Tiny Home Tuesday - Water Stilt Homes

I don't know anything about this except that it was found on Cabin Porn and what the text said. I just know that there are times this feels like it would be the perfect place to live, even if I had to have Texas in my address. 

Off-shore fishing cabin in Port Mansfield, TX. Contributed by Christian Heuer

Actually, Cabin Porn has a lot bigger format for their photo so you should either click on this photo or click on the link above, because this format doesn't do it justice. 

Is it the hiding in a tree house effect that makes these places so alluring, at least to me and my ilk? The sigh of relief joy that means anyone approaching will be well heard and seen before hailing my name? 

The idea of home and water and semi-isolation is a powerful one, and not just in Port Mansfield, Texas. There is Stiltsville, in South Florida. Wrangled over legally for many years, with some falling or burning to the wayside, as of last count, there are still seven out of the original 30 or so or was it 12? left. While they originated as fishing and loafing and whatever you get up to legally offshore in Florida, they are now, after much court room action, used as rentals. These days they are built way beyond shack standards (and I know shack standards, so just trust me on this one). You can rent one. Or more. Follow the link filled road.

In trying to find a related good article about Stiltsville, it wasn't easy. Most of them sound like they are written by 10 year olds with a smirky disdain for those wacky old-timers and their tree forts. As it turns out, the best telling is from the group responsible for saving Stiltsville, the Stiltsville Trust. There are also very good photos there as well as lots of information about the Trust. Sometimes, you just have to listen to the grown ups.

Photo - public domain

Even so, the history of Stiltsville is debated; did the first one get built in the early 20's or mid 30's? What is known for sure is that the days of plunking down homes/fishing shacks on the flat of the bay are long over. There was a time in my life that upset me a lot. Now, I'm grateful because I have not a shred of a doubt that greedy blood sucking bastards would build all over every flat everywhere and ruin a beautiful thing for everyone. Good thing the bayous are full of snakes, 'gators and mozzies or they'd be destroyed too. No doubt some of them are. Rant over.

Photo - public domain

Again on the Gulf side, but this time Florida's Pasco County, stilt houses are the subject of a number of wonderful articles and photos, some written in the 1970's, a favorite decade of mine - collected by I'm not sure who, but you can - and you should peruse them here. Think you might want to buy one? Go here. If it's still for sale.

photo credit - unknown

photo credit - unknown

Now we're talkin' shack, baby! Big shack, but shack. Expensive shack. Take a risk shack, but apparently it has survived every Gulf hurricane to blow through since the 30's, I'd trust it for awhile longer. Or not.

The idea of a home with legs rooted in the water, not a boat, not even a houseboat - I love my tiny houseboat, but I know it's not quite the same - has something very appealing that I could pin on many emotional parts of our human make up. And yet I know there are many who would no more think of this as a potential way of life than jumping out of perfectly good airplanes for a living. Is our emotional DNA so vastly different as humans? Apparently so, on many levels. But that's a subject for far more than a not so little post on tiny homes. I could go there. But I won't. Yet.

Have a teeming with touching tendrils Tuesday. Do something tantamount. 

p.s. edited to add!!! This is super important.

Friends.

It may be a surprise to some of you, but our Culebra Community Library is not part of the municipal system. Therefore, it functions solely on your contributions.

That little wood box on the front desk is there for us to help keep the library functioning.

There are a very few paid workers, as well as volunteers. Rent for the land is a monthly expense that would also surprise you. Electric & water are also expenses.

So..... next time you visit our lovely library, maybe you'd like to drop some "quiet money" into the box. It's become quite a community gathering spot, you must agree.

Thanks for your future generosity.

Pam & all the friends of the library