by Ron Foster
“That’s my plan exactly. If I can somehow stand on the ledge then we can maybe figure out a way to open it.” Donald said stepping in the stirrup LowBuck made with his hands to boost him up.
“Hell yea!” Donald said standing on the ledge and clinging to the edge of the vent windows metal frame.
“Get me a stick or broom handle or something and I can open the latch.” Donald called down.
“We got a broom in the motor home. I will be back in a minute.” Cat said hurrying towards it. “Man you ain`t going to believe this kitchen. If that big propane tank next to us has any gas in it we all set. Damn thing is big enough to run a steakhouse.” Donald said peering around as best he could.
“If you are alright up there, I will go check it out.” LowBuck said
“Yea, go have a look.” Donald said while waiting for Cat to return. “I can’t quite figure out how to read this tank gauge but we got about a 1/3 of a tank whatever that translates too.” LowBuck called out.
“Cool! That’s a big ass tank. I will figure out how much we actually got later.” Donald said excitedly as he looked at all the gleaming stainless steel ovens and ranges.
“We even got a pizza oven Bubba!” Donald said looking down at him with a big grin. “I don’t have any pepperoni but I got a couple summer sausages and hard salami. Wonder what that would taste like?” Bubba said thinking about tonight’s dinner.
“Probably damn good if you add some onions. I got chicken and beef but I doubt we see anything close to pepperoni again. I wonder how ham TVP would taste on one?” Donald mused.
“Or Taco flavor TVP might be good. Let’s have a pizza party tonight. Haven’t ever made a dough from scratch but shouldn’t be too hard.” LowBuck said and then handed up the broom Cat had brought back.
After several tries Donald finally got the latch open and then proceeded to enter the window. “Go around front and I will open the door.” Donald said as he entered the window and stepped into the sink below.
Kind of spooky but exciting to be creeping around in here. Nobody is home but he wasn’t letting his guard down.” Donald thought as he exited the kitchen and entered the cafeteria.
“Probably could seat 75 or more folks in here. Cool, lot easier doing one big community meal instead of several individual dinners. Ah you’re kidding me! “Donald thought as he exited the cafeteria and saw` what looked like a sort of boy scout supplies and convenience store. Most of the shelves were empty but there was still a lot of crap in there. Damn the door was locked. Oh, well see about it later.” Donald mused as went down the hall and entered the lodge’s main room and went to open the front door.
“Fancy digs!” LowBuck said as he entered the main lobby with its great fireplace and reception area. “We need to check that front desk and administration for some keys” Donald said “That looks like a key box next to that picture.” Janice said pointing at a green metal box next to a picture in back of the reception desk.
“I think you are right. Hope it’s not locked.” Donald said and walked over and tried it. “Damn, it is locked. Got to be a mangers office around here somewhere maybe there is a key to it. It doesn’t matter much though I can just take a crowbar to it if not.” Donald said.
“Managers office this way.” Cat called from the hall before entering it and beginning to pull out drawers in the desk.
“Got some keys!” Cat called out before everyone got there.
“Try them out!” Janice said excitedly. Cat put first one then another key in the lockbox until finally success! They had the keys to their little prepper kingdom.
“Hey we better tell Michael and Amy we got keys in case they decide to force a lock.” Bubba said heading for the front door.
“What the hell? Come here you all, you got to see this.” LowBuck said laughing
“What is it?” Cat said hurrying his way with the rest of the group to the door. The group looked stunned for a second as they watched Michael and Amy apparently having a lawnmower race of some kind towards them. Damn weird looking lawnmowers. They had LPG tanks on them and you stood in back of them to drive. Looked like a chariot race almost.
“What did you find?” Donald called out as they got closer.
“A new form of transportation.” Michael said grinning as he and Amy shut down their machines.
“Cool, was it open?” Donald said waving the keys. “Is now, I used my Kabar knife on the padlock hasp. Didn’t know we had keys. What’s cool about it is they got 3 spare tanks for each of four of these!” Michael exclaimed.
“No shit? I am going to build a trike out of one then, hell with mowing the lawn I am going to make some new transport” LowBuck said getting interested.
“I was thinking the same thing” Michael responded. “There is a barn back there also. They must have had horses here at one time. We can unload the horses now and get them settled in.” Amy said to Cat.
“Wow this place just gets better and better!” Cat replied smiling. “Hey if you guys want to check in your cabins I can give out some keys?” Janice said and proceeded back in the door to go to the registration desk and pretend to be a check in clerk.
The camp had 15 cabins and a staff dorm. Now where were they going to all choose to stay was the main topic of conversation. “Let’s all stay in the main building tonight. I will figure out how we going to power those cabins tomorrow unless somebody want to borrow one of the small solar units and have a cabin. We move that SUNRNR in the lodge now, then we can have fans, lights and a movie tonight as well as some ice and do a pizza party.” Donald suggested.
“That sounds like a plan “That sounds like a plan. We settle in and unload tomorrow. We can drag some mattresses in from those cabins for tonight. We need to heel in those fruit and nut trees until we get to them.” Michael responded
"Heeling-in" is a technique for storing bare-root fruit trees if you are unable to plant them right away. There are times when we gardeners simply run out of time to properly plant everything in the garden that we bought or in this case needed to transplant.
