Casa Maintenance

Things are still quite busy down here which is funny when you think that we come down to relax. Yesterday, Jose Luis arrived to do some cleanup work for us. He is a local man that owns a small plot of family land just down the road from us on which he raises a few cows. He is an albanil (mason) by trade and he along with his two brothers were the masons that built our house under supervision of a builder. He lives in town, but rides his bike out to his land to tend his animals as his father did before him. Jose Luis and his nephew built the stone walls for us that are shown in the photo's below. Jose Louis did all the wall building while Alehandro made the mortar from cement, lime, and sand and keeping his uncle well supplied. 

Nov 2009

Here is a view showing some of the new walls and planting beds before they were filled with soil. This photo was taken in January with the grass all browned out. It is in the middle of the dry season and it was a construction site. Not good for grass.

Jan 2010

And the photo below taken the next year, with things filled in a bit with new plants. This photo was taken looking the reverse direction and was shot in October when things are still green from the summer rains. 

Oct 2011

After the heavy rains over the summer the brush grows up along the edges of the driveway and we have Jose Luis clear it back about 3-4 ft on each side. The driveway is about 500 feet long so it will take him several days to do it. Jose Luis speaks no english so we communicate with sign language and a dictionary. If things get real tricky, we have a friend we can call and translate for us.

Nov 2012

In the photo to the left, Jose has cleared on the outside of the curve from the drive way edge back up to the tree line.   

Here is the remainder of the hill where the work has yet to be done. Along the right edge of the driveway all the way down is a drainage ditch which needs to have the brush cleaned out of it.

Nov 2012

In addition to that cleanup job, we are having another local man, Antonio, come out to do some work on the house for us. Antonio is an electrician/plumber by trade but can do just about anything. He speaks reasonably good english and did the electrical and plumbing in the house when it was originally built. He has many contacts in town and can arrange to get anything done, if he can't do it himself. The driveway surface needs some repair work after the summer rains and Antonio will arrange for a tractor to come out and smooth the surface and if needed, several truckloads of gravel mix added to fill the ruts. 

Nov 2012

Antonio is also going to refinish some rough concrete and stone steps at the front of the house with flagstone. The cement surface on the steps will be chipped off and then new flagstone cut and put on the top in a mosaic pattern. There wil be colorful tile on the risers. We will also add a semicircle landing in front of the bottom step.

Antonio also knows a bit about gardening and will help Barbara with some gardening projects. The vine in the photo below is planted in the ground and last winter it had not reached the upper terrace railing yet. Over the summer, with all the rain it has engulfed the railing and has run for about 30 feet along the terrace. It is now in need of some serious pruning and we know Antonio is familiar with this vine and knows it growth habit and therefore know how much he can whack it back with out killing it. I suspect though that it would be impossible to kill at this point short of digging it out of the ground.

Nov 2012

Antonio lived in LA until he was about 16 and helped at his uncle's landscaping business at the time. Like I said, he is a jack of all trades. He is very reliable. Several times in the past I have had to wire him money via Western Union for emergency repairs and he sends photo's before and after on email showing what he has done. Antonio lives in the local town of Jocotepec with his wife and young son. Two years ago we were invited to his sons first birthday party which was more like a block party as it was held in the street in front of his house. There were many people there (all relatives no doubt) along with a handful of gringos with whom he had worked for in the past and had remained friends with. 

As Antonio gets started, I will take before and after photos to send along.

Rick