My how time flies!

   Where has the time gone? over a year since I posted anything...best laid plans I guess. We really didn't even have a Summer here in Oregon, it quit raining in July sometime, and with our youngest graduating high school, and finally getting to see the grandkids, it's been hectic to say the least!

    I built what started out to be a carport  attached to the garage, didn't want another year of all my crap getting ruined by the weather.  I got that dried in , the wife said it almost looks professional, so I guess that's as close of a compliment I'm going to get out of her.Anyway, I also have a metal frame I've been wanting to make into a garage for years, so I been frantically been trying to get a roof on that too, up there till after dark last night, got the framing squared up and some decking on. I'm afraid I'm fighting a losing battle this time of year though, might have to tarp it and take up the battle next spring.

   Onward to the trailer , the poor thing is tarped under the metal frame being used as storage right now, I have been thinking about the restoration and what I want as an end result. I was thinking as a goal was to have it done by next summer and take the grandkids camping.

 

   I guess it's like John Lennon said , "Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans."

The Rescue

After checking it out ,I said yeah, thats pretty much what I'm looking for. Now Richard's the type that likes to get things done, a quality that I lack, so he says ,"let's get the forklift and pull it out."

"NOW?!?", I ask , "Sure why not, we got time." he replies.



 Breaking free of the death grip the blackberries had on this old girl. She's been sitting in this field for at least a few years, and in another field for another few years before that. Cleaning out the garbage inside, I discovered a power bill, from 1995, it had a Salem,Oregon address,
Rose Haven Mobile Park. It's not a full blown Mobile Home Park, but one of the smaller types that take travel trailers, and this particular park is located in the seedier part of town. So I'm thinking that this old girl hasn't been used for a good decade, if not more.

Those vines had grown over the top and down the other side, the rear end was covered and they were working their way toward the front, and total engulfment.At this point I don't even know what this trailer is, just that it's an old ,cool, Canned Ham. Tuns out that it's a 1968 Aloha Brand Travel Trailer, made right here in Oregon, originally in Aloha Oregon,west of Portland,hence the name, then moved to Beaverton Oregon.

    

 Getting her out,we ended up having to use the forklift because there were beehives in front of the tongue, so we didn't have a straight shot and couldn't hook up to it. You can barely see a corner of one of the hives in the lower right near the tire.

Now this is where the problems begin, I've always fancied myself a farmboy, but truth be told, I'm a flat land city slicker, born and raised. The fork started sliding on the tongue, so I chained it to the fork, but instead of loose, and room to move, I wrapped it nice and tight....BAD IDEA! The forklift and trailer were at a 90 degree angle to each other, but when it started coming out, it also straightened out toward a 180 degree with each other. Needless to say, it bent the #@%$* out of it, more on that later.

Best sign out for now, daylights burnin'.

                                                                                  Take care my friends

Stop!...let me add a little side note,

The 1979 Titan, Behold now The Behemoth!

 poor thing needs gutted and mechanically gone through, a little too much for me to take on right now.

after romancing and researching it for awhile , I decided it would be a lot cheaper to find a trailer.

Love at First sight continued...

So anyway where was I?...oh yea,I was helping my friend Richard several months back move a couple rigs he had laying around his place, he wanted them moved to the upper bone yard , in the south 40. I spotted this trailer in the blackberry bushes so I asked Richard about it. He said he gave it to another guy, so i left it at that, it was a old canned ham, what i was looking for, but oh well.
   
I'm a Union Journeyman Electrician ,and things are still pretty slim here in Oregon. They say the recession over a year ago...Pfffssssttt!!!! We still are over 10% unemployment here.I'm thinking I gotta hit the road, and I don't really enjoy life out of a suitcase, so a RV makes a lot of sense.
  

   Fast forward to Aug. 2010,I asked Richard again about a RV, he has a couple class A's , a Winnebago and a 1979 Titan, we talked about the Titan, it's 23' self contained, I romanced it for a while, obsessed really..... it needs gutted, but being in construction for 25 years it didn't scare me.  A couple weeks went by,I asked him about the trailer again, and he told me that the guy he gave the trailer to passed away. Well I asked whats going to happen to the trailer, he said he'll ask the widow. A week later  he said she didn't know much about it, and if he had a use for it, he could have it back. I said  let's go check it out, and that's where we pick up the story....

Love at first sight??

Here's another shot of her as is, haven't got inside yet.I had been looking for a canned ham style trailer for awhile, and my friend Richard had this one sitting in a field.I had inquired a few months earlier about it, but he said that he had given it to a guy to use as a coffee trailer at rest stops on I-5 for the Elks, Eagles,Lion's, or some other critter, I can't remember which.  She's not quite as vintage as I was hoping, but a good one to get me started.The plot thickens, but I don't want to get long winded ,so I'll continue later

Let's get this Party started!!!

Well folks, I've rescued another "fixer upper", I'm just an old softy I guess, a humane society of rusty rigs. A friend of mine had this old canned ham style trailer parked up on the south 40 bone yard out on his farm. At first , we didn't even know what it was, it was covered with black berry bushes. I live in the Willamette Valley, which is the "Eden at the end of the Oregon Trail", and the only thing thicker than the blackberries is the rain, and let me tell you,we've had our fair share this year so the black berries were out of control . This poor thing was swallowed up, and we didn't bring lopper's . Stay tuned for the exciting rescue mission...