The Electrics

Somehow, we've had to buy over seventy sockets and light switches. How is that possible? The house has only got four main rooms plus a hall!


Well, it's true that on the plan I put sockets each side of the bed and in each of the four corners. Plus a few extra for the kitchen work tops, plus some in the hall and landing for the hoover. Plus several in the lounge. But I wasn't expecting double sockets everywhere and even one triple.


And then we managed to misunderstand - a mixture of Polish and broken French doesn't help - and had to make four (or was it five) journeys to buy the right stuff.

And how did we manage not to notice that there's no overhead light sockets in the kitchen? Apparently in France and Poland it's "not usual" to have overhead lights in the kitchen. Mmmm.

And there's this crazy system in France where virtually every socket has its own connection back to a separate fuse in the fuse box. The wiring by the front door where the fuse box goes looks like macramé.


And there's the Polish obsession with hiding all the cable behind the wall or in the ceiling and plastering over it, so it's not a good idea to realise, late in the day, that there's no overhead lighting in the kitchen. It meant cutting channels across the concrete bedroom floor above and dropping the new cable through holes drilled through the kitchen beams.

EDF (our electricity company) inspected the wiring down to the cottage. Did I mention one of the builders put an axe through the main cable while it was live? (He was alright, if a little surprised.) Anyway, there was much sucking of teeth by the EDF man who said the power line to the cottage "stretched too far" and it would have to be re-routed underground. We want twelve kilowatts into the cottage (at the moment there's only three). There was more doubtful sucking in of teeth. We'll see when they come to reconnect at the end of the month what the line will support.

The electric under-floor heating is supposed to be installed next week. We hope that we will be able to use it at the same time as boiling a kettle.

The Windows are Going in

Another stage has been reached in bringing the cottage alive - the windows are being installed.


Even the small diamond windows will have glass that can be opened.


Our only regret is that the struts are not as fine as those of the old windows to the house and so the proportions are chunky rather than elegant. But the old windows are single panes (and draughty) whereas these are double glazed and will keep the cottage cosy.

L'Assainissement

Apart from the water tank (aka nuclear bunker), the other two large holes are for our sewage system.

The derelict cottage had nothing. So we started from scratch. One hole is for the 3000 litre septic tank (1000 litres for each bedroom - sounds like an awful lot).

Beyond it is another hole for the sand bed with its layers of pipes that will filtre and clean the outflow from the top of the septic tank. At the far side of the sand bed, there's an outlet pipe pointing vaguely in the direction of the ditch on the other side of Serge's-now-our field, chest high in ripening rape. Eventually that outlet pipe will flow into a gulley that will cross the field.

We need to have an authorisation (controle de bon execution des travaux) from the water company and we need it soon as friends are coming to stay in June. I worry that the controle will not be given as we have not yet dug the gulley and won't do so until Serge harvests his rape in July.

I need not have fretted. The inspector came and did lots of measuring and inspecting. The paperwork confirms what we still have to do and that's that.

Sometimes the French can be very pragmatic with their bureaucracy.

The Nuclear Bunker (only joking!)

When I came back from the UK in April not only was the roof going up but there were three great holes in the ground. One was for the underground water tank.

I'd had a casual conversation at the beginning of the build about "what a good idea it would be" to collect our rainwater for gardening, assuming a hole would be dug for a biggish plastic water tank. Not at all. A great concrete "nuclear bunker" (as Tod calls it) has been built to hold heaven knows how many thousands of litres. If ever there's a drought, we'll be able to keep the whole valley supplied.

There's a fancy concrete roof, built with metal "rafters" and at some point the hole in the top will have a pump in it and the whole thing will be covered with earth.

Three Steps Backwards

This last week, through pouring rain and thick mud, the builders have tried to resolve the problem of the water in the cottage.

They have dropped the surface of the road and dug drainage channels round the cottage. Great piles of earth and rubbish (including a load of tyres that Serge left in his field) have been bulldozed flat.

A deep ditch has been dug in front of the bank at the back of the cottage and earth thrown up (much to our consternation) over the brambles where the nightingale sings.

We know it's necessary, but the site looks like the Battle of the Somme and we feel like everything's gone three steps backwards. And although it's better, and the ditch certainly works, there is still some water oozing into the kitchen and hall.

Water, Water Everywhere, Again!

We've just spent the last hour sweeping rainwater out of the cottage.

After weeks of rain, we had more throughout the night and we knew that we were going to find the downstairs flooded (again) this morning.

Our garden is all clay and slopes down to the bank behind the cottage. The clay is like a sponge but finally reaches a stage where it cannot hold any more and the water just pours out in streams. Three of those streams reach the cottage across the rubble-filled so-called "terrace" and flow in through the gaps where the French windows will be.

