The Rose Wall, or 'It's Turtles All the Way Down!'

Started this a few weeks ago and it's been an off-and-on project when I've had some time between others.

As usual, I've used what was there from deconstruction (the old wall was haphazardly thrown together quite a long time ago out of available rocks and was starting to falling apart) along with bringing in a supplement of nicer-faced stone. The first decision was to step it out from being just a flat retaining wall, because of several monstrous "turtles" at ground level that are nearly impossible to build on sturdily. These are so termed because of their turtle-shelled shapes. Nothing can lay flat on top of them, without some serious back, front, and side wedging that is subject to failure when going up against frost heaves and force majeure. Better to come up with a design that avoids those turtles altogether. With consideration to how much stone/time it would take, and the fact that there were some unplanted roses in the yard --- white and red... how very Hundred Years War --- an idea to create some steps up to the higher bank merged into a raised flowerbed design, and a stone seating area. Just to note that I also offered the idea of creating a small water feature, which actually wouldn't cost too much, but with a lake about 20 feet away, this wasn't favored. It's all about choice, and giving options.

I have broken the rules of dry stone wall construction on this one, I will admit. On any given site, there are things one just has to work around, notably here are the two rocks on the left side. On top of the largest stone whose top is turtle-ish (but which couldn't very well be mitigated), I used some Liquid Nails exterior adhesive the other day. So, this is not a completely "dry" wall. The stone was solid as set and will be tied down by large stone on top of it, but I felt much more comfortable with a little extra insurance, that will last, per the copy on the adhesive tube "for the life of your project."

It's coming along pretty well, and I've had a few days of having "the hot hand," which is always a good feeling.