Boating with Stones

So tell me, class, who knows what a stone boat is?

If you were going to guess a boat made of stone and were wondering what the point of that might be, put your hand down. You're not woodchuck enough for this quiz.

Don't worry; I had no idea either. Until A. built one.

A stone boat is a kind of sledge dragged behind a tractor. It's used for moving really heavy objects. Like, uh, stones. A. made his out of pallets. Of course. He makes everything out of pallets.

He made it sometime last year to haul some big rocks out of the gully that he wanted to use for one of his walls. It's mostly been sitting around in the way since then, but it once again proved its worth today when A. finally decided it was time to move the huge slabs of cut stone that Mr. Jason gave him (long story) that have been lying right where they were dumped from the trucks about six months ago.

Unfortunately, they were dumped on the grass. Which is now trying to grow and will do nothing but get dead if it's covered with a thousand pounds of stone. So A. decided to move the slabs. Some were going along the edge of the garden. If they're going to kill vegetation, might as well be the damn weeds there. Some were going under the forsythias, for the same purpose. They will eventually be used for some actual masonry projects, but for now, he just wanted to get them off the grass.

Enter the stone boat. And some seriously heavy lifting.

Or technically, leveraging. Ain't nobody lifting this monster.

And there's the stone boat. It kind of looks like a beefed-up pallet, doesn't it? It kind of is.

Tuffy the Tractor had no problem hauling these loads. Good old Tuffy.

And this was just inevitable.

So thanks to the stone boat (and A.'s labors) the grass has been liberated, and is free to die another day. Bonus.

P.S. I planted some potatoes today. This has nothing to do with stone boats or anything else, I was just very pleased about it and felt the need to share. It's a tradition.