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Pensacola Discussion Forum » General Discussion » 40th anniversary party Sunday

40th anniversary party Sunday

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Sal
knothead
2seaoat
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140th anniversary party Sunday Empty 40th anniversary party Sunday 6/3/2016, 3:27 pm

2seaoat



We just got a great canopy tent for the deck which has these ten foot high ceilings with a cool crown vent with mosquito netting. We have put up three canopies, but the one on the deck is really cool and we will enjoy the same after the party. It looks like over seventy people. Some I have not seen in twenty years. We rented a couple golf carts to let people tour the islands, and we have ours which has the back seat which allows four people on the cart.

My brother in law has a 30 foot pontoon boat with some type of new fangled electric motor......we are hoping he will be able to give the kids rides as we sold all the boats in 2014 when it became apparent I could not take care of them. I just finished leveling and putting gravel on our main Causeway I installed in 2010 and it had flood damage. I will take some photos of what I consider my Northern memorial, as we are on hold on the Southern memorial. It is just a striking natural area. We had a couple people fishing the shoreline from bass boats and I was cutting grass this afternoon, and they were catching walleye and channel cat.......

knothead

knothead

It's gonna be a fantastic gathering for you Mr. Oats . . . . . . continue to wish you and your family the very best . . .

2seaoat



Thanks......I took the dog out for a run, and took some photos.....the place is looking stunning. I saw an American Pelican, heard the screech of a hawk, saw some heron catching fish, saw tons of baby geese and baby ground hogs, and saw fish jumping and cumulus clouds framing the most delightful day, as a happy dog ran close to two miles and jumped in the river......no rolling in stuff today, so a happy wife.

Now I am having difficulty with the phone transferring the photos......eventually I will post the same.

2seaoat



This tree is very unique. We have been doing prairie burns in the early spring. This maple tree has two slender legs which support it and is entirely open in the middle. Apparently, in one of our burns the innards caught on fire, yet it still is quite healthy and when looking at its crown, it looks normal. You can look right through it to see the river.
[img]40th anniversary party Sunday Tree10[/img]

2seaoat



Last year during a spring drought, I was able to take the bobcat to low areas and scoop up young maple trees where whirlybirds the year before had landed in the mud of those low spots. I would find a spot in the meadows and I would dig a bucket of dirt and then take it over to the river bottom and built a ramp with the dry soil which allowed me to bucket up the young trees and carry them back to the hole I dug in the meadow. They are all doing great this year, but again we have not had a flood......the floods destroy any tree not three or four years old.
[img]40th anniversary party Sunday Young_10[/img]

Sal

Sal

40th anniversary party Sunday Tree10

Sal

Sal

40th anniversary party Sunday Young_10

Joanimaroni

Joanimaroni

Enjoy and post some pictures for us.

2seaoat



I will be posting photos for the next couple weeks because the beauty of the islands are stunning right now. This photo is atop our main causeway where my wife and I build it up three feet using (2) three foot diameter concrete pipe laying about 25 16 foot pipe over about 80 foot channel. This photo is looking east. The gap between the two islands is the main channel, and in the 1840s an incredibly important thing happened on the land on the other side of the channel. My wife will explain more after I am gone, but the area still pretty much looks like it did in the 1850s, and some of the homes in town still have original logs from cabins which were built at the time. Our house was built about 150 years ago, and has been added to, and actually in the 1960s the entire house was moved to its present location and has modern concrete blocks for a foundation and vinyl on the exterior. The beams are rough cut in the basement and our kitchen floor is uneven as the kitchen was probably added over a hun
dred years ago. There are some incredible homes in town, with settlers who fought in the revolutionary war where their homes have been restored from the 1850s, and one still has a pull and string bell for the front door.

Our house had a famous person who owned it in the 50s and there are many other famous people who lived here since the 1830s, and when I read the history books even in the 1850s and 60s people would take a small steam paddleboat to come up the main channel and picnic on the islands. It really is a piece of chit house with few things being square, and rather small, but the beauty of the river......unmatched in my life.
[img]40th anniversary party Sunday River10[/img]

Sal

Sal

40th anniversary party Sunday River10

2seaoat



Thanks Sal.   I am trying to build a base for a road in a low area on the biggest island.  In high water, you get cut off from the north end of the island.  When I get sandy clay from 3c Salter in Milton, the clay and sand make an incredible base for roads.  However, in Illinois on these islands the soil is deep rich organic soil with not as much sand content or clay content, but rich organic black soil.  So to build the base up, I get dirt by cutting spaces to the river which allows you to fish or walk down to water level.   I simple cut the soil out and start compacting it on my roadbed.  However, because of the high organic count, you need to get limestone gravel usually in the three inch to six inch as your base on top of the dirt.  You then follow with a thin layer of two inch gravel, then followed by fine sand and small gravel which compacts and fills the two prior layers which are floating on that organic material.

