July 2, 2010

View of the day-Just like home…combine on the front lawn and a first Massey sighting of the run.

Al was up early again to unload the Freightliner in town, then he went out to the field to take the General to Colby so Marilyn would have some room to start. Marilyn was out servicing and fueling and by 11am we were on our way to finishing the last 100 acres.

Al was able to keep up for the first part of the day and once Marilyn finished the part of the field on the west side of the water run, we got everything moved over to the east side. We noticed a bank of clouds coming in from the west and there were some weather warnings, but nothing severe…we were hoping to get the field done before we got any precipitation. Not like they got back home in Yorkton…5 inches in 45 minutes last night!

Because we have a larger fuel tank on the combine and our slip tank only holds 100 gallons, we have to fill twice a day if we are going hard. Because we are so far from town and we figured we would have enough fuel to last the day, we didn’t run back in after we started…we didn’t have time. Well, we certainly did later on in the day. Marilyn’s alarm went off at 5pm and there was no way to finish the field without getting fuel, so she made a run into town.

She thought she would save some time by going to the Cenex downtown and hope that the pump was faster than the one at the Coop. It was closed for the long weekend, but you could still pay at the pumps…at $75 a crack with the dollar charge and the fuel was .20/gal higher. She decided to go back to the Coop and sit it out since we didn’t really need a full tank to finish.

What ever happen to fuel pump courtesy? Three pumps, the middle one is the one needed and the people fuelling don’t pull through to the front pump so the next person can use the other one…they hog up all three spots. Marilyn sat and waited for a mini van to move so she could get in…a few minutes later a woman came out and got in the van…yay, finally. She proceeds to get organized and looks like she is ready to leave, then a young girl comes sauntering out to get in the van…now, yay…nope. All the while she can see Marilyn trying to inch ahead to get to the pumps…then a young guy comes strolling out to the van…in no hurry. Finally they are strapped in and ready to leave and Marilyn gets “the look” from the woman because now she has to back out to leave…come on, it’s not a semi and she only had to back up 10 feet. Of course, the back was packed so full she couldn’t see anything. What should have been a 15 minute fill, turned into 30…and the clouds were getting closer.

Back at the field, she fuelled the combine then got right back at it. The wind was 40mph most of the day out of the south so almost every time Al took a load in we had to use the combine as a wind break…no tarp catastrophes today. Marilyn was down to the last 10 acres and could see lighting in the west…she still had to get the Freightliner filled which was on the other side of the water run…and get it tarped just in case the deluge hit. She managed that all right then raced back to get the last few rounds and get the cart loaded and tarped before getting wet…which she did.

Marilyn headed back into town after getting everything battened down for the night and once Al got back from Colby with the General, he picked up the Freightliner and brought it into town for it’s daily run. One load left to go to the elevator and no rain so far.

And the locals are not messing around with just the little firecrackers anymore…

July 1, 2010-Happy Canada Day!

View of the day-The full combine has to wait for the first time as the General finally makes it to the field.

Al was up early to unload the Freightliner at the elevator by the campground...well, he tried to...the pump for the hoist was out of oil so he had to run into town to find some before he could get dumped. Once he was done with that, he went out to the field and took the General in to Colby to dump. The field is 7 miles from the highway then 17 miles south to Colby...the campground is 11 miles north in Atwood, so we are getting a lot of driving in...but what's new?

Marilyn got out to the field, fueled, serviced and started combining by 10:30am. Al was able to keep up with the trucking and because the farmer needed 550 bushels of seed wheat from the first field, we didn't get backed up. We finished off the first field, then moved across the road to the second field and once we had everything spotted where it was needed, Al took off to Colby yet again.

Marilyn kept combining until everything was full, then waited for Al to get back to the field to make the last dump of the day after 125 acres. Al had made 7 trips into Colby and one in Atwood, so he was hopping all day. We are looking at 100 acres or so left for tomorrow and the weather is going to cooperate...nothing in the forecast until Saturday.

Al brought the loaded Freight back to the camper again and Marilyn went to the Coop to get fuel for tomorrow. She was pulling the hose across the box of the truck and had it pointing up so it wouldn't drip, when all of a sudden it started shooting like a geyser, then shut off. Apparently the previous fueler had not flipped the lock back on the handle and Marilyn never had this happen before, so she didn't know to check that it was off...the gent in the store thought he was helping out by flipping the switch inside before it was in the tank, thinking, like Marilyn that it was off. The back of the cab and down between the box were the only thing that really got sprayed badly...and perhaps some shoes. Lesson learned.

