Costs

The timber, decking boards, and assorted fixings came in at around £1700. Which was round about the amount I had sort of expected. As I have said I really avoided thinking about the cost beyond estimating it was within reason. Adding the deck has no only given us a lot of pleasure over the last few years, it has also added a lot of value to the house, visible as it is from the main road, the "house with the deck" is one of those houses that is known to people. I won't exaggerate too much and claim it is a local landmark. But such a claim would not be far short of the truth.

Four years later

It is now four years since the deck was built and the only sign it is worse for wear is the current coat of battleship grey paint, which will be dealt with next year. The deck boards over the manhole are a little more uneven in their spacing than they were, since they had to come off and go back down again, and I did not do such a good job as first time round.

The climbers have made slow progress over the trellis and in one case died. No claims of green fingers here. On the subject of the greenery we had a little dispute in the making of the deck about whether to put membrane beneath the deck to suppress plant growth. For most decks this is an absolute must. In this case, what with the north facing aspect, the chalky/clay crap that passes as soil and the fact that the deck was going to be way above it all, I did not see the point, neither did Barry a keen gardener who once managed a garden centre. Conversely my Dad also a keen garden seemed to think we would have plants poking through the boards in no time. Time has now passed judgment, no membrane and no plants poking through either. Grass has re-established itself on the landscaped slope and the wild strawberries have flourished.

The rhubarb that was doing well, but which got a little too underfoot in the building did not make a comeback, and nothing else we have tried on the slope itself  has survived either.

But the main point is the "structural integrity" as they would say on Star Trek, and in this regard there is little apart from the cobwebs in the joists that would tell you the deck was not recently built. I see no reason why it should not stay that way for at least a couple of decades.