The Final Step: Making a Kayak Trail Part 3
in my last video I was getting very close to completing my kayak Trail however things have changed first of all the good news is it's actually going to warm up but the bad news is the weather is changing drastically there's something called a weather bomb coming to New Brunswick I'm not going to be out here building I'm going to be inside taking shelter and crossing my fingers well the sun's gone down it's raining outside and uh the wind isn't too bad yet however it is actually now warmer outside than it is in the cabin because I haven't had the stove going just started it up now should warm up pretty quick well if you ever have to weather out a storm this is the way to do it in front of a cozy fire now the weather bomb as it's called was pretty devastating last year and you probably think I should be a little bit nervous but um I don't think it's going to be that bad yes the winds are supposed to go up to like 100 km an hour which is is about uh what's that about 60 mph which I know in in Florida when it's 60 MPH the kids all go out they all go out and fly their kites right but here 60 mph winds are pretty can be pretty devastating especially uh when the ground saturated and I really haven't done a lot of preparations for this you know I've got a bag over there with a few you know just minor things like some soups and uh uh just enough food for like a day really I've got coffee and I've got oatmeal for breakfast I think that's all I need a few snacks and uh my blue container of water I don't need the microwave as a matter of fact I'm not using uh a AC right now it's not hooked up I'm just using DC it's just to run the lights it's all I need right now uh I didn't even bring my computer don't want to work on it sometimes it's nice to get away from the computer just watch the Flames of a fireplace I mean that's the way it should be really okay let me show you what a weather bomb looks like I've got my windy app on my phone and I'm just going to hopefully that's going to focus I know it's going to take a sec but if you look right around here you'll see Nova Scotia and Atlantic Canada and uh all that red and blue that's coming up from the south is the wind and uh the more blue and purple it is the faster it is so you can see it's coming up here but this is only for 9:00 now I will show you what windy app says it's going to look like at 3:00 in the morning kind of scary isn't it? but uh we'll see uh it's supposed to peek around 3:00 in the morning and uh if I don't hear any trees falling I'm probably going to sleep right through it oh I can hear the wind I'd say maybe 50 km an an hour now not too severe well I really don't like losing trees but when they do come down there are at least some benefits like the ones I had to clear out because uh there was just too many I needed to thin out by the oceans side well that was 2 years ago and they're right here that's what I made this couch out of and the ones from a year ago from the devastating storms and all the trees came down well they're up there on the ceiling right now those are the the ones that are drying but the rest are right here and that's what's keeping me warm well it's about 2:30 in the morning very close to the peak of the wind I want to show you what it looks like outside so I put a light out there but anyway got to open the door first I think you can hear that now I'm going to let let you see it that's a little bit of a lull right now it comes in gusts Here Comes one my trail camera caught me walking around during the storm with a flashlight note the temperature and time I think that's enough whoah it's getting worse better go back inside at dawn I only had one thing on my mind coffee well apparently um a lot of New Brunswick is out of power including this area as well there are 426 outages affecting 54,057 people so uh a lot of people without power except for me my furry friends were out looking for breakfast as well hey Prudence there's Eloise back there you come to say hello did you come to see how I was were you scared of the storm oh yep a little scared there they go they were just checking up on me wow there really isn't much I mean there's no damage at all cabin's fine I still have all my trees you know there's a few branches down and some styrofoam I didn't uh store properly but I was lucky despite the blackout that which probably means there are some down trees somewhere it really didn't seem to affect my uh my cabin at all well that weather bomb has inconvenienced a lot of people there's blackouts all across New Brunswick and the power is not going to be on again for some time but for me it was a blessing because it brought that warm air uh around midnight last night it was actually 14° C somewhere around 55° f for mid December is fantastic it warmed up the ground the uh the soil thawed out I was able to do some straightening and put a few anchors at the bottom and it's going to get cold again so there's one more thing I got to do and I got to do it real quick and that's put the gravel down the gravel pile is actually thawed out as well but it's not going to get it's not going to last long no more talking got to get working the gravel I used was the same grade as what was used when I had the driveway excavated last year as I got them to throw in an extra pile just for this kayak path now I expect some smartass is going to ask why didn't I just use a bucket to carry the gravel down to the bottom instead of going up and down those stairs to the wheelbarrow well I did that for the last part but every time I went up and down I compacted the gravel with my feet once the gravel was laid I compacted it a little bit more by pushing down with the head of a sledgehammer well that's it I don't know how many steps I took up and down but it was a lot every Dawn brings something different to New Brunswick it's a cold one this morning -14 C I think around I don't know 12° F somewhere around there and I am dressed for the occasion the ground is rock hard again Frozen but before it froze again um I did get the platform secured it's nice and stable it's bolted and I