Underway

It's been a short couple of months from a vague inkling of an idea to today, and looking back there is no way we could have known that we would be where we are today, but, well, here we are!

We signed our contract last week, on Tuesday to be precise, and our DA went in on Friday, so the ball is well and truly rolling, though it's a strange feeling as we aren't actually doing anything to assist it, so we're sort of out of the loop. Everything is happening off somewhere else, so whilst they're momentous events, it almost feels like we're not really involved at all.

We booked in for another visit to the block on Sunday, and the vendor was kind enough to allow that, so we arranged with my FIL, Graham, to come along and check the place out.

It was an absolutely beautiful day, weather wise, and we started it off with a visit to the neighbours, who it just so happened were already known to Graham. This was another good start to the future, they were superb people, very easy to get along with and able to give us a great insight into the area.

After that we moved across to the block. It's still verdant even though the district has had precious little rain in the last month.

One of Graham's specialties is building dams, so we were very keen to hear any advice he had to offer on the matter, and there was a lot of good advice to be had. Due to the steepness of most of the block, and the fact that the house site is a good 50-100 metres (we don't have accurate topo maps yet, they should arrive tomorrow) above the lowest point of the property, we are faced with the challenge of collecting water and getting it to defy gravity in order to supply the house and gardens that will be around it with liquid sustenance.

A couple of spots I had selected as suitable were discarded due to requiring too much earth to be moved for the amount of capacity gained. A couple of other decent sites were discovered and some initial plans involving piston pumps to transfer water were sketched out. Once we've settled we'll be going back with the level to run it over and see what the best options will be.

We were keen to hear Graham's general opinion, as he's had a lot to do with farming and growing things, and whilst we've had some experience on the small scale, we've never made a decision quite as monumental as buying this land. I guess it would have been ideal to have him look over it before a final decision was made, but circumstances didn't permit. Still, the news was good at the other end anyway. Except for the challenge of getting the water up high everything else checked out. Lots of good timber, good soil and good climate, with pastures in a reasonable state. All in all an A+ as far as we're concerned.

We've started on some basic sketching of ideas for the place, though we're not going too in depth until we've had the time to do a better analysis of the land. We have also started to seriously consider how we are going to approach the building and power issues, with some pertinent questions asked and answered over at Aussies Living Simply.

Still more waiting game ahead of us, but we are now more assured of our purchase. Unless we have a fair disaster of some kind, we should be settling in a little under 6 months (and counting!) and then we will be free to roam at will...