Tag Archives: Washington

Walking

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My new morning routine.

Canal
A shot looking west up the canal from the first bridge.

Second Bridge
The second bridge is exactly 1.3 miles from my RV.

Apple Orchard
I walk for about a half mile alongside this apple orchard. This morning, I saw three woodchucks in rocks like these along the canal edge.

Last week, I began walking regularly. It’s part — the only part, I should admit — of an exercise regime. I know it’s not much, but it’s more than I was doing the week before.

I usually get out between 6:30 and 7:00 AM, when it’s still nice and cool. I’m back within 45 minutes.

I should be clear here: I don’t go for a short stroll. I walk 2.6 miles at an average speed of 3.6 miles per hour. How do I know this so precisely? Simple: I monitor my progress using the trip computer on my handheld GPS.

(While other people are relying on a touch-screen GPS with computerized voice to find their way around town, I use my GPSes for things I can’t easily do on my own. But let’s not go there, huh? That’s fodder for a whole other blog post.)

I took the photos you see here on this morning’s walk. The pauses brought my average speed down to 3.3 miles per hour.

I start at my RV at Colockum Ridge Golf Course. I cut through the golf cart staging area and past the maintenance shed. That puts me on a two-track gravel road between a narrow drainage ditch full of clear-running water and the golf course. I walk about .3 miles south, then make a right onto another gravel road that runs along the north side of a canal. If I’m lazy, I cross the canal at the first bridge and come back along the other side for a 1.2 mile walk. But if I’m serious about exercise, I continue to the second bridge. The whole time, I’m walking alongside the golf course and then the 55+ trailer community beyond it. When I cross the second bridge, I walk back along the south side of the canal with an apple orchard and then an alfalfa field on my right. I cross back over the first bridge and retrace my route back to my RV.

Here’s what it looks like in satellite view on Google Maps:
My Walk

Alfalfa Bales
These aren’t the little wimpy alfalfa bales we bought for our horses. These probably weigh 500 pounds each and stand nearly as tall as me.

Canal and Golf Course
A view of the golf course from the opposite side of the canal.

I really enjoy the scenery. I love the changes in the farmland. Yesterday, the alfalfa was cut and piled. Today it was baled. The apples are ripening. Some farm equipment off in the distance was harvesting soybeans or something. The groundhogs are kind of cute.

3.6 miles per hour is a good walking pace. It’s probably the pace I used regularly when I walked the streets of New York. If you don’t walk fast in Manhattan, you get run over by other pedestrians or messengers on bikes or guys pushing racks of clothing. (I spent a bunch of time in the garment district one summer.) I’d like to get my walking speed up to 4 miles per hour, but it would likely kill me.

I listen to music when I walk. I have a little iPad shuffle and keep it stocked with an ever-changing mix of my favorite music. I discovered the other day that my walking pace is at the same tempo as Paul Simon’s “Late in the Evening.” I have long legs so I have long strides. I feel it in my knees and hips.

When I get back to the trailer, I’m sweating like a pig. (Do pigs really sweat?) I force myself to drink water or vitamin water before jumping in the shower. When I’m that hot and sweaty, the shower feels like heaven and makes the walk worthwhile. Afterwards, I have breakfast: high fiber cereal with fresh berries and low-fat milk. I have coffee before the walk — I am human, after all.

According to the Walking Calories Calculator on About.com, I burn at least 259 calories each time I do my walk. That’s not very much, but it is better than nothing. I’m hoping the regular brisk walk will also help me recover some of my muscle tone, which is quickly melting away.

I’m middle-aged now, and I’m not going down without a fight.

Cherries: From Tree to Truck

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A mini-documentary.

I need to start off by saying that I didn’t do a mini-documentary about the cherry harvest process because I felt the world had a need for such information. I did it as an exercise, as practice using my video camera and Final Cut Pro. I wanted to see if I had the ability to put together a documentary. This 5-minute video is the result.

This was my second summer experiencing the harvest process at one of the orchards I dry. The Schroeders are great people, friendly and a pleasure to work with. I dried their orchard four times this year. Being present for part of the harvest gave me an opportunity to see whether the work I’d done made a difference. It did.

