We had beautiful weather last week. The boys and I found a great spot near our shed to build a Roman Road that they can enjoy until it deteriorates. Note: some of the real Roman roads still exist today, but I don't think our methods were as precisely implemented. The boys each dug a trench and they filled the trench with somewhat long, thin rocks to make a curb.
Then they dug a out between the two trenches.
Truman was the site supervisor.
They filled the center about halfway full with sand.
Next, they added a Layer of gravel (aquarium rocks).
The next layer was a layer of Concrete. We didn't have any concrete mix around and I didn't want to buy a big bag just to use a little bit (and I didn't feel like mixing concrete). So, we used Dap pre-mixed concrete patch instead. It is not the same thing as real concrete.
Finally, they used flat rocks and layered them on the top like puzzle pieces.
Building a Roman road was one of the suggested followups in a chapter of Story of the World. We didn't follow their instructions though. They wanted you to do it in a shoebox lid with thin layers of things mixed with glue. We followed the description of the real thing given in David Macaulay's City: A Story of Roman Planning and Construction. The Roman road page is pictured above. It is SUCH a great book I bought us a copy to keep. It is a great resource for arch's and aqueducts and more.
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