Dordogne Retreat - a farmhouse tale

Every day during the 5 week trip I had seen Hummingbird Hawk-moths (Macroglossum stellatarum for those of you who like the proper name) feeding from lavendar on the rear terrace. So on our final day I found a few minutes to take some pictures of these interesting creatures. Of course in the hour or so I was on the terrace none appeared!

So I was reduced to taking photos of whatever flew by, including this fellow:

After the opening for the window was made the sides were rebuilt with a slight curve and the oak window sill installed. This gives a much nicer appearance than just having straight sides:

 The tiling was started with the shower completed first:

 Then the long job of pointing the walls, both inside and out:

 Once completed (nearly 3 days!) the window was installed to complete the job:

 We are very pleased with the result:

 The rest of the tiling was then started with the floor, and the areas behind the toilet and sink:

 Grouting was completed and the toilet, shower and sink installed:

There is still work to be finished off with painting, skirting and trim to be fitted, but this won't take long on our next visit.

The outside looks great as well, we just need to finish off the rest of the wall:

With extra work for the window we ran out of time, as we do every year, so other projects didn't get completed. But we now have two very good bathrooms and this has been progress indeed.

While the end may not be quite in sight we do feel that we have at least climbed the summit and are on our way to finishing.

With the original walls being so uneven (over 2 inches difference top to bottom) we installed plasterboard on partition framing to get good flat surfaces for the shower, enabling easy tiling.

Once fitted the plumbing for the tray and mixer taps was planned and installed.

A strange thing then happened! Once we had the shower all partitioned I realised that we had lots of room for a window (in fact there had been a window in this room at some point) so I cut out the profile of a proposed window:

Then with help from Alan (master carpenter and all round good egg) and Ben (neighbour and fountain of knowledge) we started the 6 day long process of installing a new window.

With Ben's help (and his workshop) Alan put the finishing touches to the oak frame (from a local woodyard, cut to order at an amazingly low price!):

The under Ben's supervision we installed 3 20mm steel rods and joined then with wooden beams, bolted tightly each side and supported with braces before knocking a hole for the lintils.

the hole was quickly filled with two 1 metre long, 26cm wide, 13 cm high oak beams, with concrete packing:

The 2 days later we started exposing the window area, firstly on the outside:

As with many projects there are hurdles to overcome, on this project it was a couple of very large rocks. The rock on the right we removed and left the very large rock on the left for later!

The window frame was installed and the wall rebuilt either side:

The next day we then had to deal with the large remaining rock/ The angle grinder wasn't big enough so we drilled  7 holes in a line through the rock and with the SDS plus chisel hammered it until it split, with much relief, down the holes:

The window area was now exposed and ready for finishing off.

The downstairs (and up until recently, the only) bathroom had to be changed as the WC waste for the new bathroom had to be installed via this room. It also needed updating as there hd always been a damp smell and we wanted to change the bath for a proper shower unit.

Before we started:

We then took out the old bath (Peter swiniging the sledge hammer!) and discovered that the pipework was not correctly fitted and had been leaking for years! No wonder the room smelt damp.

We excavalted the floor (concrete) to take the new WC waste:

Created a hole in the wall (nearly 2 feet thick at this point) for the waste:

Connected the waste to the previouly laid pipework to the fosse:

The downpipe from the upstairs bathroom was them boxed in and insulated:

This all took under 2 days, and in the end was much simpler than we had expected.

So with the new bathroom now fully working we could go about destroying this one.

In the last article on the guest bathroom (here) there were a few jobs left to be done during this trip. So with help from Peter these were fairly quickly completed.

The pointing of the wall was the most time consuming but it made a huge difference to the room.

After application:

After brushing and cleaning the next day:

It was then just a matter of applying danish oil to the beams, painting, installing mosquito blind, adding trims and then cutting and laying a vinyl floor.

Sprinkle a few decorative ornaments and the result was fantastic:

There was the slight issue of connecting up the WC waste though the downstairs bathroom and this is covered in another article!

I was lucky enough to be joined for the first 9 days of the trip by Peter, who not only kept me well fed and watered (under instructions from the supreme commander) but also did a great job in finishing the priming and painting of the new railings installed earlier in the year. Thanks Peter!