If you are heeling in plants in the summer, they can be left in the trench for about a month. If you are heeling in plants for the winter, they can be left in the trench for the winter, but should be dug up as soon as possible in the spring for their permanent planting. Basically all it entails is digging a shallow trench deep enough to cover the roots and placing the trees in the trench at about a 45 degree angle and filling it in with dirt.
“That won’t take us long if we all pitch in. LowBuck drive your motorhome around to the back of that little shed if you would. Michael said it looks like the camp used it for a garden area at one time.” Donald said getting ready to do some quick and necessary work to protect the precious trees and seedlings.
“No problem, I might just leave the motorhome over there. There is a couple of those park shelters with concrete tables I can see from here and a power pole I might be able to rig up that homemade marine alternator windmill I got. What do you think?” LowBuck said surveying the fields and trails that made up the recreation area for the facility.
“Yea leave it there until you pick your new quarters and we unload some stuff out of it. It’s not far from the building and we can keep an eye on it easy enough. There aint no double beds in any of the cabins, just them old wooden bunk beds and not much room. You would actually have the best living setup until we make some changes for everyone’s comfort around here.” Donald told him.
“I think it wouldn’t be a bad idea. That motor home sticks out like a sore thumb in the parking lot and it’s hard to see around. It would look like your just camping out over there. Hey Donald does this place have any RV hookups? I bet it does. Michael queried and then went over to the plastic box on the reality sign and got a brochure.
“I don’t remember but I think your right. Hey cool, grab me and LowBuck one of those pamphlets. “Donald said heading towards him.
The brochure was quite informative as to what amenities remaine
d with the summer camp. The map of the place showed them they had their own little Shangri la of a lake with campsites. Two small piers, a floating swimming platform.
“Swimming! That’s the ticket!” Donald thought.
“Hey folks, just found out we got us a swimming area with a poured sand beach.” Donald said excitedly.
Everyone was feeling kind of grungy and Janice`s ride with the goats hadn’t helped any.
“Can we go swimming?” Janice said grinning ear to ear “Place seems safe enough but we got too many preps to guard to all go swimming at once. We need to check out the swim area for safety first and then do it in shifts. Hey Amy, check out this brochure. There are riding trails here but no telling what condition they are in now.” Donald said handing the glossy flyer to her.
“Me and Michael can heel in those trees and LowBuck can sit guard for you all while you swim some. Then you all can swap out and someone come back to relive us from guard duty.” Donald offered.
“Darn! Be more fun if we all went.” Amy groused
“Yea, well maybe someday, just not right now.” Michael replied giving her an affectionate pat.
“Hey Janice let me talk to you a minute.” Donald said motioning her aside. “Janice, don’t scare the hell out of yourself or anyone else but look for signs of gators before you all go swimming. Remember Eufaula?” Donald said in a low voice.
“Oh shit, you mean they should have called it Gator Point? Yea, I remember. There won’t be any alligators around here though I don’t think. It’s rare to hear about one on this lake even in the swampy sloughs the lake drains into.” Janice said looking very concerned.
“I doubt there will be any, but not far from here we got one that migrated into the pond of our Boy Scout summer camp pond so just heads up. You already know from being raised on the lake about Water Moccasin and Poisonous Copperhead snakes so look out for everyone. Don’t let them be reaching under a canoe to turn it over etc. These folks don’t know the nature laws of the lake yet and everything from old fish lines with hooks to not wiping their butt with poison ivy or oak needs to be taught to them.” Donald said confidently.
“I got ya! I will keep a close eye on your Ma too. When is the last time she ever went swimming?” Janice asked.
“Oh hell, as far as I know it’s been 40 years.” Donald replied looking over at his Mom with concern. “I doubt she packed a swimsuit Donald. You better get Catharine or us girls to find her something suitable if she wants to get in.” Janice told him.
“Get Catharine to talk to her. They relate well. Mom is not that steady on her feet and walking on pond bottom might not make sense. Catharine and you can decide if you want to humor her into taking a dip. We still got 4 hours of daylight so hang one of those solar showers up and offer that to her if she doesn’t want to go wading.” Donald said relived to give up the chore of looking out for his parent to somebody else for a while that could probably do it better.
“Don’t worry Donald, we will take good care of her and I will check the lake out myself before anyone goes jumping in.” Janice said and gave his arm a playful squeeze and went back to the happily chatting group.
Hey LowBuck, see if you can get that hound of yours to do a dog paddle or two.” Michael recommended.
“Get them dogs of yours in too!” LowBuck fired back grinning. “I guess everyone going to get a good wash-down today. Amy take junior and I will bring Scruff and Melissa dogs down later. Hell take the goats.” Michael said poking fun at Janice.
“I meant them big old pontoon feet of yours Michael.’ LowBuck chided him to Janice’s evident pleasure LowBuck had sorta of supported her with a humorous jibe.
“Well wash them skids of yours anyway, we got to share a bunkhouse tonight.’ Michael laughed back
“Enough now you two, come on Michael let’s get about our task.” Donald said chuckling at the banter. .
