Preparation and Installing our Backyard Pool

We did it!!!. We have our own pool 😀. The kids and I have been wanting a pool since moving to Australia, the subject usually came up during the summer months, Cerys doesn't like the heat much so she would always say "I wish we had a pool". But like everything else, it was the cost and difficulty we would have digging the extremely hard ground deep enough to house a pool, and getting a digger into our backyard was not an option as we back onto a road and we most certainly couldn't get one up the side of the house from the front as it is steep and narrow with steps leading to the garden, so it was constantly dismissed every time we mentioned it.

I think what made the idea stick this time was the amount of fun we all had in the pools on holiday and swimming is an excellent all round exercise and with Scott and I not getting any younger we decided that it was now time to go for it.

We spent a long time researching different pools, shapes, sizes etc, which would be suitable for our garden and for our family, as well as the fact we were on a budget. We decided on a simple pool that was not going to cost the earth on upkeep. A simple oval shaped above ground pool was the best for us, no mucking around digging out fancy shapes, perfect for swimming, relaxing, cooling off, playing around on the floats and kids pool parties.

We started (3rd July 2018) by clearing the flowers and greenery from the garden where we planned to put the pool.

Before the pool.

 Can you spot Hamish?, above and below 👆👇

We lifted the decking and moved the BBQ, then we set to work on the digging out. Scott and I dug the whole lot out ourselves by hand as trying to get a digger in to our yard is almost impossible even a mini digger would have had problems. We started off with shovels, pick axe and a heavy metal pole to dig through the earth, clay and rocks, working and digging every weekend the weather would allow and some evenings before dark set in, it was bloody hard work!!. We managed to recycle some of the earth around various parts of our garden, Scott had to take the rest to the landfill site, the amount of earth etc was incredible. We were about a 3rd into digging when Scott purchased a breaker as we had stumbled upon some really hard rocky parts, this made the breaking up of the earth and rocks much easier than with the pick axe, we had to barrow the removed earth, rocks etc down the steps and steep hill at the side of our house and transfer it to the trailer.

With the amount of rain we had, I was almost able to use my birthday gift on my birthday!!

We decided on an above ground pool which we purchased from Clark rubber. We picked it up on 18th August 2018, but we had already decided to lower it into the ground and put decking around it to give it that built in feel and look, but there was only so far down we could dig so the decking covers the remaining parts of the pool. 

We had planned to put the liner in on Saturday 15th September 2018 but the ferocious wind and rain put a stop to that, we had to brace the pool wall with what we could find because the wind was causing it to shake and crease, we were afraid it would buckle and cave in!

The weather had calmed down enough on the 16th for us to get the liner fixed in place and start filling the pool.

Now the pool had been installed and working the next job to do was the decking and wall around the pool, let the work commence.