More about Brierley today I guess because his numerous pix are priceless. They have a way of jogging the memory. Maybe he ought to do a complete picture book one of these years.
I haven’t really looked at the Brierley for a long time but it is excellent for recounting the towns and landscapes for me now. This is especially good right now as We are doing Phil’s Camino and trying to get in tune with where we would be in Spain each day. I walked this morning and now we have 79.2 kilometers walked and we are at the town of Zariquiegui and don’t ask me to pronounce that but I can find it on the map.
We are on page four and past Pamplona and past Cizur Menor and climbing elevation. This town we are at is about half way up the Alto del Perdon, the Mountain of Forgiveness. Looking back we see Pamplona and the Pyrennes.
Yea so, I think I will use the Brierley as a companion to my logbook. It will be good to jar my memory and fill in the blanks for visitors. Yes, a good addition to the process. Thank you Mr. Brierley, I take back everything I said about you, just joking.
This is Monday and Wednesday Our Jennifer and myself will be off to the hospital for our treatment again. But I have two days to get some work done. The weather is fairly good and not an impediment to progress. So, I will go for now, thinking of you, love, Felipe.
Hola Amigo Felipe!
The corn nightmare is now just like most nightmares we have; it’s history. The second of our daughters, with four daughters of her own, came to visit us from Chicago land so that these four little ones get to share in the harvest activities that the other eight grand kiddies still love but almost take for granted. The oldest of the four, Sophie, was the fortunate one to be with me in the combine when we whipped the last round of the “terrible, terrible, bad corn”. We high-fived until our hands got hot! When we dumped the last hopper load we ran to the house to pass on the good news to the rest of the family. I wanted to pass this on in thanks for your concern and prayers and those of your other CaminoHeads that took up the cause. Prayer and persevere almost sound alike and they do belong together and help each other out.
The corn finale was yesterday and today’s activities involved the neighborhood working together to help fight a cornfield fire just to the west of our home place. The field had been harvested and was truly “ripe fodder” for a blaze once it had begun (started by a spark from a transfer pump stationed in the field). Our ever ready local volunteer fire departments hurried to the scene but their equipment could not handle the scope of the blaze that was being fueled by 45+ MPH winds. A call went out for tillage equipment to bury the flames along the periphery of the fire that had now grown to over 50 acres in a scarily short time. I and other neighbors dropped our harvesting rigs and hooked up whatever tractor was available and close to a tillage rig of any kind and sped down the dust gravel roads toward the billowing smoke. Mine was the second rig to show up (a 32 foot tandem disc) and I dived into the smoke with the warning to look out for the other tillage rig working the same side of the flames. Easier said than done since the visibility was exactly zero. We dodged each other enough to avoid a head on collision and continued our flame burying quest. Within 20 minutes two more rigs showed up and then a third joined the fire gang and we team worked the job with great success. We were making a lot of dust of our own and that added to the smoke from the fire made it look like half the county was on fire. I don’t have to tell you about team work and team work saved the day again here in corn country.
We all did a brief salute and wave to the fire fighters who darted from one smoldering hot spot to another. Mission accomplished.
SF,
PFJ
Thank you PFJ for the massive update. All’s well that ends well hey? I am so glad that you guys got the job done and the fire out. Pretty exciting down there in Iowa. I hope you are having a few beers and watching this fourth quarter of Monday Night Football. We love you man, PFF