35
INTRUDERS
The swim and pizza party was a major success. Clean clothes and clean bodies had greatly revitalized the little group. Spirits were high and the future looked bright. Catharine was having her patience tried by attempting to teach Donald’s mother how to run a computer but you would never know it. What a resource they still had even without the internet. Donald had encyclopedias, Atlases, those prepper CD`s with 100`s of manuals, and the entire Netflix looking library of DVD movies that he and LowBuck had plus what was stocked in the store at the camp. Because of the fantastic SUNRNR solar generator they could watch a movie, bake bread, pump water, shine some lights, run a few fans or access on the laptop the answers to most questions to name just a few things that no other survivors but them possessed or had access to these days. A pretty good selection of paperback books completed their library on various skills as well as fictional reading to pass the time.
The survivalists had already fallen into a routine of guard duty and odd sleeping schedules. First watch was Janice and Cat tonight. 4 hours on, 4 off in hot zones. Pretty much regular sleep if the number of folks to stand duty were relaxed enough to service the need. The radios needed charging tonight so Donald had offered a simple commo solution of a few tugs on a rope for the guards to communicate with. Janice was at the far right corner of the main building in the front and Catharine was at the far back left corner of the building. Any cause for alarm was communicated through a few jerks on a line to alert the other post to be on high alert.
If it had not been so oppressively hot and humid they would of cranked up the fireplace for its light and ambiance. As it was. Two fans, a computer and a string of LED lights was getting plenty of power from the innovative SUNRNR solar generator and this was a blessing beyond belief. Donald had been kidded that his little portable mini grid setup was a prepper extreme no one but him could of pulled off, but it was all in fun. Jealousy or coveting preps didn’t exist in this little prepper group, it was combined assets and by the grace of God and a great corporation`s benevolence Donald had managed to acquire a unit. Having your own off grid set up these days with a lap top computer was tantamount to having your own Professor Einstein at your disposal. you were left with unlimited possibilities to add technology to an austere life.
The two girls were on guard duty as the sun began to go down and the rest of the group was gathered in the main lodge and just kicking back after a full day of activities.
Janice was already bored after the first hour of standing watch. She could wander out of the classroom she was posted in some and she had popped out for a moment to see if anyone felt like keeping her company for a bit. Catharine said she would be around shortly after the coffee finished brewing on the StoveTec and bring her some.
Everybody was pretty laid back and lax about security because there was no indication of any threats in the immediate area.
Oh shit! Hang on what was that? There were flashlights shining around the back of LowBucks motorhome. She couldn’t tell how many but it looked like at least three.
YANK! YANK! Cat felt on her rope. “Oh hell! Cat thought as she fumbled with her shotgun and began moving about her classroom peering over the windowsills for any movement.
“Janice felt the one yank on the rope
ackno2wledgement on the rope from Cat and scanned both the incoming road and the lights in back of the motorhome.
They must be trying to break in it she thought.
“What do you have? Donald said staying low and rushing into the room his AR at the ready.
“Flashlights in around the back of the motorhome.” Janice replied trying to get a better look. “Everyone’s in the main hall so it aint any of us poking around.” Donald said crouching down next to her and having a look for himself.
“How long they been out there?” Donald asked. “I am not sure, I was only gone a few minutes and noticed them when I got back. I have been watching them only a few minutes. They are not moving around much. Whoever it is must be trying to get in the side door. “Janice said.
“Keep an eye on them but no
shooting. LowBuck and I will go out the backdoor and try to sneak up on them.” Donald told her.
“Oh Donald do you have to go out there? Why not just fire off a warning shot? Janice suggested.
“That’s not a bad idea but I don’t warn off or shoot at what I don’t know what it is first.” Donald responded. Michael and Catharine are in the main hall. Fallback there if you need to.” Donald told her and then was off to check with Cat before he and LowBuck snuck out the backdoor.
“Anything moving Cat?” Donald whispered to her from the hallway.
“I can’t see anything in this dark. What’s going on?” Cat asked in a hushed voice. “”Janice saw some lights over by your motorhome. I am going to get LowBuck and sneak out the backdoor and check them out. Hang tight unless Janice signals you to come.” Donald said moving back down the hall.
“Ok LowBuck saddle up we going out back, there are lights moving around in back of your motorhome.” Donald said while turning off several of the indoor lights they had on.
“Michael come lock us out.” Donald said moving towards the backdoor.
“Bubba and Donald crept up to the corner of the building and Donald looked towards the motorhome.
“See anything?” LowBuck whispered
“Yea. Two dang fools sneaking up on some solar lights. That be us LowBuck.’” Donald said relived. “Who hung up the lights? Wasn’t me.” LowBuck said stepping out and observing a few lights swinging in the breeze and hanging a few inches from his roof.
“I bet when we unloaded those trees we either accidently turned them on or I never turned them off. They are my solar LED garden lights; they come on at night and off at dawn.” Donald said laughing.
“Let’s go give everyone the all clear before we go turn them off. That was kind of hairy there for a moment. I don’t blame Janice for the false alarm, damn sure looked like some folks waving flashlights around for a minute.” LowBuck concluded.