Well, we have moved in, and have spent just over a month in the cottage. So far, things are working well* and we have been concentrating on making the inside work for us, and ironing out minor issues. The other main focus has been making some progress in the garden, and organising the steading in to useful space for storage and a "workshop".
* water not included
BT are dragging their heels significantly and have still not connected us to the phone line, which has already been by Jaimin and Ali Anderson in his digger. Lukily, O2 and Vodafone have 4G coverage here so we have bought a
giffgaff SIM and it is our permanent Wifi Hotspot... Works for now but not enough to stream TV, so we have had no "box" for a few weeks now!
We ran out of water 6 days after moving in. That was a challenge! One of the local farmers was very generous and delivered 3000 liters of water to top up our tank, but with the lack of rain over the past months, the spring had dropped below the level of the inlet pipe, so the tank was not being replenished. It proved that we have a week's worth of water when/if things do get tricky. However, some significant work had to be done to deepen the well, install a new well casing, and pipe the water to the house. Some more work still needs to be done which involves digging out and moving the storage tank lower down the hill, and installing a UV and particulate filter for drinking water, which up to now we have had to periodically top up from neighbours in big 40 liter containers.
Otherwise, progress continues and here are a few images of how things are looking:
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| First BBQ! |
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| First evening fire (with marshmallows)! |
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| The kitchen in use |
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| Old floor joists from the original structure, used to make a clothes line |
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| Kids room, looking remarkably tidy |
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| Kitchen shelves, with lights! |
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| Water woes: new well (black plastic) vs old well (concrete) |
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| Making a wheel barrow ramp for access to the lower garden |
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| Eila working hard. |
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| Parking area to house steps. Step 1. |
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| Step 2... cut off the corner |
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| Step 3... install some old lintels (these are the original lintels from the cottage) |
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| Step 4... tidy up the bottom bit. Wait on more sleepers for the top bit. |
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| Sorting out the steps from the top garden to the bottom, using some (really really heavy) old granite lintels |
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| Relax. |