One of the streams also diverts and probably flows under the cottage, coming up through the stone walls.

This feels very "Grand Designs" with Kevin McCloud full of doom and gloom about the flooding and not having the windows in yet and the rainy season drawing in.

Our builders are promising to clear the rubble on the terrace tomorrow and to dig channels to divert the water away. We're not optimistic as they have promised this before. But it is now urgent. The electrician is supposedly coming on Tuesday to start laying underfloor heating.

Wet floors and electric cables - I hope not!

Links

Grand Designs

We are not planners ...

... or shoppers, we decided as we drove back from Agen following another panic purchase.

We have known since December that at some point we would need floor tiles, bathroom tiles, bathroom fittings, internal doors, light fittings. Yet somehow we've never got round to doing anything about it. We used up all our shopping energy sorting out the kitchen.

Only when the roof went on and the the builders started plastering and someone said to us in passing: "The tiler will be here by the end of the week and he will be starting on the upstairs bathroom" we suddenly realised how little time we had.

So much of this last week has been spent zig-zagging our way between tiling shops, bathroom shops, DIY shops and builders merchants in Agen, Villeneuve, Tonneins and Marmande, not to mention a quick dash one morning to the kitchen shop because we couldn't really remember the colour we'd chosen and it didn't look right in the catalogue (it wasn't) and we weren't sure it would go with the floor tiles we wanted.

Our local builders merchants saved the day with the tiles they hold in stock, so the tiler could start work. We used the same tiles in a bathroom we had to revamp when we first arrived in France and had a panic then. You would think we'd learn.

The Roof (part 2)

After a lull for Easter and then wet weather, which delayed progress, the roof is finally finished.


The ridge tiles are in place and the gables have their overlapping edges - so that the rain does not run down the walls.


I thought we might find it obtrusive. Suddenly there's this roof sticking up beyond the brambles where the nightingale sings.

In fact it is mellow, the new tiles blending with the old. From the veranda of our house, looking down the garden, the roof seems like it has always been there.

A bird, unpeturbed by the builders plastering the bedroom walls, is trying to make a nest in the rafters.

The Kitchen (part 1)

We've finally ordered our kitchen and the installation date (hopefully) is June 6th.

Our first experience of kitchen planners was a way over the top design (and price!). So we went away and rethought, spent nearly a day in Ikea's kitchen department and then started talking to kitchen companies again, this time with a strict budget. Although Ikea is good value, we struggled with the idea of having to drive over to Bordeaux to collect all the units plus the white goods and then to get our builders to assemble and install them. Using a kitchen company, we're (hopefully) handing all the hassle over to them.

Like the design of the upstairs bathroom, what looks fine on paper does not necessarily work in practice and we're still fine-tuning.

We can't have a worktop in front of the window because we won't be able to reach the window to open it. This may be the place for a wine rack. Or perhaps a window seat?

Once the walls have been plastered the right-hand units will come too close to the window, so we've changed a couple of the cupboards to something narrower.

We're installing underfloor heating and at this stage we're not sure of the exact depth of the new floor. The fridge-freezer may not fit in the gap between the floor and the beam. If not, we'll probably be shaving bits off the bottom of the beam.

The Roof (part 1)

While I was in the UK, Tod emailed me pictures of the main roof beam that runs the whole length of the cottage. In fact it's three beams, joined together where they rest on the bedroom walls.

By the time I came back, the roof trusses were on and the builders had started to cover the trusses with the wood that will form the ceiling of the first floor.

Yesterday evening, it was a shock to find how dark the upstairs bedrooms are with the wooden ceiling in place. But we also want to keep the upstairs rooms as cool as possible for hot summer evenings, so lots of sunlight streaming in is not a good idea.

Once the walls are plastered and painted white, the rooms will be a bit lighter (I hope!).

The Genoise

The new genoise that tops off the wall under the roof is in place.

We've used all new tiling. The tiles that the builders took down from the old genoise we're going to keep for the roof, where their old appearance is more important.

The tiles in the genoise are edge on, so it is not so obvious that they are new.

The original genoise went all the way round because the roof sloped in on all four sides. Our roof will be simpler, just a pitch back and front like a tent, so the end walls will go straight up to the roof peak and the genoise is just back and front.

I'm in the UK for a week. By the time I come back the builders will have started on the roof.

The Diamond Windows

The hayloft had two small diamond windows. No glass. One was stuffed with red rags, the other with bottles.


