Further Progress on the Irish Farmhouse:
Phase 2 - Spring-Summer 2003
In March 2003 we got the Horsebox over to Ireland - unfortunately we couldn't put it on the land immediately because the person selling was still messing around and we couldn't complete, so Maddy had to live in the horsebox down on the coast and put up with this view...
Later, while Carol & Tony were working overseas (Ethiopia & Iraq respectively - see Carol's Ethiopia Site ) Maddy got the horsebox on site after the seller finally signed all the paperwork - half a year after he had told us that he wanted a really quick sale...
This is the view in June 2003 with Horsebox & Land Rover parked in the field to the side of the house - the 5.5 acres stretches from where the house to the left is to a similar distance to the right behind the house and two fields towards the camera location. Not quite big enough for a Set-Aside grant! The ruins on the hills in the background are the old copper mines which used to be the industry here.
Summer Solstice 2003 was party night - no photos I'm afraid - not in any fit state to use a camera that night! The fire burned until well into the next morning, surprising number of people staggered up the track and over the stream - and of course, once you are there and the punch has been drunk there was no way to leave through the stream again in the dark!
Sunset over the Skellig Islands... sometimes the rain does stop!
By the end of July and we have succeeded in building our cement mixer - it came flat packed (we wondered how too!) The road is fixed up a bit with stones dredged from the stream and the worst bits can now be crossed using the Sand Ladder plates we got from the army surplus - needed sometimes when even the Land Rover gets bogged down in the fields which sometimes feel more like sponges.
So now all we have to do is rebuild the house... Watch this virtual space!
Work begins; July - August 2003