Stairs

Monday morning, 2 of the building team came for the last day of touch-ups.
They finished rendering the stairs and did the inside of the wall on the terrace.
It's actually starting to look like something.

Camille and Heidi are staying a couple of nights and inaugurated the pool this morning.


IT'S SOOOO NICE AND COOL!

WATER DELIVERY

This morning the 4th load of 8000 liters arrived.
Paco, the waterman, explaining to Chris that it needs to be filled up to the rim because as soon as the filtersystem is started, a lot of water will go into the pipes and the system itself.


So we need another load...


The final load arrived at one.
It takes about an hour to get the water from the tank into the pool.
So on Friday the 28th of July at two 'o-clock in the afternoon we could declare our pool as...


FULL!
And I'm not going to bother anyone with pictures of us jumping in naked as soon as everyone had left 'the premises' :-)

Roof waterdeposit

Oh, and before I forget.
They've also finished the roof of the waterdeposit and put in a trapdoor.

Remember yesterday's challenge?
Today the men have to prove they're really men...
At 7 A.M they started again and around 10 they were working around the corner.

At noon they were nearly finished with the top part.


The master mason at work: Pepe seen from above from our new terrace.


Three 'o-clock in the afternoon and they've just left.
Chris and I walked down the road to have a look at our completed wall.
From beginning to end, it's smooth and shiny and new and looks bloody f%#&ing impressive! Respect for these four guys, they've done it.

GOOD EARTH

Friday 28th of July
Delivery of 'Tierra Buena' or Good Earth to fill in the last part of the wall.
I'm going to expand the cactus garden in front of the house.

3rd delivery of water

Thursday evening 27th of July
the 3rd load of water was added to the pool.
Sien checked it out and tasted it. 'It's a big drinkingbowl!'

Second delivery of water came this morning...
We'll get another one this afternoon and tomorrow another one or two.

Rendering

We've booked Paco's men for one week and were getting a bit worried yesterday if they would be able to finish the wall including the rendering. I innocently asked them this morning if it wasn't too much work for them to complete in 2 days...
Ahhh, never challenge a spanish man! Claro que si! No problemo!
They started at 7 A.M. this morning.

And at 10 they were nearly done with the 'lower' part of the wall.


When I came back from town at noon they had done half of the top part of the high wall.

And at three when they left the front part was nearly completed.
I am starting to believe that they could actually do it!
We'll have to wait and see untill tomorrow.

Water

Our saviour with the first load of 8000 liters of precious water
( € 90,= per load...)


Although he can manouvre the thing on centimeters we couldn't avoid cutting off a branch of the olive tree. Ofcourse Blas had to do it: he's the shortest man in town but with a big heart, incredibly strong and always in for the most difficult tasks.


The tractor made it around the bend and the first load is going in...

Holy Water

Wednesday 26-7-2006
While the guys were pouring the concrete on the roof we all at once ran out of water...
Our 4000 liter deposit was empty... A small panic situation because you just can't stop when you're making a concrete roof! We had already ordered water for the filling of the pool and it would arrive that evening. Explaining the situation he promised to come with the first load in an hour. In the meanwhile we emptied the patio where our Buddha statue stands with a pump. The spanish guys were really impressed and called it Buddha water. I'm sure our roof is blessed and wont leak.

Filling in the back of the wall

Even with the earth excavated from the pool we didn't have enough to get the ground to level with the wall. We've had 4 truckloads of rough gravel delivered, and then even....


The thing at the end is called an 'almeja' in spanish; a mussel.
It's a very pictorial language.

ROOF

For the roof of the waterdeposit they put concrete beams across the space and laid the 'bobadillos' neatly in between. Brilliant system!


Some more iron mesh on top, bricks around the whole thing to contain the concrete and then you can start pouring. I dream of concrete...

TILING 2

Tuesday morning and the tiling boys came back to do the bottom of the pool.
In the background you can see the start of the construction of the roof of the underground waterdeposit.


DONE!

TILING

meanwhile there was progress in our pool as well.
Smart guys those tilers: they covered their workingspace with shadow-cloth




For once they didn't get it finished in one day: the walls are finished but the floor still has to be done.
To be continued tomorrow?

ROOF

As well as finishing off the wall the team are going to make the roof on the underground waterdeposit. Most of the materials arrived this morning: vigas (beams) and bobadillos (the red brick bread-like things) cement and sand.
They only have to put it down and make more concrete!

Reaching ground level means that we now have to think of a 'balustrade' or something that prevents us from falling over the edge

SUPERVISOR

Boy, trying our the completed steps and supervising the work

ANOTHER MONDAY

Our old constructor of our house made us an offer we couldn't
(or didn't want to) refuse.
One week before his men went on holiday, they could work for us for costprice.
Which means we have a more or less (spanish) professional team
working their asses off for us this week!

Chris managed to help out and do things in between.
As soon as I would start on something the guys would take it over.
I felt useless and have spent the day making pictures and doing things inside.
Strange....

But... we've reached the end of the wall!
All the blocks have been laid and filled!
(view today from our bedroom window)

HOT

Taken 5 minutes ago... in the shade...

I can't resist. The boys have finished building the shower and just left and I'm publishing this last post immediately.
We were wondering if the guys were brothers because they had a similar walk and build. We asked and they are 'primo's': cousins and come from Colombia. That's why we understood them so well. Their Spanish is beautiful and clear.


One stainless steel shower with a view...



Muchas Gracias!

We had planned on having a lie-in on saturday morning... that means to sleep a bit longer than the usual 7 'o-clock in the morning.
Well... at 8.30 we were woken by the sound of a car?... and turned around again in our comfy bed in our airconditioned bedroom... the sound of a concrete mixer? my concrete mixer? and a grinder? sigh.... guess the lie-in is over...
The boys were back! Smiling and singing and grinding off the hard edges and making a lot of noise. But the nice thing is that they are going to make the shower platform today as well.
You'll get to see that soon!

Every step in building the pool has it's own team.
These two guys make the rim around the pool.
And as usual in one day...
They make the mold from metal bars, a big puzzle which has to be completely level.


And they filled the mold with a thick mixture of white cement and river gravel.
Normaly they use white marble but we wanted something different (as usual)


Quite happy chaps; they even sing while working in the scorching heat
(38 celcius in the shadow yesterday)


Last bit of filling...


And after drying for a while they polish it with brushes so the pebbles show at the surface.
Feels nice under your feet as well!

and how IS our wall doing?
it's becoming quite impressive!
try to imagine that behind these stones we are now on ground level at the back of our house.

And in the same day (a lot happened on that one monday!) Alberto and his mate built the steps of the pool. They're deeper than normal so you can sit comfortably on them in the water sipping a nice glass of whatever... I want them to finish QUICK!!!



Ahhh... I can feel that nice cool water already