Construction access

The long-term plan is that parking will be up by the garage and then we'll walk on a path down to the house.  We made our path wide enough for driving in order to facilitate construction, but then it turned out that the path was too curvy and constricted for the largest of the trucks to use, including the trucks that do the concrete pouring.  So, unexpectedly, we needed to widen that path.  Unfortunately, this meant we'd lose a few more trees and some brush that we were really wanting to keep.  Once the project is done, we'll try to get it back like that with planting and landscaping.  For now, it's construction access.

This is what the path looked like before.  The trees that had to go are the three biggest ones just left of center.

My dad came for the day to help with the tree management (limbing, bucking, and hauling).  I had to go to work so I missed the action, but it was a busy day!  The crew came and they cut down the trees, cleared the brush, pulled out the stumps, and did the road.  The idea was to install the water, electrical, and auxiliary conduit pipes under the road at the same time.  Those pipes had previously ended at the garage but needed to be extended down to the house.

The large grey pipe is the electrical, the large white pipe is water, and the third is the auxiliary.  It can be used for things like cable or phone lines.

Phil used a log to smooth out the ground once everything was filled in.

They put down rock at the end and here's the finished product!  Wide and much a more straight shot down to the house site.  The amazing thing was that all of that work happened in just one day (that photo with me by the car up there was taking on the following day).