Original subtitles

Sam: We're in a pretty unique situation living out here in port protection.

(lightening sound)

sometimes, you get this really deep sense of isolation.

You know, it's like, you know, "my god."

you can stand alone, but it's always good

when you have other people around you that you can rely on.

You know, the weather is actually supposed to get,

it said rain in the morning,

didn't say anything about rain in the evening.

Hopefully, this ceiling is gonna lift a little bit.

But I bet you once we make it around the corner, it'll get a lot better.

Matt: Yeah, I imagine.

Sam: Me and my oldest boy, matt,

we're gonna get his boat all pinned together

and we're gonna go down to shipley bay.

We're gonna do a little deer hunt.

It'll be nice to get underway.

Matt: I am behind right now.

I have not put away any of my own venison for winter.

If I don't harvest a deer this year, I'm going to be scrounging.

Hopefully, there'll be something around,

willing to stand in front of my bullet.

Sam: Gotta be very delicate with this.

This was probably grandpa's, and I inherited it from him.

Matt: Looks like a treasure map.

Sam: Shipley bay.

Matt: I'm excited actually to, uh, visit this place.

I've, uh, I've heard about this place my entire life.

I named my daughter after it but I've never been in here.

I'm just, uh, really curious to check it out.

Narrator: As winter closes the window of opportunity,

competition among the hunters of port protection rises.

To increase their odds of bagging a deer,

sam and matt carlson will travel to a remote cove nearly 20 miles away,

hoping for untouched terrain.

Sam: Well, we're way off the beaten path now.

There's, uh, no chance, I don't think, that anybody's been in here ahead of us.

(laughs)

matt: Looks like you went and did it and got yourself a tree stand, finally.

Sam: I've been looking at them for 20 years.

Matt: My father and I have extremely different hunting styles.

Sam: Some assembly required.

The older I get, the less I'm able to hike over hill

and over dale so I'm gonna take a climbing deer stand

with me and see if I can make it work.

I'm gonna find a good tree to climb while matt goes out into the bush.

Matt: Good luck. Sam: All right.

Yeah, I'm, uh, like you say, call me at noon for sure.

Matt: 'kay. Will do. Sam: And if I hear a gunshot,

I'll look in a few minutes, I'll dig the radio out.

Matt: Okay. Fare thee well.

Breanna: Port protection's pretty isolated.

You can survive out here alone, but at some point,

you need another person to help.

In port protection, we're all alone together out here.

Oliver: Oh, well, you know how in prison they use cigarettes for currency.

Firewood's kinda the same thing we got going on out here.

Breanna: Yeah, really.

It looks like we only have about a day and a half left.

Oliver: This is our only source of heat.

I think we should get over and get a little bit more of this nice hemlock here.

Breanna: Am I gonna fall it?

Oliver: Yeah, I was thinking you could fall it. Are you okay with that?

Breanna: Okay. I'm willing to do it. Give it a try.

Oliver: That's what I want to hear, man. Hell, yeah.

Breanna: My name's breanna miethe, I'm 27 years old.

I live in port protection with my partner, oliver.

This is our second year here.

We first met in eighth grade in wrangell, alaska.

We didn't really like each other right off the get-go.

But he seemed to grow on me.

Oliver: Hmm, yeah.

Breanna: Now, we've been together 12 years and we're the best of friends.

A big draw to moving out to port protection was to be able to own

your own place at our age and to say,

"all that I own is because of the hard work I've put in."

oliver: People say I'm a sponge.

I try to soak up any information and knowledge I can anywhere I can.

I've acquired a lot of skills along the way, hunting and fishing.

Breanna: There's definitely a stereotype for women in southeast

alaska not being able to keep up with the men.

But that's definitely not the case for me.

I do everything a guy could do. I'm definitely capable.

We're gonna tow it over to this beach, then, over here and buck it up?

Oliver: Yeah. We'll tow right between that derelict boat

and that yellow cedar over there.

Breanna: Be more accessible there in a cold snap.

Oliver: Yeah. Breanna: Okay. Oliver: Yeah.

Breanna: That sounds good. Oliver: Smart thinking, chicken.

