The road to Delilah Lookout has been improved significantly since last year. It’s still dusty but except for a couple of easy to avoid rocks the road was mostly smooth. A sedan can easily make it up for now.
With the help of several members of the Facility Team, the District Lookout and two Forest Service Patrols, we opened Delilah’s cab on Tuesday May 21, 2024. Delilah was in really good shape with only very minor issues.
Initially we were concerned that some large black “droppings” were from a rat, but we quickly found them to be dead flies. Whew. We may install a wire mesh over the drainpipe at the base to see if that mitigates the issue next year. Last year’s maintenance work on the radio repeater shed worked very well, with no signs of water getting inside the structure.
There were light water stains on the edges of several counter maps. They were slightly protruding from the map case, where they were stored for the winter, and we think some water may have landed on them after dripping off the plastic cover. No other maps in the case looked to be damaged. We had a little bit of standing water under the door mat, but much less than last year. We saw no other signs of water damage in the cab.
Hopefully the base radio will be installed before we go into service on Friday, May 24.
Two of the three solar panels, which power the two alertcalifornia.org cameras, were pulled off their mounts as some point. We are not sure if it was winter weather or vandals that knocked them off but this is most certainly why we lost the feed over the past months.
Patrol 31 pumped 80 gallons into the water tank and we still had 75% in the propane tank. The stove and refrigerator up and running. Hopefully, we can get the air out of the heater’s gas line this weekend and get it warming the cab.
We had a several moments of missing Jim Stiglich. Jim always attached the rope to the pully system. We had to go back and look at past photos and videos to see how the master rigged it. Working on the heater pilot light and looking at the instructions printed by Jim’s hand reinforced his absence and our appreciation for the years of dedication he gave to BRF and to Delilah lookout.
So, our tall front country lookout is ready to get to work. California Buckeye is in bloom everywhere as are huge swaths of Madia and Farewell to Spring flowers, which are both having a big season.
Here is a link to our Team Member’s video of the road to Delilah:
Driving up to open Delilah Lookout on the freshly bulldozed road. (youtube.com)
More photos and videos of the day have been posted on our Facebook page at “Buck Rock Foundation”.
