Too late for Tuscany?

On Days Like These

From reading my favourite bloggers, it seems that its officially a 'slow blog season', perhaps its due to the crazy weather we are having across Europe, or else I can blame the 'day job', and a hectic few days in Moscow last week, but I have finally succumbed to Mrs J's sustained pressure to write a new post.....

The movie buffs amongst you will recognise that today's blog takes it's title from the theme tune to the Italian Job (that's the classic 1960's version not the modern re-make), and I see the title sequence to be an allegory to our current situation, why? well you may recall that as the credits role, we see the driver of a fantastic car (a Lambo Miura), winding his way thro' some spectacular Italian scenery, and whilst his attention is distracted he is ambushed by a bunch of locals, driving a digger! If you can't quite remember, check it out out here watch clip.

And so it has been over that last few weeks at Chicken House, as what should have taken a few days, has now turned into a long-running saga, with seemingly no end in sight.  However, at last, Alberto's last set of photo's show some light at the end of the tunnel, with the terracing done, the LPG tank buried upto its neck, and the terrace walls all but completed, built from a pile of massive blocks of stone.  Since my last visit to Toscana, it has become apparent (at least for a stranieri-project), that the most important person in the project is not the architect, or the builder, but the translator, and our key expert on this job has just given birth to a beautiful bouncing baby girl!  So, for our not-so-regular interchanges with Alberto, we are reliant on Mrs J's Italian teacher.  Whilst this is less than perfect, I am trying to reconcile myself that Alberto (and Chiasserini) know exactly what they have to do, and whilst they seem unable to do any of the handful of jobs in parallel, completing the job will take just as long as it takes.  This is not a project management maxim, but whilst these last steps drag out, at least it allows the piggy-bank to fill back up again to pay for it all.

So, what are these last steps? as already stated, the terracing is done, and the walls, and the gas tank.  This means that as the digger retreats off site, that the septic tank can be fitted (allegedly it was supposed to have been done last week), that will then allow the boys to re-point the front and side of the house.  Inside the plumber couldn't get on, as he was waiting for the painter to paint the walls, but then the painter had to stain the beams first!.  Again, photo evidence that the painter is on-site, so we could assume that the plumber has been able to hang the radiators, and further, if the septic tank is installed, then all the loo's can be fitted and connected up too.  Hurrah.

This all means that we are planning our moving in trip, sometime mid-July, and have been out this weekend on a last minute spending spree, buying all the duplicate items such as kitchen utensils, that you need when you run two households, this of course is on top of the boxes and boxes of stuff we have been hoarding for years on the expectation of our first house.  So, despite the changeable weather, all is rosy, and as Charlie Croker might say 'we are the self preservation society'.  Ciao 

Long train runnin'

In case I forget, the aim of the mad digging was not solely to 'do the garden', it was actually to 'plant' the LPG tank, and then finally the septic tank, the gardening was merely a sideshow, but a comment this week from my gardener seems to say that work hasn't advanced much since I left, perhaps they are all off enjoying the festa della Republica (Republic Day).

As I said it wasn't just the garden on my last trip, briefly I also squeezed in: a meeting with painter #2, again, very entertaining, as Alberto was my interpreter (and he doesn't speak any English), good job I always carry my notepad and pencil.  Anyway, we seemed to come to a conclusion, and given the size of the previous quote (preventivo), I changed the spec for this guy, no fancy paint effects, just cream walls throughout, I agreed with Mrs J if we want fancy we can do it in a few years at our leisure, when the coffers have filled up again. So I hope this guy didn't get too merry on the festa as he is supposed to be starting this week, and he needs to do a few things as he in turn is holding up the plumber (ie he needs to paint before the radiators are hung). 

I spent an awful lot of time sitting on the floor, and staring at the ceiling, thinking about what to do with the kitchen, and finally came to a conclusion that Ikea was our best bet!! Whilst it seems like sacrilege to spoil all of our tuscan features with MDF, it really is going to be the safest bet, as my original idea of the traditional built kitchen just would not be good enough, it boils down to the fact that modern kitchen units are made of 15mm thick panels, and our hand made kitchen would have 110mm brick uprights, thus loosing 95mm of storage space for every 'unit', and given that we haven't got a lot of space to start with, that's it, QED.  Its funny, for such a global company you would think prices should be the same, especially across the euro-zone, oh no. They vary greatly, with Italy actually being slightly better than say Austria or Slovakia, funnily enough the cheapest place to buy Ikea at the moment is UK, but I really draw the line in transporting 2 tonne of their boxes around Europe, I mean, its a long way to go back when you need that extra screw (that's always missing).