Breanna: I would say one of the most challenging parts of living on a float house

is definitely being surrounded by water.

It could get pretty frigid inside there.

You can't afford to run low on firewood out here.

Oh, do you want to get this stuff gathered up and go, then?

Oliver: Yes, I do. Breanna: All right.

Oliver: If you can grab all the heavy stuff. 'cause I'm.

Breanna: All right. Oliver: Crippled and broken.

Awhile back, I, uh, pulled and twisted and jerked on something the wrong way

trying to play he-man and, uh, tore my hamstring about a month now.

Poor breanna's gotta take care of me and go get firewood and everything.

Breanna: I didn't even realize, until it was all on me,

how much he does around here.

Oliver: You're gonna be falling a tree, dude.

Breanna: I really would just like to go out there

and just get better and better so that I can also be someone

that can be relied on to go get our firewood.

Oliver: Let's go start this little endeavor.

Gary: There isn't too many things I can't do by myself.

I take pride in being able to do things

and not have to have somebody else come and help me.

Last year, I filled this with wood. This was my, uh, woodshed.

I was using my greenhouse for double duty there.

And, uh, it didn't work as good as it used to.

The roof's leaking. It just sucks up moisture

and it defeats the purpose of me picking a dry tree,

bringing it home, and then getting it, letting it get wet.

That's lazy stupidity.

I want to build me, uh, a slam bang woodshed out here.

I got plans and I saved up some old junk stuff.

I have a couple pieces of tin.

And I got a friend there, jiggy, he said he'd come and help me.

But, uh, building a little woodshed will have to wait.

Freshening breeze.

The weatherman says winter's comin' here.

It's supposed to gust up to 50, it's pourin' down rain.

So, first of all, I'm gonna have to fight to get my, uh, pile of firewood in.

Come on! I don't have the wood that I normally have this time of year.

I, uh, gotta double up the catch-up.

And, uh, I couldn't have picked a worse day to go get wood.

But excuses have never kept me warm and they won't.

I, I gotta get out there and do the job to keep warm and, uh,

I'm the guy that's gotta do it.

(music)

well, I got a big pine tree picked here.

And this pine tree right here is dead, bark slipped off of it.

I think I can handle it.

If I can't, I'll go home and pout.

So, I'm gonna get 'er done.

There's some wind.

That's pretty stiff wind.

I'd like to get this on the ground before the storm moves in on me here.

Sometimes, the most dangerous thing is when the wind comes up

and you're not prepared for it.

So, a guy has to be real careful there when he saws up a tree.

Anybody that tells you that they fell every tree the right way, they're lying.

(music)

(chainsaw sound)

(music)

well, the-the big problem here is, uh, I don't want to hit this other tree.

It's when you hit the other tree, then it,

it can roll off its stump and go one way or the other.

So, when I saw this up, I'm gonna saw it from the other side,

so that I can go out that way.

Rule of thumb there, you gotta do certain things certain ways.

If you don't, pretty soon they'll pack you out of here or they'll find you here.

I cut by myself, so there's nobody to help me.

Time to let this thing go.

Worst scenario is if the tree falls on me.

(music) (chainsaw sound)

gary: Time to let this thing go.

(music) (chainsaw sound)

well, I got that tree down.

It's kinda where I was gunnin' it for.

I should be able to pull it out on the road there and buck it up. But,

first of all, I gotta go along here and limb it all up.

Been a working man all my life.

And I've been in dangerous situations.

I've seen death, looked it in the eye, and I'm still here.

It's not a happy thing, but most people will see it a time or two.

Lost some good friends to logging.

You never know what's gonna happen.

That's part of living here.

Well, that was about as easy as it gets.

I'm not that lucky usually, but something's going on today.

Must have a rabbit's foot in my pocket.

The wood looks good. The wood's sound as a nut here.

This was a good pick.

The wood is dry and I'm looking forward to throwing it in my new woodshed.

Yes! Well, there's my tree.

Stuart: Port protection is not the easiest place to live.

Sometimes, you run into people, they look like they can make it,

they'll be able to tough it out, but some of these guys,

they just can't be alone.

It's a nice early morning.

And I'm starting to hear people move about, smoke coming out of the chimneys.