We knew we had to move them, because they were where we wanted to put two full-size windows, to let more light into the bedrooms. I'd thought just to move the diamonds closer together along the back wall, but then realised that they would be where we're building the bedroom walls.

Then friends asked why we weren't putting windows in the walls "with the best views" at either end of the cottage. That was because the walls were going to have fitted cupboards under what we thought would be sloping eaves - but we've changed the shape of the roof, made it simpler (and less expensive to build). So now we've been able to put in four diamond windows; two at each end of the cottage, in the walls with the best views.

The original windows had solid stone angles that went together to form the diamond shape. The holes of the two new extra windows are framed with tiles.

Now each bedroom has a diamond window either side of where the bed will go. The windows peep out on fields and distant farms and look as if they've been there forever.

The New Bedroom Window

The stone wall of the kitchen now extends up past the stairwell and forms a dramatic feature between what will be the bigger of the two bedrooms and the landing.

All the pipes in front of the wall are where the upstairs bathroom will be. I had a panic about the narrowness of the space between what will be the bathroom wall and the balustrade round the stairwell. It's "only" a meter, but the builders assured us it will be fine.

Inside the bedroom, the new back window is in, with its new stone lintel. Its dimensions echo the original small hayloft windows at the front. One of them still has its old weathered shutters and it's still possible to see that they were once painted a soft blue.

The First Floor is Laid

Last Thursday the concrete for the first floor was delivered. The long arm stretched over the house (one of the benefits of having no roof) and the liquid was pumped in as the builders smoothed it out with great paddles.

We were going to have concrete filled with polystyrene granules to make the first floor lighter, but the builders decided our fragile cottage needed more structural support. So the walls and beams were overlaid with reinforcing rods and eight cubic meters of "normal" concrete were poured onto the floor and into the walls. That's nearly 12 tons. The downstairs beams will need support to hold the weight for the next three weeks while it cures. And only afterwards will the roof go on.

So now progress can be made on the upstairs bedrooms and bathroom. The walls are going up and the windows in the back wall are being knocked through.

To make it easier for the builders to carry up the heavy stones and bricks, they've erected a temporary staircase, made from one we had lying around in the loft. When we first moved into our house, the staircase (a way into the attic) was in a corridor behind the kitchen. But the staircase wasn't needed. We could get into the attic through the gîte/studio/whatever and the corridor could become a useful utility room. So that first summer, Eric, Matthew and Tod hauled it out the way, up into the attic.

We'd been wondering how on earth we were ever going to get the staircase out again. Good to see it disappearing down to the cottage slung between two builders.

Heating - So what to do?

Seems to me that heating decisions were much easier in the UK! Each house we moved into, we just accepted that there was a boiler connected to town gas and even when the price went up, we still used it.

Here in rural France, starting with a blank sheet we have so many choices, but none of them seem just right.

We could have a large outside tank with either oil or gas, but in recent years costs have sky-rocketed and look to continue to do so. So we've ruled that out.

So we decided this would be an opportunity to be green and to save on running costs. As we are starting from scratch, we can lay underfloor heating. So we looked at aerothermic and geothermic. We're shown fancy diagrams and people use fancy phrases like "heat source pump" and explain it's like a fridge in reverse, but I still don't really understand. The system takes in air and it heats the water that flows round under the floor. Or you lay lots of pipes across your garden and then you can't plant anything big on top and the fluid flows round your garden and then under your house. We are told that the technology has been around for 20 years. But that doesn't reassure - I remember 20 years ago, that's no time at all!

We think we'll do aerothermic and then learn that it doesn't work so efficiently when the air temperature is around -5° to +5° but round here most of December and January is -5° to +5°! So we think we'll do geothermal until we get the quote for the installation - €14,000 plus all sorts of bits and pieces that the installers need us to do first! That's more than 14% of the total cost of restoring the cottage.

So finally, we've come back to something simple and relatively cheap: electric underfloor heating. France has nuclear energy. I never thought I'd be a fan, but I'm beginning to wonder. Eighty percent of our electricity comes from nuclear - it says so on our bills. It means that France is largely self-sufficient, isn't facing ever-escalating raw material costs and at present can keep electricity price rises relatively under control.

Well that's the underfloor bit, but I thought it would be nice to have two small Godin wood stoves as well, for atmosphere: one in the kitchen and one in the lounge, with the metal chimney pipes just going straight up, through the floor, through the bedrooms and out the roof. That was until we began to explore the costs involved in insulating the pipes and what we needed to do to protect them as they went past potentially inflammable floorboards and polystyrene filled concrete.

Ah well! Another good idea bites the dust.

Antique Petit Godin: photo from The Antique French Stove Company