By Saturday all but one of the main players in the chalet move have arrived in camp. The helicopter flights continued all weekend. The two trail guards were stationed with radios at each end of the trail leading into the chalet. In between helicopter flights, hikers were allowed through.

Hikers and media people stopped to chat with Rainey. We were amazed at how many people came from all over the U.S. to see the chalet before it was moved. Bill Brager (Forks Miller Tree Inn) and his hiking buddy arrived in camp to see the chalet. I was especially impressed with one elderly couple.

They were carrying heavy backpacks, using walking sticks, the man sporting braces on both knees and they were hiking all the way through to the Dosewallips with the main purpose of seeing the chalet one last time.

Everyone we talked to seemed very much in favor of the project to save the chalet. While we were busy getting meals prepared, Rainey McKenna, ONP Public information officer, who was very adept at the politics of her job, was talking with media people who had hiked in to get information for their various newspapers. Rainey and Jeff had cordoned off a large area around the chalet and requested that for safety reasons, no one go inside that area.

It’s hard to describe the frantic work that continued from daylight until dark as the house moving crew continued to prepare the chalet for the move, stopping only to eat or to get another load of supplies being flow in by the helicopter. Inside walls were braced with 2 by 4 by 10-foot studs and on Saturday they “picked” the house.

This is house movers’ term for raising the house in preparation of moving it. When the chalet was picked, several large chunks of the riverbank caved in and large pieces of the concrete foundation that was hanging over the edge fell over the bank. Jeff was worried about the stability of the chalet and very anxious to get it moving away from the bank.

Late Saturday evening, Lisa Tourecet, ONP Maintenance facility manager, arrived in camp after hiking 20 miles in from Staircase. Lisa had not yet had the opportunity to hike that particular trail, so she decided to come in from the Dosewallips side. While many park employees spend a lot of time in the office, most cherish the park wilderness and use every opportunity to get on the trail and enjoy the wilderness that they are responsible to preserve.

We were now waiting on the steel beams and one important player, Del Davis, of DB Davis House Moving of Everett. Jeff, the contracted house mover for the chalet job, and Del have been friends for years. Del had been facilitating all of the helicopter loads at the landing, radioing Jeff Monroe with each new dilemma.

For many years they helped each other with some very difficult house moving projects and Jeff was very anxious for Del to get done at the helicopter landing and join him at the chalet. Like Jeff, Del had been moving houses since he was a youngster. He is a third-generation house mover. His grandpa started out moving houses in Wisconsin with a team of Belgian horses.

In the afternoon Sara and I saddled our horses and delivered one of the trail guard’s lunches by pony express.

We rode several miles east of the chalet heading upriver toward Anderson Pass, which historically was a stock trail, but due to slides and trail creep, has not been accessible to stock on the west end of Anderson Pass. When we reached a place where the trail started getting narrow we decided to turn around. It wouldn’t be good to take any chances on a horse slipping off the trail when we had a hungry crew depending on us for supper.