In last week’s blog I said that I would ration the pictures of Priory so as not to spoil the surprise when everything is finished. I therefore won’t include any pictures this week so I will keep things short.
In last week’s blog I also made the bold (foolish?) statement that, with the valiant efforts of our new plumber, we had a watertight system. This turned out not to be quite the case. The shower in the new en-suite bathroom has proven to be very problematic and, despite thinking we’d got things cracked, there is evidence of a small leak somewhere which is proving very frustrating. The leak is not sufficient to actually see water but it is preventing the tiling from drying and we need to be confident we have got it right.
Our plumber is coming to see us again tomorrow and, worse case, we will have to strip off some of the tiles and get back to the source of the leak. IF we can get it resolved in the week we have a chance of finishing before our first guests are due with us in 3 weeks! I’m not panicking (yet).
I’m not panicking either despite not making as much progress in Priory as I’d hoped. What I had expected to take me 4 days has taken me all week to complete. This has been principally completing the boxing in of all the new pipework and cabling required in the building. It is at least done now which means that all of the dirty, construction work is complete leaving the major task of clearing out everything no longer required, all the offcuts of plasterboard, plywood and other material leaving lots of final filling, sanding, cleaning and painting. Things will be tight but manageable – if we can get the shower leak fixed rapidly.
Encouragingly, we have welcomed our first guests of 2020 – COVID has made that even later than during our first year of 2015 – and we welcome others next week in Hayloft. While David has worked hard to get Hayloft looking amazing internally, I need to do a bit of work externally tomorrow. Having cleared the boundary next to Hayloft at the start of confinement in March, we had left some of the cut wood on the terrace which itself has started to revert to nature! A day’s work tomorrow and Hayloft will be back to its fabulous self if not better than before with a lighter, brighter terrace.
Then Priory from Tuesday …
Salut.