also put three anchors below here and one final step all that's remaining is this area here um I am going to put the stairs going down here the first thing I got to do is a little bit of cutting look at the steam coming off that by making the platform under 6 ft long permitted me to buy culled deck boards for only $2 each giving me a pressure treated floor for just $10 screws not included I was making good progress but I still had some cutting to do back at the cabin so I'm now in the final steps of the kayak path and that's literally because there are final steps that I still have to make um what I have to do is make stairs from the platform down to the ground and to support those steps I need stringers now this is a Stringer right here and uh you can buy these and I did price them locally uh they're about $50 each and I need three so that's $150 for a few chunks of wood it's like nope not going to happen I actually paid $4 for this piece of wood it was culled Lumber and made my first one myself and I'm going to make two two more and I'm going to show you uh the other two pieces were actually from my demolition of you know the the ugly ugly Edition that was right here in this very spot these were uh the beams and I've just cut them down to size now to do this yourself it's actually really really easy you don't need a lot of tools I mean right here I've got an angle finder I've got a square I got some tape and I've got a uh pencil also need a circular saw and a reciprocating saw and power of course now to start this off it's pretty straightforward I'm just going to show you in detail here so the first thing I got to do is take a little bit off this corner and it needs to be at an angle of 135° and I've got that set at 135° right now and I put it like that this piece is at an angle and I have to put I have to put a line from here to here that is 4" long now I've got my square and right where it is there we go right here I've got a mark in tape as to where 4" is and I'll just line that up a little bit more about well let's say there that looks good right there draw my mark there's 4 inches now the next piece the next uh Mark is 90 so I just go on that there line that up with the edge which is about there and there is the next one which is probably something like 10" long now after that you've got to make the steps and uh I'll just put these back in the picture here these guys right here to do that I've got my uh my Square marked off here and here this is a depth of 7 in and a width of 10 in so all I have to do line the two marks that I've got with the tape and one two and I just go on down the line it's so easy now at the very end you've got one last 90 which goes to the 5 in mark which is about there and then you're bringing it back 8 in that way it's hard to see here but yeah that's 8 in and there you go it's all marked up to cut each V section I only meet the corner with the top part of the blade more about that later on because the bottom of each V is not cut all the way through I just give a little push and it breaks off I use the reciprocating saw to cut the remaining divot out well the end is near the end of the day is near as well so we better get going so the platform has the deck boards on it and I've put in the Stringer brackets right there they're nailed in place I've got one just sitting there next one goes here seems okay and the next one good as well should be able to uh just put a board on here and I've got the uh the stairs cut as well it's easier to have uh two a pair of 2x6 but I didn't have any these are 2x8s so there's a little piece that's going to go in the back as well that looks pretty close should do it okay now the next challenge is I have to attach the stringers to the brackets the best way of doing this is with construction screws unfortunately I have nails and uh because uh you can either do them underneath or at the side it would be really hard for me to nail these underneath right now so I'm going to do the side but as I'm nailing it this is just going to pop out so what I got to do is nail and I'm going to brace it with my pry bar at the same time I hope this works gloves got to come off serious now the gloves are off I use 3-in deck screws to secure the tread boards to the stringers I did add more screws later on but for this stage I only used enough to test it in case I had to adjust along with the final gravel step I also added one in between to compensate for the deck blocks this was made from 2x6 and fastened to the stringers with angle brackets well there it is I now have a kayak Trail however the sun is just going below the Horizon and I've got to clean up all the tools so uh not going to try it out tonight probably tomorrow grab the kayak and we'll see how it works or not as the next day was Christmas Eve and the weather decided it was going to be a white Christmas Eloise didn't mind and just continued to roll as a hedge trimmer but Squirrely Temple seemed a little sad as it meant it was time for the big sleep as for the trail this was not a good day to go kaying well on Christmas Eve had a little bit of snow about 8 in but uh I let it sit for a few days and it's only about 4 in sometimes it just pays to procrastinate but it is supposed to warm up above freezing again and so what I thought I'd do is I'd clean the snow off the path that way when it's warm enough to kayak I'm all ready to go looks like the deer have been using it don't know if they've been kayaking though but remember this is New Brunswick as the year was about to end so did the snow it's a beautiful day I love it! all right! my first kayak outing this year on the last day of December New Year's Eve I'll take it well I now know the kayak path works and it's pretty easy and I also know that uh it's possible I could kayak all year around if I have the right clothing I don't have it right now I am wearing a wet suit under here I if you can see it or not but uh what I think I need is a dry suit they're rather expensive so I'm going to have to save up my pennies but I hope you enjoyed this video check out my others as well and Happy New Year!
2025-01-05 16:18
