27th June 2009

Ah ha, great steps forward.
We now have a man with a plan.

And lots of relatives to give it the seal of approval....

who, after building up their strength (with seats only for the old and infirm).....


set about planting LOTS of trees.





Yay, thanks to all, great job done, we think it looks awesome.

24th June 2009

Another lovely day on our new section, I cant believe our good luck with the weather on our weekly visits. Although this last week we had had a sneaky extra visit at the weekend as we have so many trees to plant and so little time.

Today our plans changed as the bore man rang at the last moment, wanting to come dig a hole for a sand trap. So instead of Dave having to dig another 20 holes for trees, we got our muscle power from 2 pros and could only wonder at their skill - they dug an 8m deep hole by hand with an auger. Most impressive but unfortunately unsuccessful in finding any water.

Still they deposited some of the water they had brought to finish the job in our pond, so we did gain something from their work!

We then finished planting the gums on the southern boundary.

And bought some more compost.

And mowed a lot of grass to provide mulch for the next lot of trees.

And we measured out where we wanted the native trees to go.

And enjoyed another wonderful sunset.

So now we have the trees, we have the compost, we have the mulch, we have the planting plan and we have some visitors coming this weekend who I'm sure would like to plant some trees .... but rain is forecast....

17th June 2009

Well despite another dreadful weather forecast, it was another sunny but cold day. Things are getting serious now, so while I went off to buy 100 trees or so....


.... I left 2 workers to dig the holes for them. Couldn't help thinking of the old school arithmetic classes - if 1 man can dig 6 holes in 1 hour, how many will 2 men do if you leave them unattended with a thermos flask, a large piece of cake and the newspaper? The answer on this occasion was quite a few but not quite enough as I did get rather carried away at the nursery.

Anyway by the end of the day we had 30 more gum trees planted and holes ready for 25 more.

And this all took so long that we had the pleasure of seeing the most amazing sunset. A real surprise as we don't see sunsets from our current house. Cant wait till we are enjoying them from our new deck with a glass of red wine.....

10th June 2009

This was the day we discovered that it actually rains here - though I guess the pond had given us a clue. At last we had the tools for the job and had big plans to mow the whole section and create enough mulch for all our new trees. We had just unloaded our new mower, aka Noddy's little car, and were all set to go when the rain came. This certainly made things much more difficult.

And the grass, gorse and blackberries were still growing apace and in desperate need of some pruning.

The rain got so heavy we decided to take some time out and collect a trailerful of compost but didn't realise the car would not make it back up the drive in the wet with a heavy load.

Well, it filled in a few hours in the rain.

Meanwhile the mowing was continuing, though it was very wet and I managed to get gorse prickles everywhere. But now we nearly have a front lawn (in the loosest possible sense of the word).

29th May 2009

On our last trip we had planted the first trees - 18 assorted eucalypts. Time had run out and we had not watered them or staked them. The very next day an almighty southerly storm had arrived and we were not sure the trees would still be there this week. Fortunately they all were and showed no sign of damage.

The pond had filled up too.

And not before time, the trees were given some support.

Our little battered lawnmower has been hard at work and we now have two paths, one to the water and one to the entrance, and the drive has been cut so we can get the car on the section.

But the rest of the grass was getting thicker and longer.

The neighbours

The thing that appealed to us about this section is that it is in a beautiful rural setting yet there is a little track right opposite that goes across the sandhills to a walkway alongside the river and then a new pedestrian bridge that takes you over into the town centre only 1 - 1.5 km away. We reckon we might have trouble getting there on our zimmer frames but for the time being we should be OK.

Our road runs alongside the railway at the start and they are currently building a new station there, which will be handy. We are about 1km up the road but goodness knows why we are number 123, as we have only found 20 or so other houses in the road so far and they all seem rather nice!

The only neighbours we have met so far, but they are gorgeous and seemed friendly enough.

The new sections are all at the end of the road and hopefully this will look as nice as the rest of the road in a few year's time. You can see our gate with our blue car parked outside but cannot see the section from the road.

The only house so far built up our end of the street.

22nd May 2009

We had added the old slippy slide to catch more water and returned to find it was working. Now we have some water for when we start to plant some trees.

The grass and gorse was growing apace so we needed a path to get across the section more easily.

13th May 2009

The first day of action after the sale went through. I fear we are trying to attack a rather large job without the correct tools.

Preparing a site for the water catchment pond. First remove the grass, gorse and brambles with a very small mower.

Then dig a hole and have a little rest.

Try to make it waterproof.

End of the day, not quite finished but ready to catch any rain that cares to leap in.

15th March 2009

We first visited the area with a list of 3 new sections for sale. But then we noticed an 'Urgent Sale' sign on one of the two sections that had already been sold. We think this was the first section to have been sold and to us it seemed to be the best. No house had yet been built on it. So we bought it!

It was about 0.9 hectare of grass, bramble and gorse on the top of a sandhill, right next to a working sand quarry. There were two large bunny holes and a gully full of more blackberries, the odd native tree and no doubt lots more bunnies and hares.

The following photos are a series of shots from the centre of the section. The first one is pointing north and then turning round in a clockwise direction.

The only house built so far

The last remaining bit of sand hill to be removed (we think)

Due east with the driveway

More or less south

To the west, with the top of the Island in the distance

And back to the drive