Driveway

You may have heard me talk about our driveway (1/8mi long, 100 ft of elevation gain) which is one of the perks of living here.  Because of its topography - sand over bedrock and very steep - it takes a beating when it rains or the snow melts.  The previous owner told us that he had it worked on about once every five years, and 2012 happens to be five years since it was last done.  Interestingly enough, 2012 was also about the time that the erosion situation got really bad.

We got a few quotes from local contractors who had a couple different approached, but we thought it would be worthwhile to do a little DIY and see if it made a difference before calling in the professionals.  So we rented a mini-excavator with a plan to clean the sand out of the drainage trench (in some places digging new trench where there had been none before), unplug the culverts at the bottom of the drive, and relocate the liberated material back onto the driveway to smooth it out.

Andrew was, of course, thrilled to watch and "help."

Dressed appropriately: his shirt says "I dig my dad" with an excavator on it.

Even I got in on the action...

Operating spacecraft?  This is much cooler.

When we were done, we had set of awesome new trenches... now we are just waiting for some rain to test them out!!