July 25th - Finally, the Weather Cooperates

We made some real headway today and Sue, who drives the Kenworth has hauled at least 35 loads of rock and dirt off site to a storage area nearby where we will hold the material for backfilling once the foundation is done.

It’s difficult to lay a building out on a fairly steep hillside until the hole is dug. My plan is fairly complicated as we are adding 2 old hand hewn log cabins onto the site with all 3 joined by an addition.

Two weeks ago we hauled 2 semi-loads of reclaimed lumber from Iowa. It took me nearly a month to prepare it. Soon we will begin using it.

More bottles turned up in the digging today, but nothing as old as what we found before. Three amber Clorox bottles, a jelly jar and 2 other small bottles and some rusty metal parts that we haven’t a clue as to what they are. Dylan found 2 old marbles to add to his collection of over 150. He grew up here and has been collecting since a kid. All of his marbles were found in Rico.

I met a few more neighbors today - 2 older gentleman who are interested in the project. Duane was born and raised in Rico and is now retired. He loves old stuff just like I do and is enthusiastic about my job and seeing the bottles. There is an old outhouse that sits on the property line between my house and Annie's. Duane would love to move it and excavate the hole. The neighbor just down the street did one a few years ago and pulled out 80 nice old bottles. It's been there a while.

Mark, from the Colorado Dept of Public Health, paid a visit today and asked me about lead cleanup. Arco-(now BP) owns all the mineral rights in the valley and has, for several years now, been involved in cleaning up mine tailings all over Rico. High lead content is scattered throughout Rico and to prevent lawsuits, BP has volunteered to clean up mine tailings and put new soil on many yards. They test for lead and if the level exceeds the limits of 1100 ppm, then they come in and remove all the top soil and replace it with new soil hauled from down the river. Past tests on my property show 886-1060 ppm. It’s close enough that I will have it tested again once we are thru excavating and back filling. You can imagine what it might cost BP for the clean up here….but what the heck they can afford it…and gee we end up paying for it at the pump…

Just up the hill a block or so you can see the tailings from the Van Winkle mine and one of the old buildings now weathered dark brown by the Colorado sun. Mike is surprised that the contaminants aren’t much higher being this close to the mine. He tells me that one spot in Rico tested out at 90,000 ppm. Now that's not a place you would want to spend much time at. Two months ago when I was here tearing off the addition (pictures coming soon) on the back of the cabin, local residents were being tested for lead poisoning. So far, so good, as everyone came out fine from what I have heard.

There is a town meeting tonite about future low income housing as prices in Rico have gone sky high in the last 2 years based on speculation of what will happen in Rico once the sewer system is installed. Not having a sewer systems has crippled the growth of the downtown area. Many Rico residents are against any kind of growth, while others support it. No easy answer to any of it.

The Enterprise Bar & Grill is one of the few places open for meals in the evening and their food is great. I was at the bar with Joe and Kathy earlier this evening and it was packed with locals and out of towners as well. It reminded me of a scene from Star Wars. Kathy has talked about how many unique characters live in Rico and this nightprovided a good sampling.

technorati tags:Rico, Colorado, cabin, renovation