It's not often I groan every time I move but I'm doing it at present. I've had three productive days out in the garden but today's effort was made harder by summer temperatures - a gorgeous 22°C but it sure did sap my energy. I love winter here as the weather's generally settled and I don't usually get too hot; today would have been t-shirt and shorts weather if it hadn't been for the hungry sandflies!
Today I finished chopping all the rimu - well, apart from a few gnarly pieces that will have to wait until I've got more muscles. It's great to have that job out of the way and the chopped wood can weather outside until I've dug out under the garage. I've also filled all the tyres in the second row although I'll have to go back and see if I can stuff more dirt into the tyres once the moisture has drained away.
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| Friday morning: digging out for the second layer |
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| Friday afternoon: second row in place |
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| Friday afternoon: tyre wall from western end |
The wall is going well despite a slight 'downhill' drop in the eastern end; I'm not sure how to fix this but can try to fudge it a bit on the third level. I was careful to get each adjoining tyre level with its neighbour but I didn't realise the difference in rim flexibility when they are stuffed with dirt - some tyres are thinner-walled and they 'stretch' out more.
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| Friday afternoon: tyre wall from eastern end |
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| Saturday afternoon: all tyres filled |
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| Saturday afternoon: rimu woodpile - all done! |
The warm temperature was a timely reminder to get as much work done as possible before summer's here. If I can finish the tyre wall over the next few weeks then I can get plants in and can then spend hot summer's days sitting in the shade with a cold drink! Talking of drinks, I've been indulging in a few craft beers after Ship to Shore got some
Harrington's Beer in. Thumbs up to Harrington's for making a 6-pack (each 330ml) with 6 different beers - I wouldn't have been tempted otherwise. They also do a range of 500ml bottles including this one...
A very nice drop and similar to the Bock I used to homebrew - it went down a treat after a hard day's work!
Not much time for sightseeing today but I did notice this lovely orb-web glinting in the late afternoon sunshine.
