Bobcatting

I managed to tweak my back a little bit yesterday, moving one of the massive boulders which I pulled out of the ground when I excavated the slab footings last year. I didn't need to move it far; basically just rolling it once or twice so I could reach it with the bobcat, but in the process I must have overdone it a little as I've been moving like a question mark ever since.

With heavy lifting out of the question (what a shame, no Hebel!) I decided to spend the day on the bobcat and complete a couple of earthmoving jobs that have been sitting waiting for a while. First off was backfilling against the shipping container with the remainder of the 20mm gravel I had on hand - pleasantly, I had more in the pile than I thought was there and I got enough depth to begin backfilling for real.

An hour or two of earthmoving - gently gently on the hillside, as all the bobcat wanted to do with a full bucket was buck its rear wheels into the air - and it's looking much better. I need to finish installing the Hebel above and below the big window before I backfill any further, but that's not going to happen this weekend.

The next job for the bobcat was clearing and levelling the area behind the garage, so I can set up a pad onto which we can install the first of our water tanks. For these, I plan to construct a frame-on-ground using old railway sleepers, then fill inside the frame with crushed rock and pack it down hard to give us a solid tank stand that should be pretty immune to being undermined by water.

I will need to hitch up the backhoe attachment in the morning and take a bite out of the hillside behind the shipping container, in order to nestle the tank in there out of the way.