A Stir Crazy Weekend

A cheerful sight, needed during these difficult times of the pandemic.

Visit #1238, Sunday 22 March 20, 7:40-10:15AM, 5.0 miles, 8.6lbs., of litter.
Temps in the high 20's, sunny skies, with a biting wind from the north.

That daffodil above is one of the first to pop. Virus or no virus, the daffodils will bloom.

One thing I noticed in the midst of the virus-MANY more people are out on the trails and the road in Hubbard Park. Obviously, all the government recommendations to practice social distancing is making people stir-crazy, and I'm surprised this has prompted people to do something they normally wouldn't do-take a hike. This was confirmed by a phone call I received from someone up at Castle Craig the previous day.

They said the number of people they were seeing was easily 3X the number they would see on any other weekend, which was surprising since the road was closed to vehicles.

I wasn't looking for people Sunday morning, but I did spot this early morning mountain biker on the trail.

I was in search of graffiti I tried removing a couple weeks ago.

Enroute, I found some gold. Or at least it seems to have the VALUE of gold now.

I reached the beehive fountain, where my sandpaper did a pretty good job then, but I wanted more.

I brought a couple solvents to see which worked better.

I applied with a scrub brush but frankly, I didn't see much improvement with either. We'll have to call sandpaper the winner here, and the results aren't that bad.

Up the trail I went, then walked the road down toward Merimere Reservoir and my next test.


Last time I had a hard time reaching the graffiti, so today I built and used my latest invention, The Big Q-Tip.

The Big Q-Tip and lacquer thinner were the winner here.

I forgot to take an After photo, but trust this graffiti is gone, without removing the yellow sign paint.

On the back side of the sign I had some difficulty. I think the Big Q-Tip was absorbing all the solvent.

I wanted to reach that with some sandpaper, so I put on my thinking cap and dug into my bag o' tricks.

Now this shortypants was rocking! Sandpaper put the icing on the cake.

Heading back to the park, I ran into all those stir crazy people, but it certainly was eerie seeing the playscape completely empty.

Next week: a Power Tools Weekend®.