Driving to your Property?

[EddieWalker]

Rob,

I'm loving the raised deck you have for you tents. It's makes me think of those old time African hunting camps from the 19th century. VERY COOL!!!

Can you share a few more pics of the setup? Do you have seperate tents for different uses? Eating, sleeping and recreation???

I was about ten miles from my land when I bought it, but a divorce forced me to move to it sooner than I was ready. Now it's so nice I couldn't imagine not living here.

Eddie

 

[Highbeam]

Check his profile for the site of about a zillion pictures. I spent a good half day looking through them. Quite a story they tell.

 

[DUMBDOG]

Do you leave the canopies up while you are gone or are they take down each time?

If they are left up, what about the wind or storms or is the weather there that nice all year?

 

[EddieWalker]

Thanks Highbeam for telling me about the link to the pictures. They're awesome. I've been going through them and really enjoying it. Thank you Rob for making them available.

Eddie

 

[3RRL]

Thanks Eddy,

I sure appreciate the compliment. I always wanted to hunt in Africa or India too. Sorry about your divorce, I think. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif My Dad did quite a bit of hunting in Indonesia. He was an Inspector on the Dutch police force there. It was known as the Dutch East Indies. We are Dutch-Indonesian and I was born there on the island of Java. Have been in the States since 1957 and never been back.

Those decks you see were made in 4 long hard weekends with just me and my wife. We hauled all the lumber and supplies in my Blazer from down South and all the other stuff you in that old Blazer. We don't own a truck or a trailer. Sawed it all up there and screwed it together. My wife did all the waterproof painting and varnishing. Since the main camp construction we have made improvements each weekend and even a tree house for Wesley, our son.

There are three 12'x12' decks. One has our bathroom on it and in the rear of camp. One has our tent on it and the other my Son's tent on it. The tents are coverd by those beige canopies. The patio deck is 16'x32' . The kitchen is in the middle under the blue tarp and the dining is on one end with the lounge on the other. That's where I sit with my .22 to watch the meadow.

There's also a fire pit between the bathroom and the main decks and a wooden boardwalk to it. Stairs to each deck too. We even have an Atrium where I shifted the big deck to avoid cutting some trees down.

I do have more pics but a lot of them can be seen on our website. My wife is an excellent photographer and she set up the website. You can go to my bio and it's listed there, or you can click HERE There will be photos of family and stuff too, so you'll just have to sift through them, but they are all of the property, documenting what we've been doing. Right now she's a little behind with postings of our recent trips. But you can see how we started out. I'll ask her to update the website if she can.

Here's a picture of Wesley's tree house.

 

[3RRL]

At first we pitched tents and took them down but our property is at the end of a culdesac with no other entry. The property is located in a private area with private roads. We have one neighbor who watches our stuff and we also have the road blocked off with chains. So now we leave everything there.

That's also what I meant about "working" every weekend on the camp...repairing wind and rain damage. Most things are secured pretty good but stuff still gets ripped up. But yes, the weather is really nice most of the year. Even had bears go through and wreck the kitchen and patio. They bit all the kerosene for our oil lamps and tried to eat the candles.

I sure appreciate you guys having interest in our story, but I'd like to hear more from you guys about YOUR property and pictures too. I haven't traveled at all back East or to the South and would like to see you land there. That would be great!
Thanks,

One more picture when approaching our camp from the dirt road.

 

[sodamo]

Never got a good mileage check - not a good drive hehe, but I guess our property was about 6,000 miles from Ga. Made short trips of 1-2 weeks about 3 times a year for 2 years. These were to build the place we are living in now (permitted as a shed) as we begin to build our house. We have 21 acres. I give a pasture license to a neighbor for his cattle, but we will fence off a portion for a garden and various fruit trees. We have a very active wild pig population and they are actively hunted by our neighbors, so we get smoked pork from time to time.
This web page is the house site and work progress, but there are other pics of the shed building in another album. We actually stayed in the shed after the first 3 trips. Saved money and time, getting more work done. I didn't get electricity and water hooked up until end of last August which was when wife, dogs and cats made the move permanent.

David

 

[scott_vt]

Mornin Rob,
Well I dont have quite the drive that you have, we drive about 176-178 miles depending on whose vehicle we use, its a little closer with the wifes vehicle /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

We also try and go every other weekend, we usually leave thursday nite, stop in Mass for a bite to eat and get up to our place about 10:30 or so. If we drove straight thru it would be about a 3hr 20 min ride, but we always get hungry /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif I get quite a bit of vacation time so Im able to make the weekends a little longer by a day /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

We dont hunt on the property, but my neighbors have enough property that they would be willing to let me hunt on there property if I wanted. I belong to a Fish and Game club that I shoot skeet and trap at. They also have a rifle range.

My neighbor lets me keep my Massey in his barn for safe keeping, and in turn I help him with his cord wood.

The stars are great durring camp fire season!!!

By the way nice deck /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

scotty

 

[Dk45_Jeff]

We live on ten acres near Fredericksburg Virginia and have 130 acres 520 miles away in New York’s Adirondack Park. With my wife being pregnant the last two years (son 15 months old and daughter 9 weeks old) we have only gotten up four times recently, one week each in the summer for fishing and one during deer season. Hopefully we’ll be able to add a couple of long weekends this year.

I inherited the land, and the love of it, from my father who moved to the area in the 30’s while in the CCC and bought his first parcel in the 40’s with money he saved while in the Army. I can’t really see us moving onto the land, I just don’t have the heart to replace the primitive cabin with a modern house and the rutted field with a paved driveway. Doing so would change the essence of the place for me, loosing that special something I still feel about going to camp. We’ll probably keep it pretty much unchanged and pass the land, and hopefully some of my love for it and the outdoors, on to my children.

 

[KentT]

It's a 900 mile drive for me, from Massachusetts where we now live to East Tennessee where I grew up and plan to retire. We purchased a small tract last year. We're going to put up a 2-car garage with a 1BR apartment over it this summer that will serve as a vacation cottage until I retire and the "main house" is built. Then, it will be used as a guest suite for the kids and grandkids, and perhaps for "live-in" assistance when we grow old. The development restricts each tract (5 to 15 acres, typically) to one, single-family dwelling -- so, I'm being required to connect the garage to the house (when it is built) via a covered breezeway to comply with that restriction.

This works best for us -- a "cabin" that gives the tax benefits of a 2nd home, yet is permanent part of the larger, long-term plan. We'll likely spend around 4 weeks a year there, doing further clearing, site prep, etc., in addition to vacationing....

Pics of our future retirement site

The next trip is next week, to burn the huge brush pile, finish roughing in the driveway, and get ready to start soliciting bids from general contractors...