What A Surprise!!!!!

Well its been a year this month since we moved over to BIL James four acres. The move was not that far from where we based on the other three acres for so many years. In fact his four acres are just next door. If you look close in this Google Earth photo you can see the white roof of our motorhome and the red Jeep. This is where we use to base. Now we are parked just to the right in amongst all those trees. There was a old abandoned home located there. We tore down the home and burned it several years ago. I blogged about this here http://mtnairetravlers.blogspot.com/2009_01_01_archive.html

The area where we have our full hookups and we park the MH is a circular drive that has two entrances/exits. We are parked near the top of the circle. The circular drives are lined with fourteen (seven each side) huge cedar trees on alternate sides of the driveway.
There are three cedars on one side toward the rear of the motorhome that for some reason up and died on us. We don't know if the drought contributed to their demise or perhaps their root systems were disturbed when he trenched for the sewer line. We suspect both caused them to die.

We also have another cedar tree on the passenger side that leaned pretty drastic toward the front of the motorhome. We feared if we ever got any strong winds that it just might topple over. Also another thing that really bothered me probably more was a cedar tree at certain times of the year drips a lot of sap. This sap would dry on the paint finish and was difficult to get it off. Also they shed little small needle like leaves and blue nuts that just get all over everything.

We also have four huge oak trees to our North (passenger side) that provides wonderful shade during the summer months. The largest of the four have huge large branches that reach out over the roof of the motorhome. While this provides excellent shade for our motorhome It really worried us as they have smaller limbs that snap during high winds and fall on the roof. We've been blessed thus far as nothing large has fallen that could damage or come through the roof.

To get to my point about all this rambling, BIL James, Sandy and myself have been discussing the cutting down and trimming of these trees for sometime. We all felt it would be a great undertaking and the timing would have to be when the motorhome wasn't there.
This past weekend we drove over to Canton for a couple of days to visit with some of our friends.

Monday evening Sandy received a text message from James with a picture attachment. Wow!!!! What a surprise...... that BIL of mine had removed the three dead cedars as well as the leaning cedar. Yeah!!!!!! This will also make it easier when parking the motorhome let alone keep it cleaner. They cut the cedar trees in many short lengths and plan to donate the timber to one of the local high schools that has a wood shop with wood cutting/milling equipment. They can use this timber to make different furniture pieces.

Then on Tuesday evening she received another text message with two photos attached. They showed where James had gone out and rented an articulating manlift boom with a bucket.
Articulating -boom lifts have arms that bend. Sometimes called knuckle booms, they can reach over and around obstacles to position the bucket exactly where it needs to be. They're popular in utility work where power lines, trees, and other obstacles make positioning tricky.

He used this to trim and cut back the limbs from that oak tree that had branches over hanging the motorhome. He also said they trimmed back some other limbs of the other three oaks as well as cut down several dead limbs. I don't have pictures yet but will post them as soon as we get back to base.

I've said this many times and I'll say it again James is one of the most giving person's I've ever known. I'm one lucky guy to have him for a Brother In Law. Thanks again James for all that you do for us.

Until next time. . . .MtnAire Travlers.