Thursday, October 30, 2014

The Great Construction Saga—Part 3



The next step was sand. You don’t want to backfill with the stuff you dug out in the first place, it is full of rocks and rubbish that might damage the foundation. Sand and the big shovel would arrive on Friday. When they did, it looked like this:



Backfilling with sand.




Eric guiding the shovel operations. Zack, the operator, is an old friend,
so 
unlikely to crush him.




Matt levelling sand fill under the deck. As with the stone, a lot of sand 

had to be distributed by shovel and tidied by rake. More heavy work and not 
all locations were easy to work in.



The next project, once back filling was done, was to put a trench in place so our power and telephone cables could be laid underground. This is what it looked like:


Zack making an entrance to the forest from big brother’s parking area.




Working through the forest in the little (relatively) digger.




The trench was filled with sand, carried in load after load on

a little mini-dump truck on tracks. After a foot of sand, the
cables were laid, then another foot of sand was added. Then,…





...the forest floor was restored. Only brush and dead trees

had been removed.



Yesterday, it rained. It was perfect weather for my job: broadcasting clover seed along the length of the trench. Clover grows quickly, isn’t fussy about substrate, doesn’t mind shade, and deer love it.
The power and phone lines have arrived safely at our (much improved) hole in the ground. They look like this:



Power and phone cables in the house (such as it is). No,

neither end is attached to anything yet.




While Zach dug holes for our septic system, WW, Matt and Eric moved our woodshed. It looked like this:



The woodshed unlimbered from its base and braced for removal.



Installing the base at the new location, Quebec style—there must always

be one guy leaning on his shovel.




Heave ho and there she goes.


  As I write, the septic system is being installed and landscaping has begun. More thrilling adventures of the work crew will appear in future numbers of The Great Construction Saga.

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