As predicted, with the roof completed, the weather remains fine and no rain forecast. In fact it has been glorious weather to do a bit of gardening. Jackie is now worried that it may be too hot for the spuds which are coming on great guns under the cloche. And most of the fruit trees have now burst into life with blossom all over the garden. Soon we may even be able to tell which fruit trees we actually have.

Despite threats from the builders that work would stop on the house for another break, my pleading seems to have done the trick and we still have two workers continuing on site. They have started on the rendering/plastering the walls inside and out.

living room and kitchen

We’ve also got the electrician/plumber starting soon. The forward slash is because it’s actually the same person. It seems strange to me but apparently it is the norm in Portugal. Anyway, he has been round the house with us and now knows where all the plug points, sockets, sinks etc will be. Hopefully he will be starting work very soon…

Finally, we’ve got the tiles on the roof! Now they are up I don’t expect any more rain for the rest of the year. I can’t understand why the builders didn’t put up them up earlier as they only took a day to do it in the end. Ah well, done now – so hopefully the inside can now dry out.

The extension is also taking shape. After finishing the walls to the study downstairs, the bricky is now working on the bathroom upstairs so that should be ready for the plumber soon.

Meanwhile the garden is blooming wonderful. The fruit trees have sprung into life with buds appearing everywhere. In fact, our first plum blossom is out (proof below) and the others are not far behind.

We’ve also built a small fence. It separates the veggie patch from the rest of the garden. Jackie reckons it will keep out the rabbits and javeli (wild boars) and keep in the sheep (we plan on getting some of these at some stage in the future). I’m not so sure but as we’ve planted vines and a redcurrant bush against it at least it should provide some fruit.

Things are coming along on the house fine – although every time we visit the builders we have to correct something (too late for all three north facing doors which inexplicably are not quite in the right place…) and today we stopped the downstairs loo being the same size as the study. There seems to be a (healthy?) disregard for the plans which lay abandoned on a large wooden barrel along with some beer bottles.

We did a quick tour of the garden to see how things were coping from the recent deluge and it was lovely to see tiny signs of spring growth on all the fruit trees we have planted, they all seem to be working. But the biggest surprise, nay astonishment, came when I looked under the potato cloche. I have now planted two groups of Jersey Royals (although they can’t legally be called that now), the first lot less than three weeks ago and the second lot last Friday, and the first lot have sprouted – already! In just over 2 weeks! Now I am sure (Richard not) that some of you would like to see the proof so here they are on Feb 5 and then again Feb 24:

Mmm, I can smell them boiling in a pan of minted water already…

…or rather the demolition team. After a frustrating three week ‘break’ the men arrived back on site sledgehammers at the ready. This time they were working on the lounge – bashing out big holes for the french windows. They must have a lot of trust in the strength of old Portuguese farmhouses as they didn’t bother with props (or any safety gear – at least helmets would have kept the rain off). After a couple of hours bashing, they took their customary break at 10am for a fag, a ham sandwich and a couple of beers. Then back into it.

As you can see from the pictures below (on the second day of bashing), the rain has come back with a vengeance (we’ve also had thunder and hailstorms), so round about the house is a bit of a quagmire. Inside is not much better as the roof tiles still haven’t been put on and water seems to be coming in everywhere.

“Nao problemo” say the boys, “Portuguese Farmhouse very strong”. I hope so.

Meanwhile they have cleared away the rubble from the front of the house so you can see the extension a bit clearer. Downstairs is where the study will go and upstairs the bathroom and utility room.

The raised beds are finally finished – they just need green things to start sprouting from them. Here’s one photo we took not long after we arrived in September and another this week after putting some gravel down.

raised beds before and after

And here is the pergola, which is where the pig pen once was.

pergola

Still no sight of the builders. Hopefully they will be starting again next week…

The euphoria surrounding last week’s concrete pour on the roofs has quickly dissipated. After getting the roof done, the builder said that we had to leave it for four or five days to set. Fair enough. But now a week later he has told us he won’t be back for another week as he has to finish another job! So two weeks of inaction on the house has left us non plussed to say the least.

