Close your mouth...

... when applying papercrete overhead. It doesn't taste good and you don't know what's in the water

: P 

 

Our main focus for this trip was to get all the panels of the dome covered.  It took some creative application of lath and phone wire, but we got that accomplished and all the gaps are now filled.  We still had a bit of papercrete so we started putting the outer skin layer on.  We got quite a bit covered before running out of time, but progress was made! 

Progress!

Inside:

The outer wall will eventually connect the courtyard to the dome across the driveway.  This means we'll have to divert the driveway around the west side of the dome.  Lots of digging next time...

During our breaks, we decided to put the plywood that we got for free from work to good use.  The old hexayurt and pentagcorral we were using for storage were starting to fall apart from the harsh conditions, so we built a new, giant hexacorral to store EVERYTHING!:

Empty bottles, building materials, tools, etc all fit nicely with a bunch of room left over for more stuff:

 

8' (2.4m) sheets of plywood make one big-ass hexagon!

 

Much more organized

We also took up a bunch more papercrete bricks for future projects:

 

Even though the domestead is increasing in size and we are adding more structures, we are trying to keep it as low profile as possible.  The point is to blend in with the natural surroundings from the outside, but to have an oasis on the inside.  It may stand out a bit now, but eventually, it will be barely visible to passersby.

View from the road:

Next trip: 

1. Diverting the driveway
2. Starting the connecting wall between the dome and the courtyard,
3. Digging the dome interior down,
4. Skinning the rest of the dome exterior
5. ...