“The trees were cut in the woods, quite a distance up the river,” explained Mr. Martin. “They were floated down from the lumber camp, a few miles up.”
“Could we go to the lumber camp?” asked Ted. “I’d like to see it.”
“I’d like to see it, too,” added Janet. “We had fun in a lumber camp once.”
“There isn’t much going on in a lumber camp in the summer time,” explained their father. “Winter is the busy season there, for the logs are cut and hauled through the woods to the edge of the water that is to float them to the mill.”
“How can the water float them to the mill in winter when the rivers and lakes are frozen?” asked Ted.
“That’s just it—they don’t float the logs down in the winter,” his father explained. “They pile them up near the river and wait for spring to come when the snow and ice melts and makes the water very high—higher than at any other time of the year. It is on this high water that the logs are floated down.
“However, there is some little work being done in this lumber camp now, the men said. They are cleaning up the logs left over from the spring freshet run, and this raft was one of that sort. I suppose we might stop off at this lumber camp, if your mother thinks it would be all right,” said Mr. Martin, looking at his wife.
“Do whatever you like,” she said, with a smile. “We are touring around to give the Curlytops a good time, and we might as well stop at the lumber camp as anywhere else.”
So it was decided, and after making sure nothing had been left behind, the auto party went on again.
Mr. Martin expected to reach the lumber camp that evening, and he knew he would be welcome there with his family, to spend the night, for the men on the raft had told him so. They could sleep in one of the log cabins, the steersman said, since only a few of the wood-choppers were in the camp now.