When we bought our house in April of 2002, it came complete with an immaculately paved driveway. Smooth as a baby's bottom, it looked like it'd been paved the day before. The previous owners didn't tell us exactly when it had been paved, but they did say they'd had it paved at some point. (Perhaps they did tell us and we, in our new-house excitement, simply didn't retain the data.) In any case, five years of frost heaves and wear and tear had left it looking less than pristine; a major 'crater' had opened up partway down the slope where the ground below had simply dropped away, leaving nothing supporting the asphalt, and a giant spidery web of cracks had spread across an area at the top where a drainpipe from the house flowed out onto the pavement. When the winter's snow all melted in the spring and we saw the damage, we sort of freaked out and called half the paving firms in town. Most of them told us that they were absolutely swamped and a few offered to come out and give us estimates, but never showed. One did give us an estimate far, far higher than we'd projected and we sort of went "eep" and drew our heads into our shells for the next few months.
Finally, though, in October we realized we couldn't put it off any longer and called back one of the firms, Over The Top Pavement Specialists of Swanton, Vermont. Back in the spring they'd offered to give us an estimate but never showed (probably because everyone in the county with winter frost heave damage to fix was also begging for immediate service). This time they were able to come right out. (We checked their references and found that many local businesses used them and were extremely satisfied with them. That, plus a cost estimate less than half what the other firm had given us in the spring, satisfied us that they were the right folks for the job.)
A small work crew made up of the firm's owner and two Russian immigrants, plus a dog, showed up on the morning of October 11 and got right to work. A few of the more heavily damaged areas actually had to be cut up so good asphalt wasn't going down over bad, but otherwise it was very straightforward. On a sobering note, the new paving looked much more durable than what we'd already had down and the owner of the paving firm blinked in surprise when told that the old paving had actually only been there five years. One theory was that the previous owners might have done the job themselves, or with help from some friends, rather than paying for an expensive professional job. That might explain why five years later it was already cracking in so many places.
