Let's Get Rocked; Survey Says....!
Tuesday I headed to Caribbean Queen/Depot to order rock to fill our villa's yard - they don't just deliver things via the barge, they are also a source for raw building materials like dirt, sand, rocks, etc.! I'm not entirely sure how far their scope expands, those are the items I know of for sure. They sell rock by the square yard, not ton, so this required some new calculations compared to what we are used to. I ordered 20 yards of 3/4" screened brown rock at $90BZ a yard, plus a $100 fee to cross the bridge. They said they would call me on Wednesday when they were coming to deliver.
We have a bit of prep work before we can lay down the rock; we're attaching scrap wood to the bottom of our fence so the rock doesn't escape, and we want to put plastic lattice as "skirting" under our home. It is built on concrete pillars and there is water underneath, and we get raccoons traversing under there - the lattice will hopefully deter critters.
Castillo's Hardware had the best price I found for 4' x 8' sheets, at $157.50BZ each, so I bought four sheets and had an attendant help me load them....to the roof of our cart.
Naturally, we had a tropical downpour hit as I slowly headed north to our villa. I stopped a few times to tighten my straps, and of course, I passed the gentleman who rented us the cart who very clearly saw me using it as a work truck.
Wednesday about 8:30 AM, I was still in pajamas when I heard a Mack truck in front of our home...the driver did not call, good thing we were home! I raced out to move the cart from our driveway and tell him where to dump the load; we have a recessed area for cart-parking and it's really the only option. We don't want to put it in the street and annoy neighbors. As he started to dump the load, I saw that he had white rock, not the brown rock we had ordered...not much I can do now, it's half-spilled. I'm sure it will look fine, but we had brown rock down already and we may need to order more white if we don't get 100% coverage.
1 Mack-truck is 10 yards, so our driver had to return with a second load, giving me time to put on proper clothing.
He was back fairly quickly with load #2, here's a video: Caribbean Depot Delivers Rocks So We Can Beat The King Tide
...and here's how we'll be spending our weekend:
The other downside to having white rock is that it matches the road; we are hoping no one uses our rocks to fill the low spots! You can see ponding re-starting in the road already, ugh! We WILL beat this stupid King Tide! Even more, I am excited that we will no longer be the trashiest-looking yard in the neighborhood (view the video to see our ghetto yard, currently).
Thursday I met up with a surveyor at the Cool Beans dock; we were going by boat for him to re-survey our land and cut in the property lines. We had it marked in 2018, however the front markers are now either under water or were removed, and the back ones...? The brush is too dense for us to get back to see if they're still up or not.
The view from the dock at Cool Beans
As we headed toward that palapa on the left, there was a spotted eagle ray in the water! I wish I had been able to get a photo, they are magical.
We went under the bridge (my first time going under it - the clearance is not nearly as much as you would think, and we were not in a huge boat!) and through the lagoons to get out to the west, leeward side of the island.
West Coast of Ambergris Caye by boat
Mark, the surveyor, showed in head-to-toe Columbia camo gear, heavy boots, hat with mosquito net...he knew what he was getting into! I asked what tools he used to establish the locations...? He showed me a GPS app on his phone, and Google maps. I have always been curious how surveyors "know" the exact location!
Once on land, Mark and his assistant viewed the topography and quoted $2,500BZ for the front lot, and $500BZ for the back lot. The back lot is larger, but mostly in water and did not require much chopping, hence the lower cost. The front lot has DENSE vegetation, and a small forest of cacti on the southern border. I certainly had some sticker shock, as our previous surveyor charged $1,500BZ total. That was six years ago, and we also had to pay to fly him from the mainland. For reference, our land totals 200' wide x +/- 600' deep.
In better news, Mark did say the back lot (often under water) is fairly stable ground, so it won't require a ton of fill to dry it out. Small wins.
Having Our Land Surveyed At Secret Beach - San Pedro, Belize - a video, if interested
Surveyors mark the corners of your property with concrete posts - you can see ours behind the rope, to the right of the palm tree:
When we first visited the lot after buying it, we found that many a "Beach BBQ" excursion had ended there, and one of the guides had used concrete lot posts as their grill base. We're unsure if they were from our lot or another one - this was before we paid to have our land surveyed - but this can indicate how often they "grow legs" and disappear.
This weekend probably won't include any fun beach visits; we'll be tide-proofing our villa's yard. I have some younger help coming Sunday in the way of our landscaper, Vandam. Nathan can keep the yard up moving forward, but Vandam pulled weeds and trimmed back shrubs when it was a rental.
Enjoy your weekend!
Sharon