What do you mean we are in Congo?

Sometimes I feel this is project is back to front. Yesterday we were completing the plans for planning submission. Then we go to a meeting on Friday evening, and learn that the new deed plan shows that the size of the plot is 20% less than we had based the masterplan on. Even worse the site is too narrow to put the building on!

At this point the project manager is having kittens, and would prefer a three round fight with manic mosquito than this news. Cries of incompetence ring around my head. As soon as we get home, we plough through the eastings and northings figures. Why is that different, how did this angle change, how do we sort this.

After spending half the night downloading google earth, trying to recalculate eastings and northings into latitude and longitude, and eventually doing our own drawing of the site using the angles, the team (Rog and I) cried out - That cannot be right! - not really having a clue what was right.

So, only thing we could do was to demand a further site assessment, find the concrete blocks (see photo - not easy) that detail the land and get a guy with a GPS to rework the positions and a new deed plan.

The summary, - they had not noticed that the dirt track down the side of the land had widened significantly, by the effect of torrential rain, and they therefore discounted 10 x 100metres of our land, as well as forgetting to include the exact corners of the site. Never trust a surveyor unless you are there and double check everything he does. Further deed plan arrives tomorrow - we will check it very carefully!

Oh, and why Congo. Well when we were going through the readings and comparing the GPS results on the deed plan, the surveyor announced that the plan related to GPS readings in Congo, which unfortunately for us is a long way north of Rwanda. Don't worry - we checked that one on Google earth as well.

Boy are we having fun!