Goodbye Rotten Railroad Ties, Hello Gorgeous Stone Wall!

We didn't realize how bad the side retaining wall was rotted out when we moved in.  Last summer, I did some yard cleaning and decided to tackle the job of raking out under all the huge rhodedendrons we have.  I could hardly get my rake under them they were so overgrown and encroaching on that entire hillside.

Didnt take me long- I had Tim fired up with a chainsaw in hand ready to clean it up.  We took two trees out that were so poorly grown, they were just an eyesore.  After taking all that out it really opened up the space, but then we were left with a total nighmare... rotten retaining wall.  We actually had rhoadie roots growing out of one of them and it was pushing it so far off where it should be, the hillside was starting to cave.   We ended up with a much larger project than we had anticipated, although that seems to be the norm around here anymore. It's like peeling away one layer and find another that needs peeled beneath it and so on.

We decided to take out the railroad tie on the bottom as it was damaged the most and replace it with a stone wall.  The awesome part of it is that we were able to hand gather each and every stone that you'll see in this wall from our very own property- which to us, makes it THAT much more special.  Sure, we could've hired guys to come in with a crew and load of stone and bang it out in a day or two.. and pay upwards of $8000, but we prefer to do these things ourselves as the reward of accomplishment is far greater than the end result.

This took us a little over a week, with a few hours here and there throughout the week after work and a few long days over the weekend. We're tickled pink and love the way it looks.  Can't wait to rip out and replace the upper tier next!


After tree trimming and cleaning up was done, but still has the old retaining wall:

 Start of the new wall going in, looking good hunny! XOXO  We had to dig down, lay waterproofing,                                          back fill with gravel and start laying in the tiers.

                         

These were some of the rocks we dug up, cleaned up and brought down for this wall.  And let me tell you- majority of them were heavy as hell.  Some were so heavy we needed to load em in the tractor and dump em.  This was by no means an easy task.  We agree, however it was well worth our efforts.

 The trash pile we later loaded on the trailer and took to the landfill in Honey brook.  Most of these                    were so rotted out they crumbled and fell apart when we tried to move them.
                                               Glad they're no longer an issue!

And no better way to pat ourselves on the backs when it was complete-then with a cold one.  

CHEERS!