Lumber Logs and Firewood Cutting Trip Back To The Forest

Winter is nearing and the wet weather is inbound this week so I had to go for a load of logs yesterday. I was planning on Tuesday but then I remembered I have my chiro appointment so I had to go. I got everything loaded up, the trailer hooked up, and I was on the road about 8:30. Of course I got stopped by the train...

An hour and a half later I was heading up Deadman's Creek road and the horrible washboard at the bottom.

The forest was littered with people. Wood cutters or hunters were at every camp site and I had to go around a number of people parked in the road cutting wood.

Made the obligatory stop at my tree and holy crap have the asshole cows destroyed the road. Probably the same assholes that made me crash. They have been dust bathing and have turned the road to a pile of very fine powder and a deepening wallow in the middle of the road right by the corner.

I made the drive out to hunting camp where I got wood last week but I did not find the old hatchet hammer I dropped. So I went back out to the stand of lodge pole I was to cut from.

Soon I was mashing through the brush and over the logs cutting tons of 12+ foot lengths. I dropped a few standing dead which gave me some heavier logs.

The stand had been burned out at one point years ago and there is so much dead fall I could build a mansion out of it all.

I cut up the hill in an area about 100 feet diameter and after a bit less than an hour I had enough lengths to start loading the trailer.

I drug, stood and flipped, and moved all the logs down hill in a couple channels. I loaded all the ones from down the road and moved up to load the rest. I had to move my truck so a hunter in a jeep could get past.

About 45 minutes later I had the big load of logs loaded onto the trailer.

It was a seriously heavy load and super long. The trailer was really tail heavy.

I had the bed of the truck to fill still so on the way down the road I stopped at this lodge pole that had blown over. The top was still green so it was a live tree and still really heavy wood.

I cut it into rounds then lugged them all over to the truck.

It filled up the bed pretty nicely with enough room for the tools still.

So on I went down the road towards the highway.

This time the washboard was little problem as the logs didn't move at all.

I got to the highway and THAT is where the shit got real. I had WAY too little tongue weight and the trailer would start to fishtail if I went over 40mph. I got about 5 miles and had to pull over to reset the logs. I kicked a bunch of them forward and managed to get an okay weight on the tongue. Still not exactly enough but I made it work....

I could go a MAXIMUM of 55mph while keeping the trailer straight behind the truck. 60 mph and the trailer began to fishtail and if I didn't address it instantly it would become violent. The fishtail is a harmonic that builds and only needs to be interrupted to stop it. I would slam on the brakes then slam on the gas and the trailer would stop wallowing side to side and track straight again. The wallowing trailer kept EVERYONE back on the highway. I never pulled over for people to go by but would move over to the side of the road to give them more space to pass. For once I was THAT GUY messing with traffic flow.

I was REALLY happy to make it home in one piece. My arms and hands were rather sore from the white knuckle driving and my body was destroyed from the loading. I still had to unload the wood though.

I dragged the 12 foot pallet over and dropped it to pile the larger logs on. The smaller sized ones just got tossed to the side and I will pile them later.

The trailer came off and I backed the truck to the yard where I tossed the rounds out. They will have to get stacked under the cover in place of the lodgepole lengths so they can cure over winter.

I was barely able to make it through the evening I was and still am so sore. Soaking was nice and helped my aching body some.

Thankfully I have my chiro appointment this morning which will help my poor body. Weather is coming and I have so much to do around the farm still. Potatoes really need to start coming out of the ground and garlic has to get planted.