Musings from the tide flats

We planned this visit to Camano to replace the pulley line which had been chewed up by a large driftwood tree during a winter storm.

What is a pulley line, you ask. (you won't find the answer in Wikipedia!) Many of the people on the beach attach their little boats to pulley lines instead of moorings. One end of the line goes through a large pulley attached to the bulkhead, and the other end of the ~100 ft. line  runs through a pulley that is attached to a heavy object, sunk into the mud at very low tide. The ends are tied to  stainless clamps to close the loop.The mooring line of the boat can be clipped to the hardware. The advantage of this system is that the boat can float out in the water away from the churn of the surf. In early summer there are a couple extremely low tides for the purpose of  fixing  lines and checking the buoy chains for signs of wear.

In the picture above, you see what appears to be tracks running into the water. Back in the day, larger boats were launched on these tracks. Today few are still in use; others sit on the beach as a sign of days gone by.

The day's task was pretty straightforward. Jeff had made a cement block  with a stainless steel loop through which we ran the line. The muck at low tide was unforgiving; swallowing up my Crocs and almost getting Jeff's. But we dug our hole, placed the block standing almost knee-deep in the stuff, and slogged back to shore. I'm sure the sight of us gave a new meaning to "mucking around"!

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Meanwhile at the house, Mike was working away, adding the under layer for the future porch  and filling the large hole dug for the septic.

A friendly guy, Mike entertained us with stories of his own archeological finds, and gave us a quick lesson in the workings of our new septic. If you need to know more about septics, click this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septic_system

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So much has changed, and yet so much lies ahead.

"Enduring Homes" the scaffold label reads. A sign of things to come...