When the river floods that organic material becomes mush, and you have to avoid driving on the road.  However, floods leave deposits of usually about an inch over the gravel.   This causes grass to grow, and in floods more deposits are caught by the vegetation.

Well, I take the bobcat and scrap back those deposits on my gravel roads every four years or so, but what I have discovered is a whole history of those who were here before.   I find roadbeds a foot, and two foot below the current surface where alluvial deposits have caused the islands to grow in some spots and disappear in others.   When I made this cut with the bobcat, it was interesting to see what material was used and when the roads were built.  When you uncover the road the gravel looks like I put down the road a year ago, but there is a high likelihood the road is over a hundred years old.

Here is one of the cuts I am making to the river and where I found two roadbeds.
40th anniversary party Sunday <a href=40th anniversary party Sunday Cut10" />

Oh, and that is Wima looking for baby groundhogs. She has killed two and we yell at her to stop, but the instinct of a dog is incredible. The other day one of the baby groundhogs held is ground and did not run or give an inch.....Wilma backed off and howled and barked, but her instincts were that this one was going to give her a fight.

2seaoat



[img]40th anniversary party Sunday Causew10[/img]
This causeway was built in 2010.  I have just layered the surface with two inch gravel, and then what they call ca 6 which is fines and less than 1 inch gravel.  When I run the rubber tracked bobcat over the roadbed it compresses those fines.   I had to do this because we are going to have people park on the islands and walk over the causeway to the house and there are some 70 year olds who could easily have slipped on the bigger gravel which had been exposed from the last flood.  The diameter of the tubes under this causeway are eight feet and there are five of the large tubes.  This causeway had a foot of water over it about four times since I built it......scary process building it as the tubes were huge averaging 22 feet long and eight foot in diameter......not that heavy for my equipment, but hard to handle when you are putting them down in moving water.   With the knowledge I have now I would have built it differently.

1340th anniversary party Sunday Empty Re: 40th anniversary party Sunday 6/3/2016, 10:28 pm

knothead

knothead

Please continue posting images of your paradise Mr. Oats, I love nature and appreciate your dedication to preserving something of substance for your heirs!

1440th anniversary party Sunday Empty Re: 40th anniversary party Sunday 6/3/2016, 10:53 pm

Joanimaroni

Joanimaroni

40th anniversary party Sunday Causew11

RealLindaL



Hearty congrats on the anniversary and the successful outcome of all your hard work and planning up there.  Hope things go great on Sunday - let us know.   Hearty hugs to your wonderful wife as well.

2seaoat



In all my life the luckiest thing which ever was bestowed on me was the guy upstairs blessing me with this wonderful woman.  I am so thankful she had two older brothers who would tease her and play rough with her because she ended up being one tough lady.  It is not easy being my spouse, and she has the sympathy from all my family, her family, all our friends about the burden she has carried for forty years......but she has a twinkle in her eye as I have taken her on quite an adventure on facebook, where she has hundreds of former students and friends which track her latest adventure.  After I die there will be a line around the block chasing her.......she tells me I have done the husband thing.....I am done with that......a strong intelligent beautiful woman.....why I got so lucky, I will never get it, but I think it is humor and intelligence and this rare ability to put a pit bull on a leash, and hold that leash in such a way that the pit bull never understands who is in control.

Joanimaroni

Joanimaroni

2seaoat wrote:In all my life the luckiest thing which ever was bestowed on me was the guy upstairs blessing me with this wonderful woman.  I am so thankful she had two older brothers who would tease her and play rough with her because she ended up being one tough lady.  It is not easy being my spouse, and she has the sympathy from all my family, her family, all our friends about the burden she has carried for forty years......but she has a twinkle in her eye as I have taken her on quite an adventure on facebook, where she has hundreds of former students and friends which track her latest adventure.  After I die there will be a line around the block chasing her.......she tells me I have done the husband thing.....I am done with that......a strong intelligent beautiful woman.....why I got so lucky, I will never get it, but I think it is humor and intelligence and this rare ability to put a pit bull on a leash, and hold that leash in such a way that the pit bull never understands who is in control.
How proud she must be!