You know what they say, the early bird gets the worm,

so I'm gonna take my fishing gear out

and go see if that will work on some fish.

And my name is stuart andrews.

I've been here in port protection for the last 12 years.

I've always wanted to be living in the woods, out on the ocean.

So, coming to port protection just brought the two together.

I'm known as a fisherman.

And I just try and do what I can for my community,

serving on the fire department,

working for the phone company.

I just fit in and made myself a home.

Don't plan on leaving.

I'd like to have some fresh bait for this trip,

so I'm gonna go up around the corner here.

I'm gonna go out and find me a little kelp patch, drift along,

and see what I can pull up.

Right now, we got three eagles right here.

If there's eagles hanging around, that means there's food around 'cause they're,

they're trying to feed themselves also.

Yeah, this looks like a nice little kelp-y spot I'll try.

Trusty, wore-out hook.

I'm right in the, right in the kelp line.

I just hope the fish are hungry.

Come on, little pieces of bait.

There we go. Come on, big fish.

Oh, yeah! There we go.

So, this is like a kelp cod. Give him a bonk.

There's our bait.

Now that I got my fresh bait, I'm ready to go fishing.

Matt: There's no end to challenges and dangers, just in the forest alone.

We're so far removed from, uh, any sort of, like,

real safety net that if something does go wrong,

you might get in real trouble.

(music)

this old road is a brushy nightmare.

This is gonna be a workout just moving through this stuff.

Narrator: With winter fast approaching and their stores of venison running low,

matt carlson and his father, sam, have ventured nearly 20 miles outside

the safety of port protection in search of untouched hunting grounds.

Matt: I really hope my dad can find his way through.

I think that big tree stand he's got on his back

is gonna be pretty cumbersome.

My dad is probably stringing together an intricate array of curse words at the moment.

Sam: (bleep).

(bleep).

I just thought walking down a road would be very easy with a backpack.

(bleep).

I'm singing a different tune now.

Pretty much, it was a huge pain in the ass to go through that brush.

I'm hoping that this road isn't overgrown the whole stretch.

(bleep).

Matt: Forest terrain's starting to change.

This is the heaviest used trail I've seen yet.

This is a really nice spot.

There's a lot of habitable zone here.

There's places that really look like they should be holding deer.

That's a big buck.

Or a moose.

I've seen maybe three fresh buck rubs. That makes me feel good.

I'm gonna blow the call and, hopefully, come across

one of these deer that we are looking for.

(sound deer)

(music)

sam: Matt was champing at the bit to get out and to do a little hunt.

And I'm hoping he's having better luck than I am.

I'm seeing a little opening down there.

I've come as far as I want to go. I'm gonna get

down to the edge of this opening

and see if I can spot an appropriate tree.

Try learning how to use this tree stand.

I think I can work my way right down here.

It's gonna be tree climbing 101 shortly.

(gun shot sound)

(gun shot sound)

(gun shot sound)

(gun shot sound)

sam: Two rapid shots. Very.

Three. It better be matt.

I'm gonna turn my radio on here.

Hey, matt.

Matt: Copy.

I heard tres.

Sam: I thought maybe those shots were you.

Matt: Yeah, that's no, no copy there on my end.

Sam: So, we have company.

Matt: (bleep).

All right, copy that. Good luck.

Sam: Okey-doke.

I think this is the first time that I've ever been to shipley bay

that I've ever seen another hunter.

It does aggravate me a little bit.

You go to a remote area and somebody else shows up, it's very difficult.

Matt: We're in the middle of the middle of nowhere.

But six billion people on the planet,

they're gonna show up in your backyard sooner or later.

I don't want to get mistaken for a deer.

I don't want to get shot. (laughs)

so, what I'm gonna have to do is hunt some place

that I don't think anybody is gonna be monkeying around in.

All right, I got some distance to cover now.

Oliver: Out here is really important that your partner can, you know,

do the same kind of things that you have to do.

So, that way, if someone goes down, you can just pick up their slack

as easy as possible.

Boy, I'd like to find one kinda little close to the water.

So, that way if we drop it, you know, we can tow it over to the house.

Breanna: Oh, yeah, that's good.

