never been out to the lighthouse before. Mia and I traded off taking donations in the gift shop and leading the tour in the parlor two or three times.

Our neighbors from Tucson, Jan and Paul, stopped by too. They knew they would be here so we were not surprised. We had lunch together at the Chart Room where we caught up with them about their trip to South Africa. Paul had some wonderful photos of lions and elephants on his ipad, as well as others that he plans to share with us when we all return in September. They are staying in Brookings tonight.

Two different men paid for other people on the tours--so nice--and we gave out some of our "treasures" to the six special needs kids who parents decided not to bring them in. On the last tour a baby threw up, luckily on her dad. One baby almost got kidnapped (by me)--she was so adorable! Dad even gave her to me after the tour and she waved bye to him! But it was a different story when she saw her mom. Oh, well.

In the group from Macau, one of the ladies was trying to interpret what I said after every sentence. Because that would really have slowed things down too much I asked that she just remember it all and tell her family later. At the end of her tour she explained that she had to tell another woman in her group who only spoke Japanese what I said so she could tell her son...complicated! Never a dull moment, but we don't want any dull moments!

August 6

Another busy and fun day at the lighthouse, three working hours...pretty exhausting. Made a stop at the museum and another at Subway for lunch to bring back to the trailer.

Yesterday Cary located the plaque that has been missing for the whole month of July, the one that dedicates one of the bedrooms to the last lighthouse keeper, Wayne Piland, who was part of the lighthouse service before the service decommissioned it. He took up donations and was responsible for keeping it open as a private aid to navigation, and eventually it became part of the county museum. Today he hung it back up with double-sided tape since the screws didn't seem to hold it after the room was repainted. 

(Wayne's wife, Martha, is mentioned at the bottom of the plaque.)

August 4, Sunday and Cloudy

After two pretty warm days, today was pretty cool. We worked with Dottie and Dan again while the keepers got the day off to run errands and play tourist. Hope they had fun! Most of our tourists were great, as usual, but one guy chose to put his cell on video which was quite annoying. Cary asked him to turn it off, and he had to ask twice. It tells us he doesn't have to listen; he can listen later. That may not be the case, but it is still annoying! Up until recently the policy was always No Pictures, period, until up in the light tower. And that worked well. Last month Cary and I could enforce it quite well. We will try again.

We managed to just barely get off the island just in the nick of time as the tide started in.

Yesterday we talked to the owners of a very cute little trailer, a Terry , in the RV park. They bought it for $400, but had to strip it down to the bare metal and redo the whole interior. It turned out very nice and is perfect for their weekend getaways (they live in Grants Pass). They also are re-doing a larger old trailer, a Shasta, big enough to take their grandkids out for a trip. I think he told Cary they have three vintage trailers. 

Today I saw another vintage trailer in the Walmart parking lot. That picture will also come later It was a Serro-Scotty. I had heard of a Scotty, just not that particular model.

August 2, Our First Day...this month

We didn't need to go over today, but I saw there were only three people working and I wanted to get acquainted with the new folks anyway, so we joined them. Mia and Dave are from Carson City where my sister lives. Our hour long day became nearly two and we had to wade through water again to get back to the truck. My shoes should be dry by Monday--it was a really warm day! 

Fog greeted us on our walk over to the lighthouse.

I learned to use the computerized ticket sale system. We had tourists from Portugal, the Netherlands and Romania. Two of the last ladies to go through helped me get across the pipe we call the alligator; my balance just isn't that great good and I really appreciated their help.

After a quick lunch (and a change of jeans, socks and shoes on my part--Cary wore his galoshes), we went to the fair. We realized we were way too tired to enjoy it the way we have in the past...it was a short visit. I was proud of myself for passing by the fudge!

The arts and crafts booth--sewing, photography, kids' crafts, lots of baking displayed (so tempting...)

There was also a car show, so we spent our last bit of energy looking at the great vehicles on display.

Tonight Cary is grilling bratwurst and salmon.