Last week’s blog said that, as he had put his back out, our builder wouldn’t be able to join us for the week so we wouldn’t be able to progress work on Grange. It also said that, while that was regrettable, it would allow us to progress other projects that we have wanted to start / complete.
One of those was to progress and, ideally, finish the wall to the rear of Kergudon which I had started last October. I (naïvely it turns out) thought it would take a day’s more work to get the wall complete and ready to plant. However, as often turns out with our projects, the scope of what we wanted to do grew and so it took longer than anticipated to complete.
Therefore, the 1 day predicted turned out to be closer to 3 days’ work but the wall is now complete and ready to plant and we are really pleased with the result – especially when you compare it with what it looked like before (I hope you can tell which are the before and which are the after!)
There is some clearing up of unused slate and rubbish excavated in the job to be done as well as a little more turfing when we have identified where we will get the turf from – the turf we used this week came from inside a couple of the garage bays of Grange. When we have the Grange wired and powered we will also be able to install the lights that we want and have included the wiring for.
All that is left is to build a wall on the opposite side, lay some new gravel and install the gate …
In last week’s blog I mentioned that I wanted to start to rebuild of the jungle bed – I haven’t but I did take best part of a day to dig around the stump of the apple tree that was blown down in Storm Zeus so that it can be removed (although where to remains to be seen!) and a neighbour has agreed to bring his tractor sometime next week to see if it can be pulled out.
What I did manage to complete were 2 more of the gates that we want to build to segregate various areas of the garden. One of these was to enclose the Granary garden from the main driveway and prevent our, and guests’, dogs entering the non-dog-friendly gîte garden. The second is to enclose the Hayloft breakfast terrace from the drive preventing dogs staying in that gîte from running onto the drive – and we think gives the terrace much greater definition.
Our builder remains lain up at present although we understand on the mend and we continue to wish him a speedy recovery. We may, although no guarantee, make some progress on Grange next week however, if not, there are many other things waiting to be tackled – including that Jungle bed …
À beintôt.