Let's see - replies: Showers available, we have water, but Ranger Sandy will be having folks maybe camp in a couple of areas, so there might be a bit of a walk or drive ...
The food all sounds good, I'll pass that along. Macaroni Salad, and Meatloaf - mmmm... I'll see if my wife has any home made jam for the cornbread ...
The costumes I'm referring to are the cloths traditionally worn by loggers pre-OSHA. That would be all wool with hob nails from the 1800's to tin cloth for climbers and toppers to felling suits worn by pto sawyers ... Stuff that we could do some still's of near a big tree and then maybe a short audio about why folks used to dress like this ... When we build teh slide show for teh kids for teh VC, if we don't have any of us in action we can substitute file photos in B&W of fallers and buckers and mule skinners and such, but they never show color or explain why ...
Old gear: do not strain yourself with big stuff owned by the tract or the mills. Just the stuff you as a worker were expected to own, carry or supply when you went to work.
Slowp that includes your stuff
Stuff like Axes, saws, pikes, wedges, spikes, rigging gear, etc. The stuff you can explain for the enlightenment of all about how it used to be for the woods worker. The intent is to get the personal side of this photographed/recorded before we loose too many of the older knowledgeable guys who might have inherited some stuff form their dad's and grand dad's and know what it was and how it was used ...
Dimensional cutting - has not come up but a few times with Rob. I'm sure they will be interested to hear what could be done, especially for making maintenance lumber for the Bale Mill in historic dimensions from local trees. It's a topic to bring up and start the dialog. We have an historic steam mill running occasionally over in the Sonoma area, so it's possible to have pieces made ... But it might be a great idea to set up a portable mill or an Alaska Mill to make stuff on-site if the trees are right and the need is there. We'll talk this year and see what comes up
2-Dogs: On the safety talk, I know it will be repetitive for some, and if they were there last year and are on a list we still have (?), they can skip it, but for the "new" folks it'll be a cornerstone of the program moving forward. You did a great job last year.
As this event grows and eventually becomes more "new" publicly involved, we hope to be able to gather the curious and the weekend back yard'ers who come, to actually hear what safety means in the woods. It's a "product or service" that the event can offer that exactly matches the "education and outreach" goals for the Park System. It is one reason we have the event. Right now the GTG is still small and mostly us, but in a few years when the announcement is in the big papers and we have our game down more firmly, it'll be advertised as one of the "things to do" when the public comes to see and hear.
By then I hope we can do a separate saw log for just antique equipment. Really loud, noisy, cranky, slow, heavy, stuff that we'll think we had a great day to get two cuts and crowd of a 100 to watch
A few years after that, we may add hot-rod saw racing, but that's quite a few years out and it depends on "the organic evolution" of the GTG and what we all want... This GTG's doing great as a event that started as loose idea a few years ago to now becoming an actual informative and productive party for us with food and camaraderie and some challenging experiences
We did not know if it would even work a few years ago? Now we seem to have a better handle on what we can, and cannot do well ...
I do have a couple of the old white cloth hats but they're pretty scroungy.