Couldn't bring myself to do any real work in the garden as I was hiring some labour, but I did try out my newly repaired chain saw and chop down a dead cherry tree that was dangerously close to our neighbours back wall. Silly me, I thought that the chainsaw was supposed to do all the work, or perhaps it was the fact the temp was well into the 30's, but by the time the monster had been felled, branches stripped, and the trunk cut into bite sized pieces, I was creased, and had to go and cool off in the shade of the house.  When I had enough strength to move the cut bits, even though I was wearing regulation steel boots I managed to drop the biggest bit, not on my toe (that would have been ok), but on my unprotected shin, enabling me to see stars even when the sun was shining, ouch! (I still have a very nice bruise some 10 days later).

Last word on the interior of the house, all the tiling is done, and looks great, especially the small en-suite on the top floor.  The electrician is almost done, with all of the main wiring and sockets installed (we do have a small issue that they are not all as per drawing, but a flea in Alberto's ear solved that), and as you can see we wanted the traditional, surface mounted, twisted-pair connections for the ceiling lamps (actually its the only way to have a good looking installation on beam/terracotta ceilings).  And finally even though the septic tank is not in, Chiasserini's boys are getting on with re-pointing the front & side of the house, and silly me, the price was high, as they will touch-up the front, but do the side 100%.  buona festa

Ain't no stoppin' us now

I've been back home almost a week now from the craziest gardening weekend ever, and now there is nothing blocking the completion of Chicken House.

I pitched up at 9am on day 1 to find Matteo already well in to removing half of Tuscany by way of his mini-digger, so much for Alberto insisting that they wouldn't lift a finger without me being there.  I stopped the work for a second to check the facts, I was amazed the guy spoke some English, and equally surprised that he had removed a size-able amount of dirt without any direction, so out came my file of 3D drawings which he took to heart, folded up in his shorts and returned to digging, obviously happy in his work.  As I was taking a few minutes to go round the house to see the latest progress, then the builder turned up, 10 minutes more and a flat-bed truck squeezed up our little lane, with a nice green LPG tank on the back (in Italy its called GPL!), and then last but not least Alberto showed up, so within half an hour we had 8 guys, 2 trucks, a gas tank and a digger, the only person we didn't have and I was missing the most was VP (our translator).

To get the GPL truck up the lane, the even bigger truck taking away the spoil had to be backed into the road blocking the traffic, so the boys then set to to unload the tank.  The truck was conveniently equipped with its own hoist for this job, but that would have been too easy.  They decided to use Matt's digger, and struggled with a variety of ways to rig the slings around the tank, and the digger bucket.  I was busy taking pictures for posterity, but as the tank was lifted less than safely it did cross my mind that the pictures would come in handy for the accident inquest later.  Against the odds the tank was offloaded without injury, and was on its way up the garden towards it final resting place, trucks were re-positioned and the days main job could continue.

Alberto, Chiasserini and me then had a good 15min ding-dong about how the landscaping should (and should not) be done, the only tool in our joint vocabulary being a pencil & paper, eventually we came to a compromise that didn't entail Matteo digging for the next month, and wouldn't cost me a fortune in transporting soil around Toscana.  So we agreed on: 2 terraces not 3, level 1 to have a 1.2m retaining wall, level 2 to have a 1.4m wall (the maximum you can have in Tuscany without seismic reinforcing).  Instead of extending the base level right across the back of the house, including the back of the neighbours house, that only the 1.2m level would be site wide, this simple idea probably saving about a dozen truckloads.  The final point was how are we going to make the walls? 'with all the stone from the old barn' I said, 'not enough' retorted Alberto, 'how about to use big-stones? only 80euro per cubic metre' I left him to work out a scheme and a cost (preventivo).

The fun didn't end there, we had a meeting with Painter Man #2, I employed a gardener, designed a kitchen and chopped down a tree, but more of that later.

P.S. There is one major thing to report, the new stufa is fully installed in the living room, and I think it looks great. Ciao  

Buona Pasqua

No, I'm not too late for Easter wishes, as although most religions enjoyed their eggs last weekend, this week its Orthodox Easter, later than everybody else due to the change-over between the Gregorian and Julian calendars many years ago.

Our first Easter in Tuscany continued to be hectic, (I even squeezed in an hours gardening).  It wasn't all thankfully centred around Chicken house, but spent as I guess it should be in Italy, sitting around the table with friends, eating and drinking.  Once again Karin pushed the boat out for a great dinner on Saturday night, with the table groaning under local delicacies.  The grand finale was La Colomba (an easter cake) washed down by digestif or two from Stefano's home made collection that looked and tasted like the stuff fire-eaters imbibe, and could have stripped paint at twenty paces.  Whilst most of the gathering could'nt believe what they had just drunk, Stefano put the bottle back in its hidey hole saying it wasn't quite mature yet and needed at least another year!  That's one anniversary not to put in the diary. 