Oliver: We gotta go out and try to find some firewood

because there's a cold-snap coming.

And, uh, we are desperately low on firewood, that's for sure.

Breanna: What about those dead ones up there?

Oliver: Yeah. Definitely a worthy one.

I think it's the one.

Now, we gotta find a way up to that tree.

That might be a small feat in itself.

I'm pretty excited, looks like it's gonna be a nice little tree

for breanna to fall.

The only problem is getting to it.

Kind of a crazy right-on-the-side-of-a-cliff tree.

Looks like a good spot. Breanna: Yeah, it could be.

Oliver: It's a little bit far away, but I don't think it's too bad.

Breanna: I'll carry the stuff.

Oliver: Right on. Cool, I was hoping you'd say something like that.

Breanna: Yeah. What, are you going to carry it with your teeth?

Oliver: Yeah, right.

Being hurt definitely is a bummer right now.

If I yell "push," just start pushing. Okay? Breanna: Okay.

Oliver: I'll follow you. I don't mind.

I know you won't get us lost.

Breanna: It gets steeper over here. Oliver: Damn.

We're walking through the brush, it takes its toll.

Breanna: Want me to take one of your crutches?

Oliver: No, I think I need them both.

Normally, I'm always willing to work for a long time.

It's fun but with this injury, it does not make anything any fun at all.

It's gotta be this kind of tangled weed non-nonsense nasty stuff.

But one way or another, we can't go home unless we have firewood.

And we are in fact there.

Breanna: Oh, yeah. Oliver: Cool.

That's definitely the tree we were looking at.

Breanna: It looks a lot bigger than it did from the water.

Oliver: Yeah, that's for sure. This is the one we should take, I think.

Kind of what we're looking for, one that's fairly close to the waterline,

pretty easy cut, pretty safe tree, leaning in the right direction.

It's a great first tree for breanna to fall.

Need you to go buzz up a little bit of a trail over to the tree.

Breanna: Trail again. Oliver: And clean up around it, and everything.

Breanna: Okay. It's got some mushrooms on the outside of it.

Oliver: It does. Well, (bleep).

It's not generally a very good sign.

I bet it's a wet son of a gun all the way through, dude.

Breanna: There's an abundance of trees out here in port protection,

but you really gotta look out for the right ones to choose to fall.

You want to make sure that it's not a rotten tree that's wet,

so that when you cut it up, it just doesn't bring any heat to your house.

Oliver: Yeah, man, this log's a bummer.

Crawled up here for nothing.

Breanna: Guess we'll have to go look for another one somewhere.

Oliver: Hell, yeah. Let's get 'er done.

Stuart: As a fisherman trying to go out and get your own food,

there's a lot of losses.

But that's just the name of the game.

You go tie another lure, and you just gotta keep fighting.

Stuart: Do a little fishing, do a little bailing.

Narrator: In port protection with winter fast approaching,

every meal is critical.

Stuart andrews is looking to reel in enough fish to sustain him for today

and also add to his stores with the long cold months ahead.

Stuart: Looks like we got a whale down here, down off the point.

That's a good sign for the king salmon.

That's 15 tons of animal that just likes coming out of the surface

and they don't really care who you are.

Yeah, I had a buddy, he was right here, a couple years back, humpback whale came,

flipped his boat over and, uh, the sport boat had to come over and rescue him,

bring him to the beach. It was pretty, pretty scary.

That might be one of the biggest, scariest things

that we gotta deal with out here is

wondering when that whale's gonna show up.

So, I'll try some of this fresh bait now.

I like to cut it like a little tail,

like a little fish it gives a little flapping.

Everybody's got their own little, little secrets and stuff.

I've been fishing for a long time

and I haven't figured out if the fish are smart or dumb because

sometimes you're catching them and sometimes you're not.

Sometimes, I think I'm the dumb one because I'm still doing this.

Come on, big fish.

One big fish.

Everything's kind of a gamble out here.

If I don't fill my, my freezer up with fish, come the end of winter.

It could be a rough show there when you start going hungry.

Oh! There it goes.

Stuart: Come on, big fish.

Oh! There it goes.

Ugh.

Ahhhh.

