Deck the Cabin

This will be a rather dull post, 

unless you happen to like reading about amateur carpentry 

- proceed with caution.

Our good friends who go on the annual death march with us

 needed to tear out their old deck on their cabin in the Sawtooths and build a new one. 

They had zero carpentry experience and so Chuck told them we would help them.

We forewarned them that we were amateurs but they were convinced that we could do it.

Chuck and Bob spent a lot of time figuring, measuring, calculating, figuring, measuring, calculating,figuring, measuring, calculating,figuring, measuring...

We went to a local lumber company and had their expert figure, and calculate and this is the load of lumber we hauled to the boonies to build a 20X10ft front, and 5X35ft side deck.

 

 This is the front and side we were going to deck. 

By the time we arrived they had already done all the demolition and clean up of the old deck

 

 First we had to get a sturdy board up to provide the base for the deck -

 it's a 12X12X2 plank bolted to the base.
Its going nowhere.

 Because Chuck has had a tendency in the past to rush through things and say it was "good enough"

I was fanatic about measuring and remeasuring
each part of the building process to make sure it was level and true.
Here's Doris holding the first corner post.

 Bob and Brian leveled the ground so that we could put in the cement foundation blocks
which would hold the stringers.

Lots of rocks and not a lot of fun. But it they were troopers.

 

We had to dig holes for each of the cement blocks and get them leveled.  

Once we had those done we added the stringers which would support the decking lumber.

 We tried to stagger the boards so that we wouldn't have a lot of boards ending at the same spot.

 

This was how far we got by the end of the first work day.

 Chuck laid out this board so that the diagonal cut for the corner would be even.

 

Doris had never driven a screw before but she caught on quickly.
Who says old teachers can't learn new tricks?

The front portion completed with railing going up.

 10X20 front deck boards & rail up.

 Brian was the first one to test the durability & comfort level.

 We still had the 5X35ft side to go. 

We tried to work in the shade as long as we could.

Here are Bob & Doris with the first set of completed railing.

I know you'll be heartbroken to know that I somehow managed

to delete over half of the photos from this outing.

I am particularly disappointed because I had some proof of a personal stroke of genius.

That doesn't happen too often, and Chuck even stated- out loud- that I was right and he was wrong.

It all had to do with how to figure out how to cut the opposite angle boards
 to butt up against the front decking.
I am happy to report - though I have no photographic evidence-
that we finished the deck in 2 1/2 days
I NEVER thought we would be able to complete it in that length of time. 

AND 

it is strong, level and beautiful.

It was really fun to take on the task and be able to successfully complete it and manage to keep our death march buddy friendship alive in the process.
Any of you who have worked with friends know that these kinds of things can be tricky.
 

Whew!