Darrington sits up against the Cascades, with Whitehorse Mountain on the skyline and a harder rain than the towns down on the flats. Soils run rocky, lots break off into steep cuts, and water does not sheet across a lawn so much as it cuts a track and takes the soil with it. Foothill buildings stay damp. The walk from the drive to the door is often slick. That is a safety wash, and it is also a place we do not want to strip the surface off.
Snohomish County · ZIP 98241 · 2020 population 1,358
Concrete, siding, and the mossy walk
We clean the slick film and the siding that has gone green on the timber side. Water is directed away from the crawlspace. On a slope, the runoff has to go somewhere that is not under the house.
Stone walls get a light clean if you want the face readable. We do not try to make fifty-year-old rock look new. That means blasting the face off.
The ground in Darrington
This is a small town with mountain weather. A wall that would be decorative in Mill Creek is structural here: it is holding a bank that wants to move every winter. We see shallow, rocky ground, overhanging fir and hemlock, and driveways that wash out where the grade dumps onto the road.
Planting lists shrink to what can handle cold, wet, and poor soil. Huckleberry and mountain hemlock already grow on the edges of these properties. A lawn is possible on the flatter bench of a lot, but it needs seed and soil that can take a short season, not a turf schedule copied from Everett. Cleanup is often about limbs over the roof and ditches that have filled with gravel from the bank above.
How we do the work
Most of what people call pressure washing here is organic film: the black and green on the north side, the walks, the fence. The fix is the right tip, the right distance, and often a wash that kills the growth so it does not return in a month. A zero-degree tip on a soft wood deck is how you get a furred, ruined deck.
We do not drive water up under lap siding or into a vent to prove the washer is strong. High pressure is for concrete that can take it. Wood, paint, and mortar joints get a softer approach.
What we look at first
- What the surface is
- Where the water will run
- Plants and outlets we need to protect
- Whether the black is mildew that needs a treatment, not just a blast
Wood versus concrete
Concrete can take a stronger wash. Cedar decks, fences, and soft siding cannot. If we raise the grain, the surface holds more dirt afterward. We would rather leave it a shade less bright than furred.
What will not come out
Rust, deep oil, and etching that is already in the concrete. We can fade some of it. We will not promise a new slab. Paint that is loose will leave with the dirt, and you will see the bare spots. We point those out first if we can.
Treatment
A wash that kills the algae and mildew, applied and rinsed, is why the surface stays clean longer than a blast. We use it where the film is biological. We do not soak your vegetable bed in it. Plants get rinsed.
More from this crew
- Pressure washing across the region
- Patio installation in Darrington
- Paver installation in Darrington
- Fence installation in Darrington
- Yard cleanup in Darrington
- Pressure washing in Granite Falls
Sources for the climate and the water
- USDA plant hardiness map for choosing plants that can take a Snohomish County winter.
- EPA WaterSense on watering less once a lawn or a new planting is established.
- EPA Soak Up the Rain on keeping roof and yard water from becoming someone else’s problem.
