Sunday January 22, 2017 Guerneville CA.
What to do between the rains
Last nights rain didn’t seem to come down quite as hard as they predicted at least that’s how it seemed to me. But everything was good and wet this morning. Seemed like a good day to stay home. The rain bucket showed a couple of inches of rain.
Checking things out up the hill
There was some more rain predicted to come in around two today so I decided to take a ride up the hill to see how things faired.
First I had to round up a shovel as if you remember my shovel is still stuck in the creek below the culvert.
So I put on my rain coat and found a shovel over at my brother’s place and took off.
The culvert crossing looks good
First stop was to check the culvert in the creek crossing where my shovel is stuck in the gravel. Every thing looked good there with no more sticks plugging it up. Most of the debrie already had come down in earlier storms.
Some trees down on the roads
So I headed on up the hill. I ran into some down trees and this one was completely covering the road, so I detoured to another road to the left. I was almost to the top.
Ridge top view of Guerneville
I made it to the ridge top overlook of Guerneville at this spot.
And this was my view down to the town of Guerneville.
A little closer view of the Guerneville area. The flooded field is one of Korbels vineyards. The muddy water will deposit some new silt which should be good for the grapes.
Here’s just a bit closer view of that. You can see the main town in the background. The water level measured at the Guerneville bridge is just below 29 feet at this time, just getting close to flood stage. 29 feet is considered monitor stage. It’s predicted to rise three more feet above this tomorrow morning.
Checking the flood prediction service, they say it is predicted to crest tomorrow morning around 32 feet which is minor flood stage.
Shovel work
With trees blocking the roads here and there and me without a chain saw, I headed back down the hill and did some shovel work along the way where water was going the wrong way. Debrie plugs up things and turns the water in the wrong direction sometimes. If left alone for long enough periods, these kinds of things can wash out roads.
Water’s going the wrong way here
Here’s one of the worst ones I fixed. The water is supposed to go straight across the road, not down the road to the left. I moved enough dirt and tree limbs to put it back where it was supposed to go. This is on a road up to my brother’s water tank he uses for one of his gardens.
I got my feet wet working on this one and a little overheated as I had too much clothes on, but I got er done.
I worked on a couple other miner problems down in the orchard on the way home. Actually the best time to work on these things is when the rain is falling the hardest as the rain water helps reroute things when it’s diverted properly, but most of the time it rains hardest during the night.
Kitty cat
My neighbors cat was there to welcome me when I got home once I shut the quad down.
I was a bit cold from getting a bit wet, so I changed into some dry warm clothes and took it easy the rest of the day.
This afternoons rain held off until about 3 which turned out to be mostly heavy showers.
And that was my day.