New House: The Secret Garden

Inpenetrable in the beginning

I've been cleaning up and getting to know the house I bought last month.

On my first visits a year or more ago to look at the long-abandoned Mérida centro property, the back yard -- called the patio in Yucatán -- was so overgrown and full of debris that I wasn't able to appreciate it. 

Cleared, but still a maze

Then in August, at my request the sellers paid someone to remove out-of-control thorny brush, creepers and high weeds. This enabled me finally to walk to the back of the lot. Until then, I'd been limited to looking at it from the house, staring into a mass of green from the rear doors and peering over the railing of the second-story terrace. From these vantage points I made the logical assumption that the high walls I could see out there in the tangle were the limits of the property.

Even after the lot was cleared, the patio was a maze. Two large, round rainwater storage tanks dominate the area near the house. Old property-line walls, roofless rooms and what look like a chicken coop, laundry areas and kitchen, split the lot lengthwise and from side to side. I hadn't yet seen the plat and didn't have precise measurements, so the dimensions of what was on offer were still indefinite.

The lot widens out at the rear

By ducking through low doorways, twisting and turning through this labyrinth, I was delighted to find that the lot widens out toward the rear by including a five-meter-wide rectangle of land behind the neighboring house.

Then came a bigger surprise. When I walked to the end of this section I discovered an opening that leads back in the direction of my patio.

This entry led to a space behind the high wall that until then I had assumed was the rear of the property. Here I found what I've been calling "the secret garden," a walled-in, secluded strip of land running across the back of the lot, containing the remains of an animal pen and some sour orange trees.

The Secret Garden

The existence of this space probably is due to the fact that the patio, like most in Merida centro, has been in use for many generations. The property was split up when passed down to heirs, who later further divided it into apartments. The divisions reflect changing uses of space over time, primarily for keeping animals, washing and drying laundry, and growing lemons and sour oranges (which no true Yucatecan kitchen can do without). All of this construction and division resulted, probably unintentionally, in a sliver of land completely isolated and invisible from the neighbors, the rest of the yard and from the house. You only see it when you are there.

My lawyer did the legal due diligence and all of the paperwork was in order. To be certain, before signing a contract to purchase I returned to the house with copies of the deed and plats to put the puzzle pieces together, measure and be sure that all of this belongs to the house.

It does.

So that's my secret garden. It would be tempting to plant aromatic herbs and flowers in this space, bring in a little table and chair, and maintain it as a secluded place to enjoy my morning coffee. 

However my plans to make the best use of the land mean that the high stone wall probably will come down to incorporate this tiny refuge with the rest of the patio. I guess I'll have to enjoy it while I can. But then who knows, perhaps I'll get inspired while I'm hanging out back there, and figure out a good way to keep the secret garden intact.