Claiming the land

Today we finally had our first weekend together as land owners with a break in the rain this morning. With ceremonial bolt cutters, we removed the chain across the driveway and drove on to our land. 

Today's work was to extend the "theoretically drive-able" section further into the property, in the general direction of our future well site. It was decided, through some trial and error, that - though passable - this is not yet a road for rear-wheel-drive light-weight pick-up trucks with racing tires in the rain.

Not deterred by our inability to test out our new road as we went, we pushed forward into the alder thicket. Tim felled his first tree with a chainsaw, and then many more up the trail widening our path to a drive-able width.

Tilly watched from her new tie-out line, not super impressed we were making her stand around in the rain and limiting her exploration, but entertained herself by digging a small well.

After felling all our trees, I limbed the alters and Tim started chopping them into 4' chunks with the chainsaw, before quickly realizing what we really needed was a proper woodshed to store all the newly cut wood.

With mule tape for lashing, Tim got busy creating a raised, fairly level platform for our logs and a frame for a future tarp roof.

We didn't quite break through to the proposed well-site before calling it a day as the rain and wind started to pick up, but we did clear the existing trail to the point where it needs to branch off for the well, plus framed in our beautifully rustic woodshed. All in all, a successful morning having fun working together on the homestead.

Our Home

Today, our property closed! We are now the proud new owners of just over 9 acres of trees across the street from our Honeymoon Point Farm, thanks to a lot of help from Mum and Dad particularly, as well as all our friends in the community, chiming in with support, suggestions, and information.

The property from Google Earth with an overlay of the site-map.

The previous owners went to great lengths to plan out where everything ought to be on the property, filing paperwork to make way for a future well and septic, and doing all the soil tests to match. They also allowed loggers to come and harvest the trees from the center of the property, making for dense new growth of alder thickets, nettles, and black berries. Lots and lots of blackberries. So many blackberries. 

Tim fighting through overgrown blackberries with the machete.

We've been spending our time waiting for the property to close doing some light exploration of the property and carving out some trails through the brush. Today, for the first time ever, I was able to walk to all four corners of the property and hardly had to crawl through deer tunnels through the blackberries at all. Another hour with the machete, and we'll have a pretty solid trail system to reach all four corners and some interesting spots in between. Next on the machete list is to create walk-able property lines for a future fence. 

Mum pretending to knock on the future site of our front door - current home of blackberries.

A fence around the perimeter would be nice for keeping Tilly from visiting all the neighbors, for bringing the goats up to clear black berries, and for some day having all our critters (plus guard geese and adorable ducks) up on our land, but first there are some more pressing issues for livability. 

Beautiful fall along the secondary driveway, just up hill from our future septic site.

Tim seems to think silly things like power, internet, water, and septic should be important. Oh, and a house, I suppose, to put that wiring and plumbing in. We've been doing our feasibility studies and have our plan roughed out - power needs to go in right away, then we'll dig our well (have to have electricity to run the well pump), the septic will go in (need power and water for septic). 

Tim + machete v. blackberries.

That gives me the next year and a half to learn to make proper architectural drawings and design us a house while we get the power, water, and septic in before it's time to apply for the permits and break ground pouring the foundation of our house. From then, we hope to have the house dried-in within a year, and another two years to be finished-enough (the carpenter's house is never finished, and if we are doing things ourselves, that makes us the carpenters, and plumbers, and electricians, and everything else). Our county gives a pretty tight "recommended timeline" of when they expect us to be at particular goals.

Dad checking out our trail-building work.

Over pre-Thanksgiving, we led a dusk-walk through the property for Brother Tim, Brother Daniel, Amanda (in flip flops), Maggie (in fashionable boots) and took everyone making it as a sign of our good work. Grandpa still needs a full tour, but I think he's waiting for us to get the path closer to lawn-mower ready. He's heard all our stories of camping and hiking trips first hand and uncensored and is probably skeptical of what we consider a "trail". But really - aside from the wetlands through the middle of a couple, some blackberries, nettles, and down trees - the trails are quite good! Joe, Mum and Dad all made it with no complaints filed.

Tim, at war with the overgrowth, bravely wielding his machete.

If we build our house two-stories tall with windows facing East, and if our neighbors decide to thin some trees across the road, we could have a pleasant ocean view from our hill, though either way we will have a pleasant view with our animals wandering the property and trees to climb and make into secret forts. It is wonderfully wild and perfect for endless exploration up on our 9 acres of dreams.

Heading down the driveway after a day of exploring and trail-blazing.