The Schroeders were kind enough to let me walk the orchard and packing shed area with my Sony Handycam for a total of about 8 hours over two days. I also stopped in around sunset one evening to take some of the establishing shots with the soft “golden hour” light. They and their workers explained the process to me. I shot a total of about an hour of video footage. That that was barely enough. I still wish I’d gotten better shots of some parts of the process.

I found the cherry harvest fascinating — and I think you might, too. We’re all spoiled — we go into the supermarket in the summertime and find cherries waiting in the produce section, already bagged and ready to take home. But how many of us consider how the cherries get from the tree to the supermarket? It’s a complex process that requires hundreds of people and specialized equipment. This video shows part of the story, following the cherries from the trees in one orchard as they’re picked, gathered, chilled, and packed into a refrigerator truck. Take a moment to see for yourself:

Done? Not bad for a first serious effort.

From this point, the cherries go to the processing plant in Wenatchee, WA. They’re run through more cold water and lots of custom equipment before they’re picked through by several lines of people who toss out the bad ones. Then they’re sorted by size, run through more clean water, and eventually bagged and boxed up by even more people for shipment. I was fortunate enough to get a tour of that facility (and five more pounds of fresh cherries) a few days after I shot the video for this one. I may do a video of that facility and its process next year.

The amazing part of all this: the cherries are normally ready to ship to stores the same day they are picked.

More amazing stuff: the cherries I saw at the packing facility were headed for Korea and would be there within 18 hours of my tour. Whoa.

The point of all this is that there’s a lot that goes into getting fresh food into stores. Cherries are unlike many fruits — they have a very short shelf life. With proper care, they might last a week. That’s why everything is rushed and why so much effort is put into keeping them cool as soon as they’re picked.

I hope you enjoyed this. Comments are welcome.

On Standby 17/7/60

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What being on standby really means.

Occasionally, someone will comment about how I apparently get paid to do nothing during my summer job as a cherry drying pilot. I need to correct them. I’m not doing nothing. I’m on standby.

Specifically: I’m on standby during daylight hours seven days a week during my contract periods.

My Work Day/Week/Term

Let me start by providing a definition of each component of that statement:

  • Daylight hours means the time that it’s light enough to fly. Sunrise is at approximately 5 AM here; sunset is at approximately 9 PM. That’s 16 hours. But I can also fly during the twilight period that begins roughly 30 minutes before sunrise and ends 30 minutes after sunset. If a client wants me to fly the first thing in the morning, he’ll call as early as 4 AM, so my standby day starts then. Generally speaking, it’s not likely that I’ll be launched for a flight after 8:30 PM. I will, however, launch to dry a small orchard as late as 9 PM, so I consider that the end of my standby day. That’s a 17-hour day.
  • Seven days a week is pretty self-explanatory. It’s every day of the week. No days off, no holidays. I was even on call on my birthday — for the third year in a row.
  • My contract periods vary from year to year. This year, I have a total of seven contracts, most of which are for small orchards and overlap each other. From the first day of the first contract to the last day of the last contract is about 60 days. Last year, I had two days off between the end of one contract and the beginning of the last. The year before, I thought I’d have 10 days off, but nine of those days were filled with a last-minute contract.

So, to summarize: I’m on call 17 hours a day, seven days a week, for 60 days. That’s two months straight with no days off.

“On Call,” Defined

What does “on call mean”? On the surface, it means that I have to answer my phone any time a client might call me and be prepared to fly when requested.