1840th anniversary party Sunday Empty Re: 40th anniversary party Sunday 6/4/2016, 10:25 am

ZVUGKTUBM

ZVUGKTUBM

I hope you have a great anniversary event tomorrow, Seaoat!

BTW, has the Corps of Engineers and State of Illinois permitted all of your alterations to Waters of the State?  Dredging and filling, etc. are something property-owners should not engage in without input from appropriate regulatory bodies.

It is a beautiful location.....

http://www.best-electric-barbecue-grills.com

1940th anniversary party Sunday Empty Re: 40th anniversary party Sunday 6/4/2016, 11:04 am

2seaoat



In Illinois you have a triple form which you fill out for the Army Corps, Illinois Department of Resources, and Illinois environment. In addition, the county you live in gives you a floodplain work permit. I had to hire an engineer who drew up detailed plans.....about 3k. It ended up in the middle of the project a flood blew away our concrete work and we took huge hits, and I decided to change the design and basically built it according to my plan as I went out and found the five big tubes and put about fifty 3 x 6 concrete blocks in the causeway and completed it. It was just my wife and I who built it. She would work the chains, and I worked the excavators, bobcat, and lull. We had people in town just get lawn chairs and watch me work. The old timers were saying it would never survive a flood or ice flow.......it was the talk at the local gas station where people gather over their coffee. The Army corps then became a dick because my box culvert which was a 10 foot by 20 foot was not needed in my new design which actually had more flow through, so they said I had to put in a 10 foot wide section. Illinois Department of resource had real engineers who said why, he has the flow through, but they continued being dicks. So instead of 10 foot box culverts, I went with 14 foot legged culverts where I built the footings with 3 x 6 concrete blocks where I buried them adjacent to the new causeway about 100 feet east and then built forms and poured concrete footings on top of the blocks with about foot and a half steel reinforced footings. I then had a crane set 4 sections which my wife and I then built forms around the legs sitting on our footing and poured another foot of concrete. I then excavated a new narrow channel and told the Army Corp they could stick it if they did not like it......everybody signed off on it, but those two feet cost me 25k more, and I still have a 10 foot box culvert twenty feet long in four sections sitting in the concrete yard.

Later they came out and did an inspection and complained about my park model which I now have in Santa Rosa County, and wanted me to move it. This was after NO and the Robinson decision which did not give them tort immunity, and I told them that I want an administrative hearing.......and by the way the army col. who is an attorney and was about to be the Illinois adjunct general of Illinois would be my attorney, and that I was going after them individually for their conduct on this project......they sent out three big wigs the next day and apologized, sent a letter saying everything was approved, the park model could stay where it was, and gave me permission to raise my other causeways and I did not need a permit for the same from them......all in writing. These petty inspectors abuse people and people take it.....I do not allow bullies to win.

2040th anniversary party Sunday Empty Re: 40th anniversary party Sunday 6/4/2016, 11:57 am

ZVUGKTUBM

ZVUGKTUBM

2seaoat wrote:In Illinois you have a triple form which you fill out for the Army Corps, Illinois Department of Resources, and Illinois environment.  In addition, the county you live in gives you a floodplain work permit.  I had to hire an engineer who drew up detailed plans.....about 3k.   It ended up in the middle of the project a flood blew away our concrete work and we took huge hits, and I decided to change the design and basically built it according to my plan as I went out and found the five big tubes and put about fifty 3 x 6 concrete blocks in the causeway and completed it.  It was just my wife and I who built it.  She would work the chains, and I worked the excavators, bobcat, and lull.  We had people in town just get lawn chairs and watch me work.   The old timers were saying it would never survive a flood or ice flow.......it was the talk at the local gas station where people gather over their coffee.   The Army corps then became a dick because my box culvert which was a 10 foot by 20 foot was not needed in my new design which actually had more flow through, so they said I had to put in a 10 foot wide section.   Illinois Department of resource had real engineers who said why, he has the flow through, but they continued being dicks.   So instead of 10 foot box culverts, I went with 14 foot legged culverts where I built the footings with 3 x 6 concrete blocks where I buried them adjacent to the new causeway about 100 feet east and then built forms and poured concrete footings on top of the blocks with about foot and a half steel reinforced footings.  I then had a crane set 4 sections which my wife and I then built forms around the legs sitting on our footing and poured another foot of concrete.  I then excavated a new narrow channel and told the Army Corp they could stick it if they did not like it......everybody signed off on it, but those two feet cost me 25k more, and I still have a 10 foot box culvert twenty feet long in four sections sitting in the concrete yard.

