We have 3-1/2 acres in the Sierra Nevada Foothills of California. In many ways, our claim to the property seems tenuous. We share the land with the forest and animals, and we feel it's our duty to protect the land for them. The lower, eastern half of our property is so thick with manzanita and Ponderosa pine, that we've never walked there. We have one path through that area that leads to the 150-year-old ditch that provides our irrigation.
Above the manzanita, we have a cleared area that serves as a leach field for our septic tank and a buffer area to protect our house from wildfire. Occasionally, people have found rattlesnakes in that area, but I haven't found one yet myself.

About a third to half of our property is taken up by the house and garden, shared with some very stately, tall Ponderosa pines. The land drops down quickly past our property line, and there's a one-square-mile wooded ravine to the west of us, owned by the Seventh-Day Adventists and preserved as a greenbelt. We can't see east or south at all, but we can see all the way to the Coast Range to the west.

We may own three and a half acres, but only about an acre of it is actually ours to use - but hey, we can see forever.

If you and your father buy that acre, Rosie, remember that you are only stewards. Take good, loving care of it.

-Joe-