What it also means, however, is that I have to do the following:

  • Be prepared to launch within 10-20 minutes of a call. That keeps me pretty close to the helicopter whenever there’s the slightest chance I might have to fly. One day, I waited in my truck where the helicopter was parked for four hours. (I flew 2.1 hours.) On Thursday, I waited in my RV for six hours. (I didn’t fly.) Friday morning, I was up at 4 AM and waited in my RV for two hours for a possible call; I was airborne within 15 minutes of getting it. The 27-acre orchard was dry less than an hour later. That’s the kind of service my clients expect. That’s what they’re paying standby for.
  • Check for voicemail messages. If I take a shower, drive through a dead cell coverage area, or simply don’t hear my phone ring for more than a few hours, I need to check for messages I might have missed. I should always answer the phone when a client calls — even if I’m already on the phone with my husband or a friend. Some clients will actually panic if they can’t reach me on their first try. (I am, after all, hired to help protect a crop worth tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars.)
  • Monitor the weather all the time. I track the weather on the Internet, weather radio, and by looking/walking outside. I have a weather app on my phone that includes in-motion radar. I sleep with my iPad on the bed so I can check the weather before I go to sleep and as soon as I wake up. I also have to be prepared to answer weather questions for clients that aren’t as close to their orchards as I am.
  • Keep the helicopter ready to fly. That means keeping it fully fueled and preflighted between flights. I generally refuel right after landing. I keep the tanks completely topped off so I can get a full 3 hours of flight time if I need it. My clients can’t wait for me to refuel. My clients also aren’t interested in waiting for me to get routine maintenance (like oil changes) or repairs. That means the helicopter has to be ready to fly for the entire season before I get here.
  • Keep fuel for the helicopter available. I buy fuel in bulk for the 82-gallon transfer tank on my pickup truck. There are two places I can get it: In Wenatchee (35 miles away) and in Ephrata (20 miles away). I need to have at least 30 gallons in the tank at all times, so as soon as it drops below 50 gallons, I try to make a fuel run. I have to do it on a clear day when there’s little or no chance of flying. Although I also take that opportunity to run errands I can’t run in Quincy (where I’m based), I always buy the fuel first, just in case the weather turns bad and I have to rush back. That’s happened twice this season so far.
  • Schedule my errands around the weather — and be prepared to change my schedule at the slightest hint of rain. My errands include grocery shopping, banking, post office runs, laundry, and the occasional quick meal out. It also includes familiarizing myself with new orchard blocks I’m contracted to cover.
  • Not drink alcohol. Let’s face it: the rule in aviation is “eight hours from bottle to throttle.” If I’m on call 17 hours a day, there is no eight-hour stretch that I’m not on call. So, theoretically, I can’t drink.
  • Not see a movie. Heck, this bugs me more than the alcohol. Every summer, there are so many great new movies, but I can’t see any of them. The closest theater is 35 miles away and I can’t lock myself up in a dark room without checking the weather for two hours. And at night — well, I do need to sleep.

Two Sides to Every Coin

The other day, a friend of mine came to visit with his daughter and grandson. We had lunch at the golf course restaurant, within view of the helicopter and only 150 feet from my RV. Afterwards, we stopped by the RV for a diaper change.

My friend’s daughter told me how envious she was of me and my job. She said it was the greatest job she’d ever heard of.

I’m not complaining, but I do want to point out that there are two sides to every situation. I seriously doubt whether her job would get her out of bed with a phone call at 4:10 AM. Or live in an RV on a tiny campsite near a busy (read that “noisy”) intersection. Or keep her stuck in a farm town (that doesn’t have very much to offer except about a dozen Mexican restaurants) all day on any day there was the slightest chance of rain.

So yeah, I’m getting paid to just wait around. But there’s a huge responsibility that goes with that — and zero tolerance for not doing the job right.

On Truck Problems and Unbelievably Good Luck

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They say we make our own luck, but how could I in this case?

I’m up in Central Washington State on a number of cherry drying contracts. My only means of transportation — unless you want to count my bicycle — is my husband’s 2001 Chevy Duramax Diesel pickup. It’s a great truck, well cared for and very reliable.

The other day, I started noticing that it was having trouble starting. It would start, but it needed more cranking than usual. I attributed that to my bad habit of listening to the stereo with the engine off while working on the helicopter. I figured that if I stopped doing that, the problem would go away after my next long, battery-charging drive to Wenatchee or Ephrata to fill the transfer tank with 100LL.

