August 2018 — Digger on Overtime

Considering the heat of August afternoons, we've managed to get lots of work done during the cooler hours of the mornings and evenings. During the oppressively hot afternoons we've been extra grateful for our improved access to the beautiful creek! Especially since the river beach (on the opposite side of the property) has dropped to about knee level. The creek (just behind the yoga deck) is well over our heads in some areas and perfect for an afternoon swim. We even tied some rope to help us climb up to a spot to do an awesome rock jump into it.

The existing terraces are starting to take shape and come to life more and more as we clear them off and tidy up the mimosa tree piles. We've also had to set some time aside for strimming the baby mimosa shoots that are making an aggressive come back. However, they're much more manageable as little shoots compared to the mimosa forest we faced this time last year!

Our friend Spike helped Rory get the beams finished off in Ruin 1. Now for the floor boards and shelving along the back wall. We're preparing ruin #1 to move into for the winter; but long term it will be the reception/library bottom floor, kitchen/dining extension 2nd floor, and the top floor extension will be an indoor studio space. 

Rory spent quite a bit of time working the good old faithful digger this month too. He's dug a well to pump water up into the holding tank at the top of the property — which he has also dug. Then he cleared an area closer to the top and flattened it out to be a car park higher up for cars that might not be able to make it up and down the steeper park of the track. Lastly he dug the bank next to Ruin #1 which will have a roof extending out from reception/library. It has really opens up the terrace and that area, and it's much easier to visualise how it will look now. The idea is to hang some hammock swings for a nice area to have coffee or read a book. For this winter we will likely move our temporary kitchen up to that area. And we'll sleep in what will be the cozy reception/library for this winter.

To prepare for autumn planting, we visited a tree nursery with our garden design friend and expert, Shelley😀, who is Paul's wife — the one building the pool. She's working on the plants portion of our natural swimming pool. The plants half of the pool will serve as natural filtration for the water pumping back into the swimming part of the natural swimming pool.

We're planning for when the rain starts to plant some native and mature trees around our boundary. It will be welcome shade for the coming summers, and serve as a protective barrier from forest fires. Also some willow trees along the river bank will do well in the moist ground down by the river and be quite beautiful come the Spring and Summer. 

As far as work exchange help, our friend Pablo from Guatemala joined us a couple weeks ago. He'll be doing a bit of traveling around Europe the next 3 months, but Cara Creek will be his base where he'll help us out with the endless amount of clearing, building, planting and more. We also have a return volunteer, Adrianna who had stayed with us for 4 weeks in the Spring. It's really nice to have someone return and express their astonishment about how different the place is. Although we may not always realise it, we are little by little getting there.

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