The guest house on Hesketh Island

When you arrive at Hesketh Island as Lauri and Greg's guest, you will see this beautiful cabin on the cliff above their house. The story of this guest house is pretty unbelievable and entirely amazing.

I don't know diddly about building a house from scratch. I've torn apart an existing structure and renovated it. So that means I know a little about dry wall and paint, but absolutely nothing about cutting down trees and making lumber from them. When Greg and Lauri decided they needed a place for company to stay, they invited family and friends to join in the fun, much like the Quakers (for us city dwellers, think Witness, the movie with Harrison Ford). Obviously, an area had to be cleared.


And obviously, the trees were then turned into lumber. With a chain saw? Yup. Greg spent 2 years, cutting trees and milling them to get enough lumber to build the guest house.

Lauri tells me this is one year's worth of chain saw milling. Eventually they got themselves some milling equipment at their place in Kasilof for cutting up firewood and that helped.

The pilings go in the ground and the floor is started. I remember this part from my short stint as a helper when Lauri's house was being built -- her house in Kasilof, which was a cute cabin to begin with, before all the rooms got added. You must understand that you do not build any ol' time you please in Alaska. You have a few months in the summer and you get your tushy in gear. Of course, you have 20 hours of daylight, so that helps.

This is the first installment of the story of the island guest house. I will be back to tell you more tomorrow.

I leave you with this:

Take, and welcome joy within you:
Showers, flowers, powers,
Hatfulls, capfulls, lapfulls,
Treasures, measures, pleasures,
All be yours to enjoy!
~ Caitlin Matthews