Got Driveway? (Long Post)

Temperature in the teens and snow in the air. On Sunday, April 27, I headed up to The Lot. I needed to open up the trailer and get ready for the backhoe to arrive the next morning. Opening the trailer meant hand-pumping water, starting the furnace and refrigerator, and  seeing if all systems still worked. I had the generator going to charge the batteries and give me some electrical power for lights.

Mice had gotten into the trailer, causing quite a mess. (Pam will have more on that situation later.) I cleaned as well as I could for the moment and called Pam and let her know to bring up disinfectant when she came up on Monday, then called it a night. Note: I drive down the road about 5 – 6 miles to get into a good cell phone coverage spot to call Pam. Rarely is there cell coverage at The Lot, although once in a while that does happen (not often enough to be reliable).

Monday morning it was even colder and the snow was heavier, enough to put a white coating on Sanderling Court. I made a quick trip to Fairplay to pick up a few items, including hardware to seal the gap where the mouse had gained entry. (A plastic panel under the trailer had broken and fallen away. I was able to re-attach the panel and eliminate the gap.) Then I headed up to to Hwy 285 to wait for the United Rental truck to show up with the backhoe.

The rig arrived around 11:30 on the back of a large flatbed trailer.

Backhoe arrives

Quite the machine

With no instruction, the truck driver unloaded the tractor and left. I got right to work.

The next set of photos was taken by Pam on Tuesday —  she had arrived with the dogs late Monday and had been cleaning mouse poop and bagging laundry the previous day. By Tuesday I was working on the most difficult part of the driveway extension –  the rock wall and crushed granite area.

Getting started on the extension

Digging out rocks

Note the rocks I am digging out of the roadway – those babies were huge and almost a job-stopper. Temperature was in the low 20’s; I have on my stocking cap and heavy winter coat. At times we had snow showers.

Using the bucket to move material

Along the way we had a couple of lighter moments. One morning we wanted pancakes but had no mixing bowl so we made one out of an empty water jug:

Water jug turned mixing bowl

The fresh snow on the mountains made a striking site as this telephoto shot shows.

The Mosquito Range from our lot

We changed plans a bit – never did use the culvert I bought – and made a circular driveway near the top of the gulch (creating a cul-de-sac). The original plan had been to continue going uphill into what we call the saddle area, but the circular drive plan made more sense as it would allow me to pull the trailer to the “top” of the drive and out again without having to back the trailer at all.

Here is a shot I took shortly before I left. At this point I still had some hand shoveling to do.

RV at the top of the circular drive

I did not get all the photos of the drive I should have, but I was getting very tired by the end of the week and here I still had hand shoveling to do. I unhitched the truck, finished some hand work, then went through the process of re-winterizing the trailer. Pam had headed home with the dogs on Saturday; I left for home Monday morning, May 5th.

You can see, just behind the hood of the truck, the space I excavated for the storage shed. It will be delivered May 23rd. Before then I need to get some gravel down on the driveway and am working with a local gravel pit to get that done. 3/4 inch washed rock goes for about $12.00 per ton plus a $100.00 round trip charge for a truck capable of handling 14 tons. One of the gravel pit guys is going out to Sanderling this Monday to get some idea of how many tons of rock we will need (and can afford).

Overall I was satisfied with the work I did. The circular drive will work out well and is just big enough to park the RV and still be able to get the truck unhitched and down the driveway. Another advantage of the circle drive is proximity to the areas needing clean-out of dead and downed wood; getting the aluminum trailer closer to the work area will speed up the process.  Eventually, the circle drive will also allow (big) truck access to the spots where I think the well and septic will need to be installed.

By the end of May gravel will be down and the shed will be in place. That will complete several of our major projects for the year — completion of the driveway extension, pad for the RV, pad for the storage shed, delivery of the shed. Other than lot clean up, we’ve reluctantly concluded there will likely be no other major projects in the works for this year. It would be nice to get a well drilled but the nearly $9k price tag means we’ll have to save for a year to be able to afford it. That’s why we have a 5-year plan. 🙂

That’s it for now. Thanks for looking in!

Pam’s Two Cents Worth (or maybe Ten Cents Worth):

How cold was it?  Too cold for Blondie to come out from under her blanket until mid-week.  She had to wear her doggie coat [again] to go outside in 18 degree weather, not her favorite piece of apparel. Blondie was not amused.

Blondie under her blanket

How cold was it?  The batteries would only power the RV furnace until the wee hours of the morning, Jer had to go into the cold and start the generator to recharge the batteries early each a.m.  Br-r-r-r.

How cold was it?  Too cold to leave the “slide” out all night, cold air circulates under those extensions and there’s no insulation under there.  B-r-r-r.

How cold was it?  Too cold to open the windows and air out the RV after I started spraying bleach on all the mouse turds that had to be cleaned and disposed of.  Hanta Virus is carried in the West by mouse droppings, so I had to use bleach, rubber gloves and facial covering while working under the cupboards and on surfaces.  The mice seemed to enjoy the bathroom the most, although we had nothing stored under the sink in there.  Mice even chewed on the hand soap.  I hope someone had a stomach ache (“I’m forever blowing bubbles…”).  I can now easily distinguish mouse turds from regular dirt and seeds.  Not a skill I hope to use frequently.

A comment on Big Boy Toy operation:  There’s a reason heavy machine operators are paid the big bucks.  Backhoes are dinosaurs to operate and they are dangerous.  As the spotter and designated “911” caller, I alternated between worrying if Jer would survive when the backhoe flipped over the embankment, if we could pay for the damage to the backhoe after it flipped over, and finally both.  My thoughts were, “Fields, what did you  get us into?”  The driveway transitioned from a lovely crushed granite base to plain old dirt; the dirt-based length of the driveway extension is what prompted the need to order rock from the gravel pit.  And the soft dirt was a major problem in trying to negotiate with a heavy backhoe — no footings, big ruts and lots of tipping.

When the storage shed is delivered – presumably on  a flatbed – then we’ll know if the driveway is wide enough and firm enough.  We already know it’s expensive enough.

If there is another major expense this summer, it will likely be investing in a battery farm to store power from the solar panels and keep the furnace running all night.  Maybe even enough power to run the microwave.  There’s a thought.

Happy Trails.