Retaining Wall Completed

   The boulder retaining wall was completed by the end of the week and all told took about a week to finish. It required an extra train of boulders to complete and we had to source the stones from farther up state since local reserves ran dry.  In all, the guys with Tango Pools did an excellent job fitting the stones together.  It was a task made more difficult since all the rocks needed to be brought up the driveway 2 at a time with the wheeled forklift, rather than having them dumped at the house.  The driveway wouldn't have been able to take the load of the boulder train.

   Here's a look at the top of the wall where the planting bed will be (left).  The lighter stone is the base rock of the paver patio.  You can see a faint paint line outlining the back edge of the paver patio.  A course of sand will be laid over the base stone and carefully leveled to proper drainage away from the pool.  After that, the patio pavers will be laid.

   Here's a wide shot at the pool area in totality.  The planting beds are pretty generous and will frame the back side of the yard nicely.  I'll have to call in irrigation to run new lines around the back of the pool, and repair any heads that were destroyed during the creation of the pool.

   This is where the boulder wall currently terminates near the end of the pool deck.  The paint lines in the dirt at the base of the wall estimate the location of the equipment pad.  The rest of the wall will be completed after the utility and water lines are run, to ensure that the wall won't interfere with the runs.  Eventually, the boulder wall will meld into a limestone wall, which will frame the stairs leading to the back yard, from the side yard.

   Here's the low sides of the boulder wall and the excellent work in fitting the stones together.  The wall ended up being almost 6 feet high in most places, which is why it required an extra order of stones.  The wall is backed with a geo fabric to retain the dirt and prevent animals from burrowing and undermining the retained soil.  I think it would be nice to put plantings in the crevices, if the wildlife allows it.

    Here's a wide angle shot of the boulder wall.  The land on the low side of the wall was used as access for machinery in the creation of the wall and is cleared of weed vegetation.  It's almost nice enough to use some how, but we're not sure if we'll purpose it.  A pool fence will be installed on the low side here, about 3-4 feet from the boulder wall so we might just end up planting it with wild flowers.

   The wall height near the deep end of the pool is only one boulder high.  The paver path around the deep end is only a three foot wide walkway, but there is a little space for some low plantings of we want some here.  The hope is that the 4 foot high pool fence will deter some of the deer from entering the back yard and allow us to actually have some plants.  I know deer can easily jump over the fence, but maybe it will make it just annoying enough for them to find easier pickings.  We've had limited success with hydrangeas, as they're routinely chewed down to the stubs.

   The pool equipment was also delivered at the end of the week, so we're all set for installation.  I didn't have time to take a close look at it yet, but I'll make a post about the equipment we're using with all the model numbers.

   That's it for this post.  Next up will either be paver laying or utility trenching/running.  The bonding inspection passed and the electrical and gas inspection will need to be passed before any equipment can be installed.   Things are definitely on the home stretch now that all the hard landscaping is completed.