All right, we got lingcod!

Now I got dinner.

The end of the day is near.

I'm gonna go to the beach, cook me up a nice fish sandwich.

The rest I'm gonna save for a good plate of food later on.

Okay, let's go cruise the shore.

One thing about going out and getting your own food,

there's a sense of accomplishment.

I think it kind of translates into how well the food tastes.

Gary: Here in port protection,

not everybody wants to turn lose of their stuff.

It's like the old saying there,

"when you throw something away, about two days later, you need it."

oh, this was my shop, here. Kind of a catch all.

Had quite a bit of tools and stuff in there,

and last year we had a lot of snow there,

just collapsed it down and I just left it as it is.

If you can salvage something from some, uh, derelict spot there,

that's money in your pocket.

And, uh, my collapsed shop still has some salvageable tin on it

for the roof for, uh, my woodshed.

It's about 18 feet

I don't have the experience there, I'm a chainsaw carpenter.

By guess or by golly, you just use a chainsaw, saw this off, saw that off.

If it fits, fine. If it don't, make it fit.

Jiggy: Hey, morning, gary. Gary: Morning, jiggy. Jiggy: Hey.

Gary: Not a nice day, I didn't pick it.

Jiggy: You, you did not pick the driest of days to do this (bleep).

Gary: So, to get this right, I gotta have somebody there

that's gonna measure and can calculate, and think a little bit.

Jiggy's a neighbor here.

He's been here quite a while, he's a hard worker.

Jiggy built a house over there, I think he taught himself, and so, uh,

he would be the go-to guy. Jiggy: Well, what are you thinking?

Gary: Well, these 2x4's are gonna be the frame of this thing, and, uh,

then we're gonna put a roof over here, a tin roof.

Jiggy: Gary is, uh, fiercely independent.

Um, it's not often he's asking for help.

So, in a way, I feel privileged that he, uh,

reached out to me to give him a hand here.

Oh, yeah, there ya go.

(laughs) hit it, hit it, brother.

Ouch, that looked like that hurt.

Gary: Not really, no brain, no pain.

Most people in port protection are like-minded.

They like the solitude.

But we gotta stick together because it's to our benefit.

The only way to keep port protection alive is to work together.

Jiggy: Okay, one more over here, gary.

And then we'll get a piece of metal up and see how that looks.

Gary: Roger, roger.

Breanna: If I could describe the women out here,

I would say that they're strong, capable, independent.

That's pretty big shoes to fill.

I hope that the people of the community can see me as a capable woman

that can survive out here with the best of them.

Oh, looks like a ravine down here.

Might be a little bit of a struggle.

Oliver: You are not kidding about that.

Breanna: No, it goes deep down.

Oliver: It's a bummer we braved that crazy trail to get to that tree

to find out that it was kind of a rotten little log.

We're gonna walk on down the beach a little ways and find another tree.

Oliver: We get too much further away from our skiff and we may have to go back

and grab it though 'cause. Breanna: Oh, yeah.

Oliver: If we need something, but I think we might have

everything we need.

Oh, hey, that actually doesn't look like a bad tree right there.

What do you think about it?

Breanna: Looks like it's already leaning kind of towards the water,

so that'd make it easy to tow it.

Oliver: It is leaning right against the water, cool.

I think we found it, man, we found your first tree.

Breanna: I think it's the one.

Oliver: I think it's the one, too.

Breanna: Yeah, I think I'm just gonna lean down right here,

I think this is a good spot.

Oliver: All righty, man. Like I said, just make sure,

just pay attention to how flat your bar is,

how level your bar is, and how deep you cut.

That's what you're gonna be wanting to pay attention to.

Breanna: I should get to it.

Oliver: Do it up, fire it up, dude.

Breanna: I've been living a subsistence lifestyle my whole life.

I've fished, I've hunted, I've split and stacked firewood.

I've pretty much done it all except falling a tree,

and so, I want to check this off my list.

Oliver: Chill out for a second.

Breanna: Take a break for a second.

It's a little chewed up, but. Oliver: Watch out, belle.

Breanna: I got my first cut pretty straight. Oliver: I'm coming down.

Breanna: So, you know it's gonna fall that direction.