However, work continues on the garden and the raised beds are perfectly manicured, ready and waiting. In fact, Jackie has planted our first veggies. Jersey Royal potatoes specially flown in from Jersey (actually posted here from her sister). They should be ready in about three months. And the strawberries are also bedded in and raring to go.

raised beds ready and waiting

Jackie has also been busy in the kitchen. We rediscovered a huge pile of walnuts the other day which we had picked in November and she made a delicious walnut cake. So delicious in fact that Furface, the local moggie who has adopted us, sneaked in and snaffled up half of it while we weren’t watching.

I’ve also been busy utilising my great strengths – brute force and ignorance. I’ve finally removed all trace of the former pigsty. In its place we’re going to build a little outdoor dining area with a trellis which will be dripping with vines. That (hopefully) will be going up next week, so look out for the pics.

Finally, a good sign that spring must be on its way is that a tiny wren is building a nest on our balcony. Here’s a pic of the wren and a blackcap who came for a butcher’s.

wren and blackcap

Just to share with you the amazingly weird long armed sci fi machine that turned up Thursday to put the concrete on our roof:

Well, I was impressed.

And what a lovely day

What you can’t really see is the guy with the blue helmet is carrying a box and that’s got the dials for operating the machine, controlling how much gumpf comes out and when. No carrying up buckets by rope, it was all done within an hour. Talking of helmets – none of the builders have any safety gear at all. It reminds me of when there was a fire in the hotel next to the BC in Hanoi and the firefighters turned up: helmets, goggles, matching dungarees… and flip flops.

But now it’s Rain Stopped Play unfortunately and the builders won’t be back until mid next week as they wait for the cement to dry (or is that concrete? I get confused between the two…)

After weeks and weeks of downpour the weather has started to be kind, and just at the right moment. There were a few delays the first week but now, the week the roof goes up, it couldn’t be nicer. Blue skies and lots of sun. Actually, it could be nicer – it’s freezing cold! Frost welcomed us this morning but hey who cares because when we get to the house the builders are already there and every day there seems to be real progress. Not surprising perhaps with the hours they put in: they arrive at 8 and leave at 6. And amazingly they do seem to be putting up the roof in a week. The concrete posts are all in place and our builder reckons both the main roof, and the flat roof over the extension, will be done by Friday which is splendid news.

My only concern at the moment is the soil in the garden. Despite oodles of horse manure, composting and growing comfrey nothing is ready yet to put on the soil. I hadn’t been too worried up until now – I’d been turning over spadefuls of moist (admittedly rather heavy) stuff, and with worms in too (despite far too many vine weevil larvae which are waiting for some juicy roots and rabbits waiting for some juicy shoots). But the nice weather has dried up the soil and today I went to break up some clods of earth – and couldn’t! Rock solid! The soil desperately needs some nourishment. Meanwhile I tried to buy some potting compost and despite visiting three garden centres yesterday couldn’t find anything decent. I asked at one place and was shown a huge bag of peat and was told that’s what I needed. It looked dry and unwholesome, and suspiciously cheap. So my latest mission is to find good quality potting compost as the little seedlings are going to need a good start in life.

Richard continues to strim away, everything looks so much nicer once the brambles have been blitzed. Hope to have some tile photos up next…

After the roof, went the bathroom and whatever room was below it. Unfortunately however, it continues to rain, seemingly incessantly. This means that water is now getting into all the rooms. The builders aren’t worried, but considering that without the roof we can plainly see that the walls are simply made of rocks and mud (see photos below) and the ease with which the walls came down makes us nervous at best. The sooner the rain stops and/or the new roof goes on the better!

Meanwhile we continue to work on the garden and have been busy on the raised beds.

As promised, the builder and his men arrived on Monday 11th January to start work. An auspicious day as we had first seen the house exactly 8 months previously on May 11th and arrived in Portugal to live on September 11th.

At the end of the day they had completely removed the main roof and started demolishing the bathroom. This had been a fairly recent extension to the original farmhouse and wasn’t constructed very well so we have decided to replace it.

Meanwhile, we continue to work on the garden. As promised here is a photo of our first cloche and the space set aside for the shed.

As discussed previously, it’s been pretty cold recently. In this photo you can just see some flecks of snow but I can tell you at one stage it was a complete white-out. However, none of it stuck. It also continues to remain bloody cold in our rented house. We’ve hung impromptu blanket/curtains up in an attempt to stop the chilled blasts coming through the window frames. Here’s Jackie huddled up next to the gas fire. Roll on summer.