You mentioned the 16 acres the house sits on and I think that if you count the marshland behind the house you are looking at that amount of land. The front of the house has a good 5 acres of pasture land and the house probably occupies another acre of land so when I look out there I wouldn't be surprised to find out that there is about 9-10 acres of marshland and water.

Kathy
Your comments didn't offend me, I wasn't planning on going back and doing any measuring anyway, I'm still trying to figure out what that little area off the back of the kitchen is going to be! I now think it is going to be a screened porch and the deck will be up on the second floor but if it is then in my opinion its way to small. The screen porch needs to be at least 8-10 feet deep so you can sit out there and eat and entertain without having to scooch-up every time someone needs to get past you.

You could put on hip boots and probably walk all the way out to the beach on the Bay. The problem is that you would be crushing the grass, snails, fiddler crabs and all the other little organism that live in the salt grass.
The view from the 3rd story sitting room will show you what you would see sitting on a bench on the beach. Put a really nice telescope up there and you can watch the sailboats crossing back and forth across the Bay!

Tonight I'm posting the last group of photos that I took at the BC last weekend. All of these pictures are from the outside of the house and I've got a couple of pictures in here that might by a DIY surprise or they may be just protecting the septic tank drain field. Living out here in the boonies requires septic tanks, no city sewer so you want to make sure once the drain fields are installed that you pack the ground down to hard overtop of them.
Since this is my first BC experience I want to apologize if I stepped on anybody's toes with taking the pictures and going on the property. It appears from my fan mail that BC used to build everything in gated communities to eliminate people being able to spoil surprises they may have up their sleeves! One of our bloggers thinks that going out there may just put this type of home location in jeopardy and they may be right so I'll just refrain from posting pictures. I'll still be going out there and riding by the place and seeing what new things might be going up and I'll let you know what I can see, but I don't want to spoil any of Mary's surprises! Here is the last set of pics. http://s718.photobucket.com/albums/ww185/Harleyma...

Hey Nebraska, you have a shower on the first floor - its outside where ya'll voted it to be !!!!! :)

DonD
I really don't consider my fellow bloggers in this area as "punks" and they would be the only ones reading our blogs. I'm sure you've never drove through developments under construction and stopped and walked through any of the homes being built but its pretty common practice around here. Its a Sunday afternoon drive around thing and I don't go onto properties that are occupied or posted.

ok, here is the link to the Town of Mathews, enjoy!
http://s718.photobucket.com/albums/ww185/Harleyma...

Gosh, i get cold just listening to my northern and western bloggers talking about still having snow! brrrrr Just to give you something to look forward to, last week I had to pull my lawnmower out and cut my grass and yesterday when I was re-locating day lilies in my borders I noticed that it needs cutting again! Temperatures are starting to maintain in the fifties and sixties, things are greening up here in Hampton Roads, Virginia! I've been playing golf now for about two weeks also now that its not so wet.

Just to help you guys envision living in the blog house I took some pictures of the closest town (about 6 miles) on Va Route 14 that you follow down to the BC. The pictures show you the original downtown but over the years the town has spread out along Rt 14 with small businesses, convenience stores and a gas station. There is also a little general store in Susan but I haven't been inside, it looked like a house when I rode by but I caught a sign on the front saying it was a general store. I took these pictures standing on either side of Rt 14 (main street) and looking both ways down the road. Check out the map of Mathews County painted on the side of the Rexall Drug Store and Ice Cream Parlor. In the close-up picture of the map, if you enlarge it you can see the little red dot indicating Susan. There are two roads right there just below Susan, the second road looks like an h with a tail curving to the left. That is Bellevue Road and the BC is located about halfway down the little tail and out on the little peninsula. Ok, don't want to spill all the beans and have BC people get mad at me, I forgot to get the link so I'll post it next time.

Clive
When I rode out there Sunday and was coming down the driveway I noticed something particular, the last 75 - 100 feet of the pasture, next to the driveway had daffodils popping out all over the place! So maybe part of the orchard was a daffodil farm. :) The neighbor in the little house next door came over and was cutting daffodils to go into her house so someone will enjoy them.

The neighbor who built the gigantic home next door has planted rows of trees in front of his home, couldn't tell if they were fruit trees but he has planted about a dozen.

The stairwell doesn't appear to be getting banisters on but 1 side, the other side (short side) appears to show a full or partial wall. It would be deep enough that a washer and dryer would fit there and not poke out into the hallway. You could do the laundry while gazing blissfully out of the french doors onto the front balcony! :)