Later they came out and did an inspection and complained about my park model which I now have in Santa Rosa County, and wanted me to move it.  This was after NO and the Robinson decision which did not give them tort immunity, and I told them that I want an administrative hearing.......and by the way the army col. who is an attorney and was about to be the Illinois adjunct general of Illinois would be my attorney, and that I was going after them individually for their conduct on this project......they sent out three big wigs the next day and apologized, sent a letter saying everything was approved, the park model could stay where it was, and gave me permission to raise my other causeways and I did not need a permit for the same from them......all in writing.   These petty inspectors abuse people and people take it.....I do not allow bullies to win.

Final Score: Seaoat - 10/Regulators - 0. Good job!

http://www.best-electric-barbecue-grills.com

2140th anniversary party Sunday Empty Re: 40th anniversary party Sunday 6/4/2016, 12:13 pm

2seaoat



Final Score: Seaoat - 10/Regulators - 0. Good job!


Nope.....the game is never over with the tyranny of regulatory government......I had an inspector show up last year accusing me of putting concrete on the shoreline. You are allowed up to 1000 feet of shore stablization without permit, but I had done none of it, and a neighbor to my north was doing some shore work......but they came and hassled me, but after I left a rather unfriendly phone message to the inspector, she apologized and said she made a mistake........the game is never over with these folks.....pure tyranny for the little guy, and the more people they abuse, the more bully like are their actions. I get protecting navigable and jurisdictional waters of America, but sometimes they are simply wrong, and abusive. I think they killed people in NO with their arrogance.

2240th anniversary party Sunday Empty Re: 40th anniversary party Sunday 6/4/2016, 12:28 pm

RealLindaL



2seaoat wrote:In all my life the luckiest thing which ever was bestowed on me was the guy upstairs blessing me with this wonderful woman.  I am so thankful she had two older brothers who would tease her and play rough with her because she ended up being one tough lady.  It is not easy being my spouse, and she has the sympathy from all my family, her family, all our friends about the burden she has carried for forty years......but she has a twinkle in her eye as I have taken her on quite an adventure on facebook, where she has hundreds of former students and friends which track her latest adventure.  After I die there will be a line around the block chasing her.......she tells me I have done the husband thing.....I am done with that......a strong intelligent beautiful woman.....why I got so lucky, I will never get it, but I think it is humor and intelligence and this rare ability to put a pit bull on a leash, and hold that leash in such a way that the pit bull never understands who is in control.

Good for you, Sea; I was hoping you'd say something like this.   I know you've praised your spouse before but this is the best I've personally read.   I don't know if she peruses your forum entries but this is one I hope you'll please print out and give to her, make SURE she sees, OK?

2seaoat



She and I do not need to write anything out.....we are partners in our adventure and are one, and that means getting pized at each other, but we are lucky that as our physical attraction to each other is not as strong as two crazy young twenty something celebrating our youth and bodies to now a more cerebral meld which is far more strong of an attraction. When I went to Mexico for almost six month going to school, I went through a physical withdrawal which was very difficult, but after about three weeks I realized the physical part was small compared to the cerebral meld we had established, and I came back from Mexico in December 1975 and we were married in June 1976......so she knows I am not the type of man who tries to fool a woman with flowers, candy and BS......I never cheated, and I treated her always as an equal partner, my hugs and actions are better than words........and she tolerates me......which plenty of people can tell you is her only character flaw.

2seaoat



Here is a 12 foot rise in the river which covers the causeway I just posted. Major damage and loss. Scary powerful.
[img]40th anniversary party Sunday Flood_10[/img]

2seaoat



Here is the crossover that I began working on a year ago this spring. I will take a chain drive soil conditioner over this built up dirt and will plant grass seed over the entire surface as I do a final level. I will then get about six dump truck loads of two inch gravel(below the dirt is three to five inch limestone) and will put a final rock grade on this crossover. In a flood this will give us time to get to the north end and secure things. Now the water stops us at this low spot. I will show the final crossover this fall with the rock and grass.
40th anniversary party Sunday Roadbe10

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