There were a lot of combines moving down the roads around our field and after talking to the gent at the fuel place, it seems like they are doing a lot of patching out. Yesterday they combined 9 and 10% moisture wheat and today it was 18%...everyone will be catching up to the wet stuff soon.

And by some fluke there is internet in the camper again...

June 30, 2010

View of the day-We’re making dust again as Marilyn does a pole dance never even coming close to the wires.

We were up extra early to drive to Stockton, but this time we went through Colby so Al could have a look at the route into the elevator. We grabbed a quick breakfast to go, then headed east to Stockton, meeting a lot of crews moving west.

Once we got to Stockton, we decided to fill the slip tank with fuel for the combine but the pumps were so slow and cut out at $75 we figured we would get some at Colby on the way back. Those pumps and the bank charge $1 every time you use it…what a racket. We hooked the header up and started back to the farm with the General and combine.

Marilyn stopped to get the slip tank topped off at the Coop in Colby then made it out to the farm just as Al was unhooking the trailer. We got the combine unloaded and set up with the header, then opened up the field…and what a field…flat as a table, all standing straight up, running close to 40 bu/ac, and 10% moisture. Perfect.

Al was concerned about being able to keep up with the 18 mile haul one way but Marilyn was managing to time it just right for the first couple of loads. Al came back with a bolt missing from the bottom of the shock we had just installed, so we found another bolt and got it back in place and tightened down. While we were in the yard fixing the General, we decided to put the Freightliner into service and after getting it started, Marilyn drove it over to the field.

Al got one more load in and Marilyn filled the General and Freight one more time and Al brought the Freight into Atwood and parked it at the camper to unload in the morning. Even though we started around 5pm we managed to carve out 75 acres.

The campgrounds have exploded with harvesters and they are scrambling everywhere…it’s getting crazy. And speaking of exploding, the fireworks stands are doing a booming (pun intended) business and someone close by our camper likes firecrackers.

Not Al…not yet, anyway.

June 29, 2010

View of the day-Our camping spot in Atwood, KS...right by the elevator and apparently there is no jake brake law in this town.

We were up early to start battening down the hatches in the camper. We didn't even stop for breakfast, we just headed out to the bins to get settled up, hook up the shop trailer to the camper and head north.

Just as we got to the corner before the bins we could see there were a couple of high line trucks parked in the middle of the road. They had been putting new poles and wires up and were just in the middle of restringing them when we came along. We couldn't get the camper by them so there was no way we would be able to get the Freightliner and it's load anywhere near the corner. They move over long enough for us to get the camper by and they said they would be out of our way in 45 minutes which worked out good because we still had things to do before we left.

Ken and Kevin came up to see us and after we got everything organized the line men had moved on and we were able to leave. We made the tight corner and Marilyn decided to check the lights on the cart trailer...of course only one was working, so we spent and extra 30 minutes finding the splice that was causing the problem. We had everything operational, so we continued on our way.

We had another busy day on the highway and the high point came just south of Phillipsburg when Marilyn, who was in the lead came up behind a little white car and it was behind two older John Deere combines with their 30ft headers on and they didn't seem to be moving over. The little white car whipped around the first one and as he was passing Marilyn could see that it was the dreaded Department of Transportation enforcement. He pulled out and passed the second combine and they seemed to get the picture and let us pass. Just as Al got by the combines, the DOT car pulled over and put on his lights, so Al pulled over to the side and called to let Marilyn know he was going to be delayed. After sitting and waiting for the man to show up, he looked in his rear view mirror and saw that the man had been stopping the combines and not Al...needless to say Al just drove away and wasn't bothered again. Does that count as a stop by the DOT?

We made it to Atwood, pulled into the campground that we had booked a site in only to see that the spot that we had been promised was filled by another harvester. Marilyn went in to talk to the lady and she said that was the only place that the semi that had been turned into a camper could park. She let us chose another spot, where we parked, got the A/C working, then hooked the shop trailer up and took the rigs south of town to the farmers yard to unload.

We got out there, unloaded the tractor and cart in record time, left the shop trailer and came back to town for supper. We took a tour around the town before going back to the camper to see if we could get any local tv or internet. No to the first one and yes to the second...well, it's intermittent at best, but at least Marilyn doesn't have to drive anywhere for the upload.

Tomorrow we rescue the General and combine from Stockton...

June 28, 2010

View of the day-The pile is building at Glade, Kansas, while they work on the flat storage behind the elevator.

We slept in a bit since Marilyn was up late shopping and Al got hooked in watching The New Two Thousand Mile Harvest video. He had just wanted to watch a couple of chapters of the DVD, but got sucked into the vortex and stayed to the end, and Marilyn got back to the camper around 2:30am from her Walmart visit.

