'Historic' Gravel Walkway
2 Materials
$330
3 Weeks
Medium
When we built our house last year we did it under a unique circumstance. We were building on top of a hill, on land that had seen it's last house in 1969. Our builder was a retired fella that built for us as a 'consultant'. We were writing all the checks for our build. We were finishing going in to winter so there were a number of things we chose to put off until spring/summer. We had to bring in 25 loads of dirt in the back to raise the level. As it is, our back yard slopes steadily downhill from the house which makes it treacherous for two 65 and 69 aged people. One of the things we didn't do in the original build was a walkway/catwalk and steps from our basement French doors to our lower porch outside of the garage. After a couple of mis-steps with carpenters quitting on us we finally found someone reliable. He built that wood walkway and steps. However we still needed to connect the driveway around the corner of the house to the steps he was building. We took that project on and finished within a day of his finishing the steps. I marked the project as medium. It was all straight cuts with an electric miter saw. The biggest issue for us was the manual labor. Wheel barrowing all that gravel from the end of the driveway for an almost 70 year old fella wasn't easy. I got the easier job of raking it all level.
'Before' picture of the back of the house.
We began with 6 squared off 4x4 landscape timbers and made a 4 foot by 4 foot box next to the driveway. After we had the box installed we filled it with the same white gravel we used in our rock garden project.
The first three steps
Our goal was 2 boards high for the step. This picture reflects three steps (boxes) down to the turn around the porch.
Three more gravel steps down to ground level.
Around the porch there are two more steps down until the last stretch to meet the steps.
Our carpenter closed in under the porch and built the door to get under it. I put an old wrought iron trellis we already possessed to discourage people from stepping off the end.
This is the view from the upstairs porch. In the spring after the ground settles we figure we will have to level off the boxes again.
This is the back of our house thus far complete. In the spring, after the weather warms up, we plan to continue the gravel steps down the hill to where you see the rocks lined up.. We always say we grow those rocks on our land. They are everywhere.
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2 of 3 comments
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I sold my house a few years ago sure could have used that inspiration then what a great idea.
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I love them and your house!
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