Too much rain, Not enough rain.

Cullman,   AL


We arrived back in Cullman yesterday afternoon following an eventful 3 weeks away.  The first week was spend parked in Salem, VA Ford dealer parking lot while the truck got it's new engine.  As I reported I did manage getting away for a few days.  At the hospital. 

The next two weeks were at either Gettysburg Farm Thousand Trails or Hershey Thousand Trails.  Life is strange.   For 7 years or so I loved RVing.   Then I got tired of it.  Really tired.  It no longer holds the interest I once have.  There is no place like home.  We came home two weeks before we planned to.

About the weather.  Those living in MD, NJ and PA where I have family have had more than their share of rain this summer.  I've talked about my one daughter who owns a converted grist mill built in 1832 near Hershey, PA.    Part of a stream that operated the mill is diverted to under her house.   For almost 200 years this building has withstood flood and high water.  Her brick floored basement has seen much flooding as has the five foot thick stone walls.    This year saw their highest basement flood.   Several feet.  It doesn't take long for it to drain and then the rains come again.

Each time there are heavy rains debris gets lodged under the house.   Each time they don their waders and attempt removal. 

Daughter Terri and Grandson Justin working to remove debris from under the house.

Len and Son-in-law Steve pulling out part of a large tree that was stuck under there.  Grand-dog Cain supervises.

They have more rain than needed while here in Alabama we have had so little.   We came back to dead flowers and a garden in bad need to a good watering.   Really feeling the draught it is our pond.  This is how it looked a month ago.

This is how it looks now.

To compound the situation, a neighbor about 1/2 mile away is putting in a pond.  It looks more like a lake.  It's huge.  Our closest neighbor also has a pond.  He told us that until this new pond/lake fills ours will continue to lose water.  The new pond is on the major spring that feeds our ponds.  So it has to fill and the overflow goes into the ditch/stream that runs in the middle of our closest neighbors land and fills his pond and then the ditch along our property line.  So the first neighbors lake fills, the overflow goes to the 2nd neighbor, his overflow runs to our ditch that fills our pond and our overflow runs back into our ditch and along it goes.  We have a spring also but it does not put out enough to make up for the underground water than is now filling the pond/lake that is being dug.  All this would change with a good rainfall.

We were greeted by our friend when we arrived home yesterday.

Until next time