in the vicinity of little dip
Gary was offered some limestone from a garage that was being demolished and kindly picked it up and got it out on the block, for use in the foundations. Good size blocks, in pretty good nick!
Here are some long-range pics of Ned’s block, from the eastern side of Roland and Angie’s block, and then across to the lakes. The first one shows some of the infrastructure set up for the equestrian work. The second and third are the back paddocks. The fencing is good–races have been installed around the front part of the block–and shelter belts planted. Power is on, and underground water. The shed is quite large, used for all the horse feed, saddles, bridles, etc.–horse stuff! Looking dry in midsummer, but has nice flats which green up and provide good feed over the winter.
Here are some photos I took of Angie and Roland’s block today–midsummer and dry, but still very beautiful! Mainly pictures up the back, of the hill, the orchard gully and the trees. And one at the end looking from the western boundary across to our new house site!
Theo gets a special mention here because it is the generator he fixed that is driving the water pump. When I say ‘fixed’, I mean put back together from a fully disintegrated state in a wheelbarrow, using the exploded diagram on his phone. Deep respect from us!–and also from the builder, who is not so easy to impress.
Bit of drama on the land with the concrete truck! We had made a track through the trees, with the idea that it would come up the more gradual slope to the house site then across through the trees–but it turned out it was too much of a slope for the concrete truck. So then the woman truck driver (from Lucindale, runs the business there with her husband and shares the delivery work, having raised two children, pretty impressive) backed the truck (10 tonnes, mind) up behind the shed and revved it up the hill towards the site!–but it was still short of the site when the wheels started spinning. So she braked there and Gary called Jim the plumber who eventually brought out his bobcat out and they bucketed the concrete out onto the slab. Interesting, got done in the end! The base of a 7000 gall concrete tank–which now will be built by hand.
Second day of work on the site, with two projects:
In the morning we installed the submersible pump into the bore. This was the pump Roland found on EBay in Melbourne, delivered for $150 in a few days over New Year!–pretty impressive. Particularly as other quotes from irrigation companies in Millicent and Naracoorte were around $3000! We (that is, Gary Thomas the builder and I) lowered into the bore, to the water at around 8m, along with the power cord and attached to the ag-pipe (reinforced poly-pipe). Plugged it into the generator, pulled the cord, switched it on–and there it was, a strong flow of clean water! We had enough pipe to get it to the garden outside the shed, which is where this picture of Gary is taken. From there it will go up to the tank above the shed, next to the trees, when the rest of the pipe (ordered) turns up. Makes such a difference to have water on–brings it alive, somehow.
