CCF

gee Tim your a great story teller thats brilliant 

Cheers Steven! 

If all goes well, I will be starting up my journals again this Sunday. 

Cold here the past few days, has not reached much over -9. 

Nice work as usual Anders, the functionality you have added to this model is unbelievable! 

Nice work Steven, makes the shop look realistic mate. You must be almost done with the shop?

Don't bother finding big nose's list Tim, if you wrote it on paper it would destroy too many acres of forest :D :D

Wait till he sees this, you've asked for it now Gav!  :D

Nice farmyard you have going there Brian, Graham's sheds look a treat on your farmyard! 

Great stuff Tim... please repremand Gav.... he set off in a tractor without making any checks... he's got no fuel and very little oil pressure as well 

Not to mention his bad driving either... fancy getting stuck 

Cheers Marky! 

Good stuff Tim, how'd you know I like playing in the mud

Shut it big nose, at least I haven't caused the quantity of damage to the tractors that you have : :D

Cheers Gavin...I'm going to have to side on you with this one...do you want me to find Marky's ever growing list of damages to farm equipment?  :D

but there is still time Gav!! :D

nice work again Tim

Cheers Ben! 

Another great read Tim excellent, is that your house in the backround of one of the pics? you live in a lovely part of the world.

I'd do a bit of firing and Hiring if i was you some of those workers are a danger 

Cheers Garret...yes that is my house in the background mate. 

It will have to be a while before anyone new to the farm gets the sack...doing that requires topping Marky's list of tractor damages!  :D

Glad everyone liked this week's journal...hopefully only a few weeks more until the weather is good enough to start up the farming journals again. 

In the first two weeks of March, one of the things we like to do on the farm is start up our farm machinery to get the oil ready fro an oil change, and to make the farm machinery easier to start when needed in the spring. This week, we took out several tractors to get ready for the year, and get some farm work done.

Today, Dave hooked up the IH 5288 to the rear grader blade, and graded off the road from the barn to the fields. Although most of the roads were muddy, he was able to get the tractor through with no problems:

A view from the cab:

Continuing grading the road:

Cleaning up the rest of the snow on the road, looking from the back of the cab:

Turning around and heading back to the barn:

Driving through some of the muddier parts of the road:

Finishing up and driving back to the barn:

Meanwhile, Gavin, a recently hired farm employee is picking up a trailer that the farm lent to a local farm:

A view from the seat:

Continuing down the road:

It was not long until Gavin accidentally hit a soft spot on the road, and got the tractor stuck:

Gavin called Dave up on his cell phone to come pull him out of the soft spot in the road. Fortunately the 5288 was still warm, so he rode down with a chain to tow out the tractor. The 5288 had a bit of trouble getting to the tractor, but it made it through the soft spots on the road:

Hooking up the chain to the 560, and slowly pulling it out of the soft spot:

The 5288 managed to pull the 560 out from the soft spot. Seeing as the 560 would not be able to handle the soft roads, Gavin took the IH 5288 to retrieve the trailer, while Dave parked the 560 back in the barn:

Hate to say it, but that's all for this week folks!

Another great set of pictures Tris, nice silage setup you have going there. 

Nice job Kiwi Fruit mate, looks good that!

That Topsy Turvy Fergie is an ideal candidate for inclusion in Further Adventures of Marky & Bazza  :D ;D!!!

Thanks Tam mate...I think that gave me an idea for next week's episode!  :D

Nice work on your layout Smish, always enjoy seeing the farm layouts on here. 

Nice job Finn... haven't seen anything like this done before. 

A bit of snow in the early hours. The snow quickly turned to sleet, and now rain.

Nice work again Stephen...those vending machines make a nice touch to the shop. The lights are effective, nice progress! 

Today, the farm tried to clean up some of the light dusting that we received last Thursday. While the snow from the snow storm several weeks ago was still frozen solid, the light dusting was cleaned up easily.

Because the snow blower is in the shop with a cracked auger, we used the road grader to remove the snow instead. A farm employee is grading all of the snow from one road into a pile:

A view from the barnyard:

Finishing up the road, and parking the road grader off to the side of the road:

Meanwhile, Dave, a recently hired farm employee, is picking up the snow pile with the IH backhoe, and dumping it off to the side of the road:

A view from the cab:

Parking the backhoe off to the side of the road for the night:

Hate to say it, but that's all for this week folks!

*The Adventures of Marky and the evil Bazza" are now posted Here to keep the two different Cider Hill Journals seperated. *

Your new workshop is coming along nicely FM, those signs and various shop objects are making the workshop look realistic! Nice work mate! 

Happy birthday Bazza 

Luke's signature...suck it up and take it like a real man!  :D

Happy birthday Brian 

Looks like cracking weather too, i'm jealous sat here in the rain of the UK, can't wait til i'm over there in 2 years time! All the pictures you and Tris post are very encouraging and i'm sure alot of the younger generation on FTF could be motivated in to following in your footsteps!

Indeed, I know they have encouraged me! Hopefully when I get college out of the way, this may be something I would like to try! 

The fact markey is been let of his well deservied numpty  \

Be careful chap...I remember you were let off of a certain one that had to do with time zones.  :D

Nice work on the gates there, nice farmyard scene aswell. 

Went searching for Eagles again with a friend of the family form NY, now sitting at my computer making 1/16th creme pie tins for tommorow's Marky and Bazza episode. 

Another great conversion job mate, nice work!