Yesterday was my big errands day. The weather was supposed to be good. I planned to do my laundry at 7:30 AM, then head up to Wenatchee to get some fuel, a new mattress for the RV, and some groceries. And maybe some sushi for lunch.

These grand plans came to a grinding halt when I turned the key in the truck. I waited, like a good girl, until the glow plug indicator (a diesel thing) had gone out, turned the key, and got the sound of an almost dead battery trying in vain to crank a diesel truck engine. Not enough juice.

Of course, I tried it a few more times. It just got worse.

I dialed my husband in Arizona. I figured I’d ask him if he’d ever experienced this kind of problem before and whether he had any tips on how I should start troubleshooting. But he wasn’t answering his phone.

And that’s when my next door neighbor here at the campground appeared, standing at the front of his travel trailer, wiping the sleep from his eyes. “Having trouble?”

He’d heard the dismal cranking sound and had come out to see if he could help. I produced a pair of jumper cables — the Girl Scout motto is “Be Prepared,” after all — and opened the hood. But instead of him pulling his pickup over to mine, he walked over with what looked like a brand new car battery. He put it on the ground beside the truck. Then he went back to his truck and came back with a battery tester. He tested both batteries in my truck. (Yes, it has two.) “They’re both a little low, but they should be okay. Sometimes it’s the connections. A loose wire or a gunked up terminal. Then the battery doesn’t charge right. You have terminals on the sides, but the ones on the top are better because they’re easier to keep clean.” He went on in the same vein, telling me more about car batteries than I ever wanted to know.

It was then that I remembered what this man did for a living: he traveled around the northwest, collecting and recycling car and truck batteries. In other words, he was a car battery expert.

How could I be so lucky?

We jump-started the truck from the battery he’d brought over and let it run for a while. That confirmed that the problem was not the starter. He pointed out where the connections could be a problem. I shut off the truck, then turned the key and restarted it. I asked him where I should go to get it fixed. He told me that if I took it to a car place, they’d probably try to sell me another battery, which I didn’t need. He was pretty sure I just needed my terminals cleaned. He said he could do it.

A Bad BoltTen minutes later, he was pulling off the terminal connectors and cleaning them with his wire brush. (For the record, I also had a wire brush in my toolbox.) One connector had quite a bit of corrosion — it might have been the culprit all along — and needed to be replaced; he pulled a new one out of his truck and did the job. (Do you know anyone who keeps new terminal bolts for side battery connections handy? Can you say Maria is lucky?)

We chatted while he worked. We talked about the geology of the area. He collected petrified wood and knew all about the Missoula Floods that had carved coulees through the volcanic rock of the area. “You should see them from the air,” I said.

“Yeah, that must be great.”

“When you’re done, I’ll take you and your wife.”

Ancient LakeSo when he was finished and I had everything put away, he followed me to the ag strip where the helicopter is parked. I had to do some interior reconfiguration — remove my helmet and the oil bottles under the front seat that I’m using for ballast, add headsets — and then we all climbed in. I took him and his wife for a 20-minute flight around the area that included downtown Quincy, Crescent Bar on the Columbia River, Quincy Lakes, the Gorge Amphitheater, and Frenchman’s Coulee. Along the way, I learned that he and I had the same birthday (different years) and that he’d won a helicopter ride when he was a kid in the late 1950s. He took pictures and said he’ll send me copies.

I really appreciated the way he stepped up and offered to help me with my truck problems. It’s nice to see that there are still people who are willing to come to a stranger’s assistance when they can. Most people couldn’t be bothered. Or they’d worry about liability.

He really appreciated the helicopter ride. He wouldn’t take any money for the parts or his hour or so of time in making the repair. This morning, before he and his wife headed out to their next campground, he stopped by to thank me yet again.

But it was me who needed to thank him again. Not only had he fixed my truck for free, but he’d given me a good excuse to go flying on a nice day — for a change.

No, It Doesn’t Work That Way

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I don’t provide services for free.

Today, a potential cherry drying client stopped by my trailer. I think he heard about me from the ag strip where my helicopter is parked; those guys do his spraying.