We grabbed a quick breakfast then went out to the bins to hook up the header to the pickup, then head for Stockton, KS. How quickly we forget about our “lets just move on Sunday” thought from the Cherokee move…the highway was pretty busy for a Monday. Once we got to Stockton, we parked at the fair grounds along with several other harvesters…there were trailers and equipment all over the place.

We figured we might as well take a road trip and check a few leads, since we didn’t have anything lined up, so we headed west from Stockton. We were somewhat surprised that we didn’t see very many combines running in the fields, as a matter of fact, some of the fields were still pretty green. We got to Colby and decided to look for a campground…just in case…and found one. It was right along the interstate and almost in the Walmart parking lot…Marilyn was sold on it, even though the nightly rate would have been almost triple what the Cherokee rates were.

We drove north of Colby and stopped to visit a farmer before going north to Atwood to see what was there for parking the camper…unfortunately for Marilyn, there was a spot. After we checked out the town, we started back for Great Bend, stopping in Oberlin at the Pizza Hut for supper…the first Pizza Hut visit in Kansas. We thought we would go back through Phillipsburg to check that highway out and we had to wait for a pilot cart just outside the town, but it wouldn’t have affected a wide load, so we would be fine.

We will be busy tomorrow paying bills, settling up with the farmers, tearing down the camper…although we didn’t even set the dish; who had time to watch anything…before we hit the road and head north.

It was a day of over 400 miles of driving…

June 27, 2010

View of the day-Everything is loaded and ready for the next move from Timken, KS.

We got to sleep in today, a nice change from the rest of the week. We didn’t get any rain last night and the front that came through brought us relief from the hot temperatures from yesterday. We went for Sunday brunch then did a bit of shopping for parts, then Al went back to the camper and Marilyn did some Dollar Store shopping.

We went to Albert to pick up the General and after fueling it up, went out to the bins to start the loading process. We got the cart loaded in no time at all and had it hooked up and chained down ready to go. Kevin came out to drop off some papers and we had a chat with him before he left to go watch his kids play ball. They played in a tournament yesterday in Ness City…it was 107ºF there!

We started loading the combine and we still can’t quite get the hang of lining it up right the first time. Good thing we have a few more stops to practice on…we’ll get it yet…at least we aren’t in a hurry to get somewhere just yet. The farmers in Phillipsburg have found someone else since their crops were ready before we finished in Great Bend…that’s the way it goes. We finally got the combine loaded and hooked up to the General then got the shop trailer lined up so we can hook it up behind the camper when we take the last load.

We went back to Great Bend, got cleaned up, then went for our weekly laundry run…no internet there...but thank you McDonald's for having it while we had supper while waiting for the dryers. Marilyn has been uploading the blog courtesy of the NexTech store’s free WiFi and it is right next to the 24 hour Walmart Supercenter…and she hasn’t set foot in it.

That will change tonight…

June 26, 2010

View of the day-It was the hottest day of the run so far…the heat index was at 107º

We got out to the field and were able to start right away…well, after rearranging a few things. Al had to run the cart out to the middle of the field so we could get the far end done without having to drive to the trucks. Once everything was in place, Al continued hauling to the elevator and Marilyn finished combining.

We got the main field finished then had to move over to a 10 acre patch, but in order to get to it we had to take the header off to move through the tree lined low spot. We got the header swapped out in record time…we’re getting a lot of practice at it…then started to combine the last chunk for this area. Once we finished and got the trucks full, Al took the semi to the elevator and Marilyn went over to the first field we had done to get the Horst header trailer. She waited for Al at Ken’s yard, where he dropped their semi off, then went back to the combine to load the header.

After the header was loaded, Al took it up to the bins and Marilyn followed in the combine. Ken picked us up and took us back to the field so Al could get the General to take it to the elevator and Marilyn got to move the tractor and cart back to the bins. After getting it parked, Marilyn went to pick Al up at the elevator, where he left the General for the night.

It was a busy day everywhere as the weather has been ideal for harvesting with combines and trucks flying down the back roads. There aren’t a lot of fields left and there is harvesting being done all the way up to the Kansas/Nebraska border. There is a chance of thunderstorms tonight and the clouds were starting to build in the west, hopefully when the front passes through it will cool off a bit.

We got back to town in the daylight…a first this week…had supper, then went back to the camper. We had such plans since we had gotten off early, but by the time the showers were done, we didn’t feel like doing anything.

Tomorrow we load up again…