Parcel 4

A few years ago, the lady who owned The Homestead before us made a "lot line adjustment" to give a small .14 acre piece of the property to her daughter and son-in-law who lived next door.  Because it was the third time the original property was split, that piece became "Parcel 4" to the county tax authorities.  Anyway, this family transaction was done with a handshake and the deed that they recorded was scrawled on the back of an envelope—almost literally.  What it clearly did not indicate was joint tenancy as between the daughter and son-in-law.  In Utah, evidently, tenancy in common is assumed if joint tenancy is not explicitly noted.  (Note to DIY Unlicensed Attorneys:  This matters.  As we shall see.)

With the lot line adjustment, The Homestead became a .36 acre rectangle with one owner, and the daughter's property behind it became a .36 acre rectangle with three owners.  Bear with me here, we are getting into the minutia of stupid property transactions.  Without realizing it, the daughter and son-in-law had created three different real property ownerships on "their" land.  On the .22 acre piece in front was the house that they were living in.  It was owned by Chase Manhattan Bank.  On parcel 4 they had unwittingly created two 50% ownerships—one was the daughter's and one was the son-in-law's.  As my reader knows, under tenancy in common, this 50% ownership doesn't mean that you own half the property, it means that you own half of the rights to the whole property.

Trust me, it gets better:  At some point after this wheeling and dealing, the son-in-law got cancer and died.  There was one son, but no will and no probate.  Hang in there, this is starting to get interesting:  After a suitable period of mourning, the daughter married a different guy, and he moved onto her real property estate.  The four of them lived over there—daughter, new husband, step-son, and new baby—for a couple years after we had purchased The Homestead.  They didn't seem to care much about the place, and it became trashy and run down.  They left dirty diapers in the yard, kept a couple of yappy dogs, and brought in a bunch of un-penned chickens.

Abruptly, last summer, the daughter and new husband and the rest of the family moved out of the house.  They had stopped paying Chase Manhattan six months or a year before, and the bank had finally evicted them.  A property management company came in to clean up the mess, and a dull-witted realtor put a sign on the street.  The property had been foreclosed and Chase Manahattan was offering it for sale, the whole .36 acres.  After a suitable period of mourning, we made an offer on the property—contingent on the bank's ability to prove they owned the whole piece.  The bank's realtor insisted that they did, but after some research at the county recorder's office, I concluded that he was wrong (like I said, he was a great guy).  So, when I saw the daughter and new husband at the county fair, I made them an offer for parcel 4.  They verbally accepted and told me to give them a call about signing a contract.  When I called a few days later, they told me that they had just declared bankruptcy and were not allowed to conduct business without the permission of the United States Bankruptcy Court.

In the meantime, another party made an offer on the bank's house.  It was, evidently, a better offer than ours and, moreover, came with no contingencies.  When the bank showed up at the closing, however, they had only the house and .22 acres to sell because parcel 4 had never belonged to them.  Parcel 4 was now in the control of a bankruptcy court and a dead guy—with 50% ownership each.  So, we made them each an offer.  Actually, we offered to buy the property from the court, but the trustee told us that he only had the daughter's 50% to sell.  If we wanted the rest, we would have to wait until he could get a state court (not the federal bankruptcy court) to probate the dead husband's estate.  In the event, the trustee determined that probate was unnecessary and that the federal bankruptcy judge had the authority to sell the dead husband's 50% share.

When the court order and the real estate purchase contract showed up at our title company, the escrow officer we use, Steve, balked.  The title company attorneys decided that only the state court could probate the 50% share, and that the federal court had no authority in the matter.  So, there we sat.  I called and had a friendly chat with Steve each week as he waited for his corporate legal department to make a final ruling.  On Wednesday they did:  In favor of the transaction.  The federal bankruptcy court's order will stand.  We met Steve on Thursday morning to sign the paperwork.  The title should record tomorrow.  Parcel 4 now belongs to Rural Ways.

St. George Art Festival

Don't forget the St. George Art Festival coming up later this week.  VSO will be showing on Friday and Saturday in the "new" Town Square of the historic district of St. George, Utah.  She will be debuting a number of paintings, of which the one pictured is my favorite.  You can show up with your checkbook early on Friday to fight for it, or you can make me an offer today to secure your purchase.  If you wanted to start in, say, the mid-five digits (that is five digits to the left of the decimal), I might give you some pre-festival access to this masterpiece.

