Update On The Old Homestead

I woke up this morning to the first winter snow on the mountains surrounding my old homestead tucked away in some isolated valley in the middle of nowhere. In Alaska we call this “termination dust” and is always seen as a wake up call that winter is fast approaching. A year ago I posted a thread lamenting how behind I was on my projects due to some big life events and work projects on the homestead that took up way too much of my time last year. What a difference a year makes!

Last years foundation work on the cabin allowed me to more than double the size of the cellar. I now have a 10 foot deep cellar measuring 14 feet by 20 feet. I am just now finishing the shelving, but the freezer, gun safe, and long term food preps were the first things I set up. We are filling the freezer with mostly wild berries and moose. Some of the other shelving can wait until winter so I can maximize my time outside.

I had a failing culvert that I replaced with the help of my other year round homesteader borrowing his excavator. While I had his excavator, I widened the road in some problematic areas to prevent large snow berms. The wife and I have been spending some time pulling up large rocks and doing repairs on the road to reduce the damage to our plows. I just bought one of those $6,000 bercomax snowblowers this year. The snows the past few years have been deep and you can only push snow so much before you run out of space to put it. The plan is to push the frequent 1-3 inch snows with the plow and use the snowblower for the deep stuff. This should make a big difference this year.

We added another couple miles to our private trails behind our homestead. I was heavy into this work when Sourdough lost his neighbor to a brown bear doing the same task. I have a healthy respect for bears, so this weighed heavy on my mind. Regardless, once the trails were finished, we were able to harvest firewood enough for our homestead and my house in Palmer that my son lives at. We have run out of places to store it, but have probably 15 chords put away. I was able to have the time to also clear a two mile trail to a set of cabins owned by a elderly Native American who settled the place back in the 1960 but moved to the lower 48 a decade ago when he and his wife got too old to live there. He says I can use them if I keep an eye out on it and keep people away from it. It’s been two years since I’ve been out there, but everything was ship shape and no signs of trouble. These are part of my fall back cabins. Plenty of firewood to hold up there if need be. Working on this was good training for my 14 month old beagle learning what the various scents are. Like my previous dog, I am training him to act differentially around bear scents. He is real good not to wonder, and tends to circle around us on the look out when we are working. It’s great to have the extra set of eyes and an excellent nose.

Due to COVID, I stayed away from the crowds and didn’t go to Dillingham for my annual fish harvest. Compensating by adding more moose meat and large trout that are abundant in the lakes around the area.

I still have put off adding a whole house generator. Most of my preps have been to be able to sustain myself without electricity, so I want to be careful. Ideally, if I can burry a large 300-400 pound propane tank, this might work with our cold winters. I have a smaller generator that can keep the freezer cold, so this is low on my priorities. I have what I need to do well without electricity.

The garden has produced in great abundance with everything we tried. Kale, spinach, lettuce, radishes, carrots, a host of herbs, and a variety of potatoes. The carrots and potatoes should last until May in the new expanded cellar. I will add a new greenhouse before next spring and have the spot picked out. Our “makeshift” greenhouse for this spring will be a vegetable and herb garden. I saw posts on an Alaskan forum of Alaskan grown corn on the cob that I may try for next year. When we ran out of space for our seed potatoes, what we didn’t give away, we just stuck them in the ground in various spots around the homestead. Even with zero maintenance this summer, every one of those produced. We are leaving our potato beds in place for perhaps another week with the first killing frost. It got down to 34 this morning, so it won’t be long.

Fate has been good, allowing us to shore up security. We live on an isolated stretch of road. Originally, there were two homesteaders, one on the southern side of the road, and one on the northern side. The homesteader on the southern side is still there, and he owns all the land allowing access to the valley. The homesteader on the northern side, subdivided and sold in the 1980. I have the original home and have purchased several of the other parcels. Now there are only three owners who control the access to the mountain on the northern side. They live out of state and summer on their property. This summer we worked out a deal where we are swapping our individual, none connected parcels so we each have larger fully intact parcels. None of the other owners have access to my private trails. One of the owners share my road access to the highway, and the other has their own access. But with now only four owners with fully intact parcels who control access to a vast amount of wilderness, we now have a land ownership to make our firm pact of allowing no outsiders access has teeth. We own all the land between two large creeks with steep ravines. While someone could go through the hassles of fording a stream getting wet, and having to scale some steep ravines, most wouldn’t. I’m feeling pretty good about this.

A plus is one of the out of state owners are both good bush pilots and they keep one of their planes at a private runway about 30 minutes from our place. Maybe next summer I can start working on my license to fly. The wife is not a fan of adding new risks to our lives, but the possibilities of survival greatly increase if you can disappear into the wilderness.

 

Do you intend to operate from their runway & park your plane at their place?

 

There is no suitable terrain for a runway near our place. The plane would need to be stored on property with a private runway. There isn’t a commercial airport anywhere near us.

 

Its actually advantageous for your security being away from commercial airport. But as you had stated its 30 minutes drive from your place to that private runway, that quite a distance during any contingency. BTW is it a runway (tarmac) or just an airstrip (grass / dirt)?

What plane you currently have or intend to have?

 

It’s a grass/dirt runway. There are only a few old homesteaders between us and the runway, so we won’t have to deal with people in route to the runway.

 

I am glad to see there is two of us on here devising a plan for an escape aircraft . Though we both live in a rural area , can see an overwhelming army possibly entering the territory . An evacuation I see as a remote need but a prepper has the mind set to prepare for all contingencies . Actually I think I will start a thread on this .

 

Poltergeist, my bug out plans from my bug out location includes the use of my feet, ATV, snow machine, and RV. Adding air mobility would be a game changer.

 

My group is looking at several possibilities for our own secluded air strip for taking off the ground . " all close " . Depending on the situation we are cataloging different earth touch down possibilities on secluded air strips . Also taking into consideration the survivability of the fall back position , the airplane may land at .--- And I agree Sourdough about the only thing that would cause us to execute such a plan is a full military invasion from a foreign country .

 

Well as to airstrips sounds like a, or a few well maintained hayfield(s) could be a good camoflage. Few people near us that have private planes and the one guy did that. Came in and built his new house and his hanger off the edge of a hay field then he had the field flattened and smoothed with a drag pan and grader and then seeded it and in the summer he keeps the main area mowed shorter and the rest on the sides and ends are cut and bailed like a rgular field. Now I don't fly or know much about it but I'm assuming even if grass wasn't cut in the landing area the ground being smooth and flat would go a long way to landing on a field. Most people driving by would think anything other than it's a field.