Digging the Foundation

Jun 27, 2026 · 6 min read · foundation clearing excevator ·

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Massive Rocks

Execvator & two giant rocks — Two giant rocks, one an accent, one a problem.

New England is known for growing rocks. Stick you finger in the ground and you’ll hit a rock. This property must be old because the size of the rocks that grew here are massive. These boulders are responsible for breaking the pins on two different sized execvators multiple times, messing with the breaker, and just overall acting like icebergs - they look innocent on the surface, and 2 hours later we still haven’t found the edge.

We were able to move some of them, but thankfully the excevator guy had the forethought to rent a breaker. This rock chips and cracks well. We will have plenty of material for nice walls, a nice stone chimney.

Breaking one of the giant rocks

Of course, some rocks he was able to pick up and toss. That was pretty cool watching and listening to that!

Finding a rock and tossing it to the side.

Clearing the Land

Now the fun part - clearing the land and digging the hole sped up in timelapse fassion. We set up two cameras pointing towards each other for better views of the process. Each one was set to take a photo about every 7 minutes. These two cameras show progression over about 7 days. Things move fast, but those gigantic rocks just suck up time.

Timelapse of digging the foundation looking north

Timelapse of digging the foundation looking south

Final Hole

The foundation hole is mostly complete. There’s a large rock sticking out of the center, and there’s a to clean up for the front entrenceway, but the bulk of things are clear. Maybe that rock in the center is in the perfect spot for a column. Somehow, that probably won’t pass insepction regardless.

Here’s the hole, walking up from the driveway into the basement of the house.

The detatched garage has posed some problems for us, mostly on where it should go. It’s hard to get any bearings on the property with just dirt and trees. Once we put the corners of the house in and measured properly, the other gigantic rock we were worried about was no longer a problem!

Next time…

No photos of the footers dug, but they’re there. Same with the alcove for the entrence way. Next up, scheduling an inspection for the footers and preparing for superior wall!