Near Spring

I've lived in southern Utah long enough to know that we are not yet free of the snow and ice.  We are, however, in the middle of a March thaw that puts me in mind of spring.  The equinox is not until later in the week, but already we've had temps over 70F.  The last frost was, I think, five or six days ago.  The bulbs—crocus, daffodil, tulip—are out of the ground and starting to bloom.  The buds on the elm trees are swollen.  We are burning only in the morning, and I've still got plenty of my March wood stacked and waiting.  I finished pruning the fruit trees yesterday.  The yard, such as it is, has turned green.  And, of course, around the edges of The Farm my ears are starting to catch the song of the lark.

Alta

After losing our way at Snowbird yesterday, we brought Saurer in to make sure we found the best turns at Alta.  And we did.  (Of course, being that it was Alta, could there really be any bad turns?)  Things started slowly with a Castle hike and a handful of turns in some stiff wind-blown crud.  After that we spent a few minutes following Saurer into a steep section with a couple of signs that said "Cliff Area."  That didn't work  too well, and required some extra hiking.  But, by the time we settled in for the afternoon, there was nothing that could go wrong.  The weather was bluebird, the snow was creamy, the company was excellent.  We lapped Greeley, the Gun Sight, and Alf's—several times each.  It was not possible to make a bad turn.  The conditions were outstanding.  A great day on the crik.

Snowbird II

Benson and Wally weren't the only ones dropping in on Great Scott today.  Rural Ways sometime skis, too.  Proof.

Snowbird

We were supposed to have nice weather.  Instead, we got wind driven ice chrystals.  There were times when the clouds took away our visibility and the ice seemed to strip the skin from our faces.  Along with that, there was some stiff crud and plenty of exposed rock.  On the other hand, dropping into Great Scott with Benson and Wally can make up for a lot.  Besides, if it were easy, they wouldn't call it Snowbird.

Two Laps in Center Creek

We got one more little burst of snow yesterday afternoon, so we decided to try Center Creek before the sun did too much damage.  The results were mixed.  VSO laid down a pretty nice track in the fresh snow—cold beneath the surface.  But, on the next lap, the sun had warmed the track and turned it a little sloppy.  By the time I got to the top it was feeling like the beginning of a slog fest.  That is the problem with these spring storms.  One day it is winter, and the snow is light and soft; the next day it is summer, and the snow is heavy and sticky.  Two laps was all we got on this day.

The Point

First there was Elk Meadows, but they went bankrupt and the area was derelict for a while.  Now there is Eagle Point:  A little four or five lift alpine ski area abutting the Tushar Mountains about 20 miles east of Beaver, Utah.  I went up there for an hour on Thursday to ski a few laps.

Let's start with the bad:  The resort is split into two different pieces, one on each side of the highway.  There are two lodges, two parking lots, two snack bars, etc, but they are not very well connected, and you can't buy lift tickets on the good side.  So, you have to drive up to the upper lodge, wait in line for your ticket in the rental shop, and then drive all the way back down to the parking lot on the other side.  They run a shuttle bus between the parking lots, but, I mean, that is a lot of fooling around.  Then from the lower side parking lot, you have to walk up the stairs to the lodge, across the deck, and down a little bunny slope before you can get to the main lift.  To get back to your car, you have to ride the bunny chair back to the lodge and do all that in reverse.  In sum, the thing is awkwardly designed and it takes 35 minutes to get yourself together and half-way up the lift.  It sure ain't like Alta, where you can pull up to the bottom of Wildcat and be skiing the steeps in ten minutes.  (Heck, ain't no place like Alta, it's hardly fair comparing.)

Now the good:  The southern half of the resort has pretty danged good terrain.  I mean, for southern Utah, I wasn't expecting much, but there are some nice turns to be had.  It isn't steep like . . . well, like another place I like to go . . . but it is a nice steady fall line, with a few challenging obstacles.  It is not heavily skied, so it stays soft all day.  It has good north facing snow, so there are no bare spots.  It is just very pleasant skiing, and hard not to look like a hero.  (Except for one guy, who stopped next to me and began complaining in a heavy French accent that there was something wrong with the powder, and that he just couldn't seem to turn 'em like he expected to.  "Maybe there is something wrong with my skis," he said.  I looked down at his brand new $2,500 set-up.  "Yeah," I agreed, "maybe it is your skis.")

Indian Creek

This time I made it to Indian Creek.  It was another bark beetle reconnaissance mission.  But, in contrast to the North Fork of North Creek, where we were last week, the beetles in Indian Creek were plentiful.  Many of the ponderosa pines that survived the Twitchell Fire are now infested with Mountain Pine Beetle.  Most of them will die.  It's too bad.  There are some nice looking trees in those stands.

Steve again made sure I had snowmobile transportation.  In addition, he invited several other colleagues.  It was a regular motor-head rendezvous out there.  Fortunately, there were no creek crossings:  I was able to keep the machine upright and on top of the snow.  Am I getting better, or was it just luck?