Posted by Andrew:
The crappy crapper that was here when we moved in.
No kidding, less than a foot into the dirt and we hit frozen ground. With all the dry weather, fire is a questionable means, but on the first rainy day we had a small fire and made some progress. Got us down to maybe 24 inches or so.
With no more rain, it was back to pick and shovel work. It's been slow going, with about four to six inches of progress each day, just what has thawed since the previous days activity.
Swinging a pick in a small hole certainly gets harder the deeper you get. After the fishing trip with George, the hole had been sitting for four days and was thawed pretty well for about a foot a half. It's amazing being able to just slide the spade into dirt you were unable to work loose with a pick ax last time you were at it!
Finally a good soaking rain for a couple days and we had a nice campfire size fire in the rain for about 4 hours. I picked and shoveled the bottom down to frozen ground, and flattened it out before the campfire and was at 52 inches
After the fire...
Once again it was just amazing how easy the shovel was slid into dirt you couldn't pick loose 12 hours ago! Patience is the name of the game it seems. We'll still go a little farther I imagine, as this is not a process you want to repeat anytime soon.