Having agreed to a quote and a start date with our French builder we decided to return to Arné to celebrate the commencement of the work on the house. All the stories indicated to us that we might well find that the promises to start would be broken. But quite the reverse has happened. We arrived to discover that the work had already commenced; part of the roof had had the tiles removed. And promptly on Monday as promised Jean Claude appeared and continued the process of removing the tiles – the broken ones are thrown away and those that are complete are stored for use back on the restored roof, which will give it an old look.
The next day having completed the work at the front we set to and took down all the trees that grew close to the back of the house. The most difficult was the very large pine that can be seen in the original photos of the house in the earliest postings. But Jean Claude was not daunted and he got it down and then cut it up into useful slices which we have stored to the side of the garden at the back. We also had a bonfire to get rid of all the useless spare wood. The difference made by all these changes can be seen in the photos at the top.
And then the process of stripping off the tiles proceeded at the back so that in the end there were no tiles at the western end of the house. The next step though was far more difficult; the problem of the wall that’s falling down reared its ugly head. With the removal of the roof the strength holding the wall up would be significantly reduced with the very real possibility that it would collapse. So, Jean Claude jammed three acrow props against the wall – see the picture above – and then also put strengthening concrete with iron reinforcement at two places across the crack, the pictures above show this.
And then the weather intervened – rain is a problem for roofing as it makes all movement across the roof extremely dangerous. We went for a visit to Biarritz where the weather proved to be beautiful. And when we returned we discovered that despite the rain Jean Claude had actually continued with his efforts on the roof stripping away the wood. A further day’s work has resulted in all the western end of the roof being removed so that there is effectively nothing left except the walls – as the pictures demonstrate. The next step was to create a reinforcing ring beam of concrete at the top of all the walls prior to the process of rebuilding the roof. Jean Claude was able to do this across most of the front of the house before the weather once again turned nasty with high winds and lashing rain. It was fortunate that he had managed this part of the work as he had stated to me that this area of wall was wobbly and could come down in a storm – the concrete reinforcement held throughout three days of abominable weather so we are confident that progress will continue without a collapse.
Jean Claude stated that if the weather holds sufficiently then he confidently expects that the roof for this part will be fully renovated by the middle/end of January and we shall be able to commence the internal works on this part to make it habitable enough for our use. We shall see!!
The other bit of progress has been the provision by EDF of a temporary electrical connexion on the post nearest to the house. Howard the electrician contacted EDF and despite the recent strikes managed to make the necessary arrangements. The next step which he will undertake is for a cable to be run from this temporary box to a board in the pigsties allowing equipment, and possibly the caravan, to be plugged in. We left before this could take place as the weather prevented any work on the electrics.
Notwithstanding this somewhat doubting comment about the timescale for the completion of the roof, it has been so encouraging to be here and witness the progress being made so rapidly. And when the weather has been so good as it has been, it has served only to reinforce our view that this will be the most wonderful place to have as our home.