I stepped outside to chat with him. He introduced himself as a cherry grower with 22 acres of trees in town. Turns out, his three orchard blocks are right by another orchard I’m signed up to start drying in a few weeks, right at the peak of the season in this area.

“I figured that if you were in the area, you might cover my trees, too,” he said. “If I need you,” he added quickly.

Drying CherriesHis exact thoughts became pretty clear as the conversation progressed. He wanted to be able to call me to dry his cherry trees, but he wasn’t willing to pay a daily standby fee. He figured that the other growers were already paying me for that. He’d just get my services when he needed them. In other words, he’d get the same service and hourly dry rate they were getting, without paying for a contract.

I should make something clear here: without standby pay, there’s no way in hell I’d be here, sitting in an RV in Quincy, WA (of all places), watching the weather every waking hour. It’s not fun to be stuck in a farm town 24/7, on call during daylight hours on days that last 16 hours. It costs money to come up here and stay, it costs money to bring the helicopter here, it costs money to have the helicopter sit out on a concrete pad, idle when it could be doing tour/charter work someplace far more interesting. While it’s true that I make more per hour when I dry cherries than when I fly tourists, if it doesn’t rain, I don’t fly. I flew less than 5 hours over a nine week period last year; if it wasn’t for the standby pay, I would have lost a shitload of money. As it is, I barely broke even. So, needless to say, I won’t work for any grower who won’t pay standby. It’s fair to me and its fair to the other growers who do pay. I also wouldn’t expect any other pilot to do it. In fact, if I met another pilot who dried without standby, I’d chew his ear off. He’d not only be screwing himself, but he’d be screwing the rest of us, too.

I’m already stretched very thin for the period this guy “might” need me. In fact, I wouldn’t mind having a second helicopter around to help me with the contracts I do have — especially for about 5 days when I’m swamped. But I don’t have enough standby pay to pay a second pilot. I explained that to him. I suggested that he find a few other growers that wanted coverage and pool the standby money. I gave him a dollar amount to shoot for and told him the contract would be a minimum of two weeks.

He changed his tune a bit, making it sound as if he really didn’t need a helicopter. “Not much fruit this year,” he said. “Some guys won’t even pick. They’ll let the rain ruin the cherries and collect insurance.”

I countered that statement with what I’d heard. “They lost 60% of the crop in Mattawa. This isn’t like last year. Everyone has fewer cherries and every time a crop is lost those cherries become more valuable.”

I think he was a bit surprised that I knew what was going on. I wasn’t blowing smoke, either. I was speaking the truth and he knew it.

He told me a little about a local pilot who offered to dry his cherries last year with a big helicopter. He didn’t want standby pay. He’d never done it before and he just wanted practice, to learn how to do it.

“You want someone practicing over your trees?” I asked with the proper tone of disbelief.

“No,” he replied. “That’s why I turned him down.” He queried me about the kinds of helicopters and what was best for the job. I told him what I knew. Then he said, “I was thinking of buying a helicopter and just hiring someone to fly it for me.”

The absurdity of that statement made it difficult to reply with a straight face. “You might have trouble finding a pilot willing to come work for you only two or three weeks out of the year.” I also wondered whether that pilot would be satisfied to just sit around and wait, without pay, until it might be time to fly.

There wasn’t much of a conversation after that. He didn’t get what he wanted; I wouldn’t back down. I repeated my suggestion. “If a few of you get together and put in the money, I can get another pilot and can easily cover another 50 or 60 acres.”

“I don’t know if there’s anyone else.”

I knew there were plenty of other growers in town. Last year, they’d taken the cheap route and had lucked out. Maybe they’d even done it the year before that. But this summer was different. This summer, it was raining and unprotected crops were being ruined.

“I’ll get you my card,” I said, going back into the trailer. I came out and handed him the card. “Call me if you think you want coverage. But don’t wait until the last minute. I’ll need at least two weeks notice to find a pilot.”

I watched him drive off and went back inside. Will I hear from him? It depends how much it rains over the next two weeks.

I’ll be doing a rain dance later tonight.