But this second part.

Oliver: You're not done with that face cut.

This right here is into your, you know, this is it right here.

This is where you're gonna aim for. Breanna: Okay.

Oliver: Steep down, basically, just aim for that, with your, with your saw.

Oliver:What I mean? Just as long as you're up here

and gonna hit down there, you're gonna be at a steep enough angle.

(music)

(chainsaw sound)

breanna: Oh, it looks better now. Yup.

Should I cut a little bit more into this?

Oliver: Hmm, yeah. I mean, you can if you want,

and clean that up just a little bit, but to tell you the truth,

that's a good (bleep) face cut.

That is a really good face cut, actually.

Breanna: Okay, cool.

Oliver: You can, yeah. You did salvage it.

Breanna: Ah, good!

Oliver: Stop cutting, it's falling.

Oliver: Stop cutting, it's falling.

Just sit up, chill.

Breanna: Whoa. Shaky, jittery, and I feel all just like.

Oliver: Is your hand shaking? Hold it upright. Breanna: Yeah.

Oliver: Yeah, man, good job, I'm proud of you.

I'm extremely happy that breanna successfully fell her first tree.

It's, that's a very cool thing.

As time progresses and we live out here,

she's constantly picking up more skills and improving the ones that she has,

and it's just, it's awesome to see that breanna: Feels good.

I had some snags there, but I didn't do everything perfect, but I mean,

it's still my first tree, so, yeah I, I feel good.

It's a pretty rewarding feeling to go through all the efforts of getting

the right tree down and bringing it all the way home.

And now to have it here and we can just split it up,

put it in the stove, and to know that I'm the reason

why we're warm tonight is just,

it's a great sense of pride.

Stuart: I don't know what it is with me and nature,

but it's just been something from the very beginning.

I couldn't stay out of the ocean, couldn't stay out of a tree.

This is just kind of my element here.

I'm just not gonna trade it.

What a nice day it turned out to be.

I got a little bit of everything on this trip. And

I think I'll do a little fried fish sandwich.

Not much, but it's gonna, it's gonna cook up.

Gonna be a feast, it's gonna be enough to get me home.

Winter's coming, I can feel it.

Days are getting shorter.

Everybody's rushing around trying to get their firewood in,

getting their freezers full.

I still got tons of stuff to do before winter.

Not much time left, but you just gotta do it.

Never give up on it.

Yay, mother earth. Thank you so much.

Thank you for this beautiful day.

Hmm. This is the kind of dining you only get right here.

Sam: It pretty much takes a lifetime to learn the tricks of the trade

in this part of the world.

When you're young, you start out, you,

you want things to happen fast and it doesn't always work that way.

But over the years, you finally figure out you gotta slow down

and focus in on something that works for you.

With any luck, matt's at least a half a mile away from me.

He's gonna try to hunt uphill and hopefully he's gonna see what he needs to see.

I get to move at a more relaxed pace.

Narrator: In southeast alaska, venison is an essential source of protein

during the long winter months.

While his son, matt, hikes further out into the wilderness,

sam carlson will hunt from a tree stand conserving energy

while increasing his range of view.

Sam: Let's see.

This is the moment of truth.

Seemed to be good.

This feels like a rock.

Get my boots in the stirrups, pick my feet up, stand up, take that up with me.

Slowly but surely.

I feel very good.

This thing doesn't wiggle at all.

This is pretty sweet.

Every six inches you go up you can see another fifty yards

it's crazy.

I can see the whole fricken world from here.

(making animal sounds)

I have some visibility here, I feel good.

If I just have some patience.

Matt: Your hat's out here, buddy.

I'm just gonna put it on this stick and you can come back and get it.

Out here, I've seen a lot of ticker tape trails from hunters coming through.

I've seen evidence of people I didn't expect to see,

but I'm still pretty confident in my ability

to put miles behind me and just keep moving. So,

I'm gonna just push as far as I can

and just explore this new terrain for me.

When I'm out in the woods, uh, by myself, something else kind of takes over.

You're basically putting yourself

in an area where you're, you're pretty exposed.

And a lot of, I think, older instincts and older thought patterns kick in.

