got the arbor up

I did get my arbor put into place.

I had mentioned these anchors that had to be pounded into the ground, The corner posts of the arbor slide over the angled metal anchors and are held in place with screws.

Be careful measuring where to place the anchors!

Hammer them in to the ground...using a piece of wood in between to prevent the metal from getting smashed and bent.

Then you set the arbor in place. If you did a good job measuring - all the corner posts will slide right down on to the anchors.   

No photos of that step...I was holding an arbor, man!

Now you lift and push and check for level - front to back...

and side to side...Then put a few screws in to hold it in place.  

(I will be removing those fence boards too...when I get around to it.)

We can see it from the pool area....

The whole reason I started thinking about buying an arbor was so my hops vine would have some support.

I tied some twine from bottom to top and looped the longest part of the vine around it. We'll see how it does.   I had mentioned here before that the hops vine would not climb that plastic mesh I had stapled to the fence post.

  If it doesn't like this arrangement, it's just out of luck.

Now, here's the rest of the story on that arbor....

When I ordered from Amazon I chose the arbor in a "mocha" color. It was a light grayish tan and I thought it would look better with our old ugly rustic fence boards.

When I first opened the box with the arbor pieces in it, it was late afternoon. The pieces were lighter than I expected but I thought it was just the angle of the sun making them look light.

Well, as I got more of it put together I realized it wasn't "mocha" at all.  It was white....like "is someone getting married over there" white.

I contacted Amazon, and they apologized and wanted to exchange it for me.

I told them I wasn't sure if it would come back apart and fit back in the box. I also said I would be satisfied with credit for the price difference (mocha was more expensive)...and also an additional discount since I was saving them the expense of shipping this one back and sending another one...and I pointed out that this white one probably couldn't be resold anyway.

Well guess what?  They refunded all of my money.    A free arbor.

Amazon is a top notch company.

I still wish I had the "mocha" color, though. I even thought about buying some of that spray paint for plastic. The white is just too bright.  Maybe once the vines grow over it, it will look more natural.