Almost 200,000 years of evolution kind of wakes back up.

It, uh, definitely will help you clear your mind and,

and help you understand your place in this planet a little bit better.

Okay, quiet.

That's it right there. I saw fur.

(music)

that was the first deer I've seen today.

(music)

matt: Okay, quiet.

I saw fur.

That was the first deer I've seen today.

(bleep).

I don't know if it was a buck or a doe.

I, uh, put down a lot of miles today and I saw one deer.

And it bolted the moment I saw her.

It's gonna start getting dark really quick.

I need to get off the mountain.

We put in a fair amount of energy and time into this trip and it's,

it's disappointing not to come home with, uh, some meat.

Definitely hoping to, uh, get another hunt in, but as it stands now,

I'm feeling a little bit more pressure.

On the upside, I got to explore a lot of new terrain.

Shipley bay, that's the place my daughter was named for.

Having been here now, I'm glad I did,

because this is a beautiful part of the planet.

I'm extremely happy I was able to visit this area.

There ya are.

Well, that's pretty cool.

Sam: I got a bird's eye view.

All the way to the back edge of this little clearing there.

Matt: Well, that's excellent, man. It works.

Sam: Well, I found a spot and I'm liking it.

Matt: Well, I, uh, I saw a lot of ground.

Didn't see a lot of fresh stuff, so I'm, uh, I'm pretty burnt.

Sam: Okay. And this place is not holding deer.

Matt: I guess you don't know if you don't try.

Ghost town. Ghost town.

Gary: What goes around, comes around is a good term for here.

Because when you help somebody, you gotta pay it forward there.

It's a good way to live. Ready for it, then?

Jiggy: Yeah. Gary: Okay, I'm going for it.

Narrator: With the help of his neighbor, jiggy,

gary muehlberger is building a new woodshed on his property.

This shelter will help protect his firewood from the elements,

keeping it dry and ready to burn during the cold winter months.

Jiggy: Yeah, this is, uh, precarious at best.

Gary: All right, you got it.

Jiggy: All right, I got it. Hey, alright!

Holy (bleep), there's one up here. Oh, don't tell me.

Gary: What?

Jiggy: I thought you said these things were 18 feet.

Gary: It's too short, huh?

Jiggy: That's what I get for listening to a guy who can't read a ruler.

Gary: Yeah, you should go through the next hole.

(laughs)

jiggy: I'm gonna need to cut that end off first.

(music)

woo-hoo-hoo-hoo! Gary: How 'bout that?

Jiggy: Okay, one more, gary, one more.

There it goes. Heyo!

(music)

gary: Very good.

You gotta make it work some way or the other.

Thank you, jiggy.

Jiggy: Looking good so far.

Gary: And, uh, "gary-riggings" the term that I use.

I don't know what jiggy would say.

Maybe it's a jiggy job there.

When it comes to building a woodshed, a jiggy job is way better than a gary rig.

Jiggy: High-five on that one, man. (laughs)

we got a roof. Gary: Covered up.

Jiggy: I'm inspired by gary.

He's got the physical abilities that a lot of men his age

just don't continue to carry on.

It's a hard lifestyle and, you know?

I think that's what keeps gary going.

He gets up and goes, wet, rain or shine.

Gary: Jiggy stopped the jiggle. (laughs)

here in port protection there, I've helped everybody at least twice.

And, uh, I've had people help me too, so,

it's just what goes around comes around and, uh,

it's the nature of how this place is.

Stuart: Here in port protection, we're individuals.

You gotta be stoic, you gotta be tough.

Breanna: It's really a rewarding feeling when you have to step up

to the plate and help somebody.

Sam: We all share one thing in common, we're fiercely independent.

But sometimes you're far better off if you have some friends

and neighbors that will help you get through the tough spots.

(music)

gary: Yeah, that's just right.

Very well done there, thank you very much.

I appreciate all of this, jiggy.

And sometime, I would like to pay you back if you have something to do.

Jiggy: All right. Gary: So, you keep that in mind, whatever it is.

Jiggy: All right, thank you. Gary: I'm up for it.

Jiggy: Nice working with you today.

Gary: It's been a pleasure, jiggy.

(music)

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