Our gastro-experience continued (later) the next day, when we enjoyed a lazy but no less extensive brunch, with all kinds of Salumi, breads and cheeses, I even volunteered to do my world famous scrambled eggs, closely watched by Stefano who was obviously hoping to steal my recipe, and only after that blow-out did we venture to the house, to show K&S nostra casa for their first time, with approving nods all round. 

If that wasn't enough for an Easter Sunday we went for a passeggiare in Perugia, and were amazed at both the numbers of people who had the same idea and the wind up on the hill by the Duomo, then early to bed for our long trip home the next day.  Buona Pasqua

Mamma Mia! Magalotti

We pulled up to the house, bathed in Good Fridays afternoon sunshine, ecstatic that we had actually caught the builders working, and not just 1 or 2 of them but a whole cohort of Chiasserini's men toiling away, on what is a holiday in most other parts of Europe.  We were early for our planned site meeting and keen to get updated with the developments as we hadn't heard from Alberto in 10 days.  As we rounded the corner of our neighbours house our hearts sunk, why did we have doors, when there should be windows??? When, how, why did this happen?, this isn't what we discussed, argued, chivvied about for so long with all and sundry.  As they say in football circles, I was gutted!

Unfortunately no time to dwell on that for the moment, we had (as usual) a carload to empty, this time the new Stufa, one big radiator and 4 very large rolls of loft insulation, time to press gang a few helping hands to save my aching back, and in double quick time the Stufa was sitting in pride of place amongst the builders detritus in the kitchen, and the rear suspension breathed a sigh of relief.  The troops then started to muster, first Chiasserini, followed by Alberto & Virna, Tizzi (the Plumber), and eventually, the man we were all talking about Magalotti (Carpenter). I must say that even though I was in full flow with the site meeting I was so pissed with him it took me more than 10 minutes to even say hello, and what Mrs J had to about it say made Alberto's eyes water.

The site meeting flowed well from room-to-room, admiring the work done in the 10 day communication blackout, such as:- second coat of plaster, ALL the floors down (and with 4 guys busily grouting them in), front & rear doors fitted, and also those doors we didn't want also fitted.  We did have a few sticking points along the way, most noticeably concerning the loft insulation, which I threatened to do myself, but I eventually capitulated as my back was killing me after the drive down, but making Chiasserini swear that he would do in a lot less than the 12 hours he had quoted for, I mean, get a life, 12 hours to fit 4 rolls of insulation, my Granny could do it quicker than that.

We also had a lengthy debate with the tiler (who was presently doing the floor), about how not to waste the precious tiles that were only just enough to do the job.  This would have been a doddle, if it wasn't for Alberto chipping in with seemingly random ideas to how to save tiles, do it this way and that, and generally making a nuisance of himself.  I even asked VP for the Italian for 'the customer is always right', to be told (by Alberto) that it didn't work like that in Tuscany, I should have known!

After all other points were finished, and Chiasserini & Tizzi had left, it was down to Magalotti, me and the doors.  And do you know what, apparently it was my fault, another thing I should have known, he misunderstood my instructions, therefore it was my fault QED, but........ he could rectify the error, for a very special price.  To put this discussion in context, we had just arrived after a very long drive, the site meeting had already taken 3 hours, my back was killing me, and we still had to go to Alberto's office to choose colour schemes. I really wasn't in the mood for Magalotti, also the things I wanted to say to him, I couldn't say through my lady translator, so I asked him to mail me his ideas and costs, and he went. 

Uff, all this writing about the doors has got me going again, but enough negativity, what about those floors? I know Tuscany is full of them, Umbria too, but these are ours, laid by our boys, and will be walked upon by our kids. Hurrah! 

What a weekend!

We just had a whirlwind weekend in Toscana, and away the rest of the week on business, so a quick update, on what we saw, who we met and what we got up to.

Main reasons for the flying-visit were, meeting at the bank, pay the house insurance, and site meeting with Alberto & builder, we also fitted in a quick ciao with Romolini's, a curry night for Karin (provided by the hand of Mrs J), and a few new friends, signing a new contract for our LPG tank installation and stocking up on Italian xmas goodies.  We also had a full day in the garden as the weather was glorious, and we managed to tame at least 80%, so at least we can see the scale of the problem, and what needs to be done this year (or more likely next).

Things discussed on the site visit were: progress to-date (see pics 'site visit'), re-plastering, finishing damp work, raising the internal door heights, sandblasting, fitting a new chimney flue, removing/replacing all non-traditional floors/cielings (not easy or cheap), the problems of plumbing in Tuscany, and digging a big hole for the gas tank.

I'll go into some of these main problems later when I'm back at the weekend. Ciao  

Big Plans

When I was in UK last week I got a copy (courtesy of www.amazon.co.uk) of a recently published book on how to design & manage large gardens (see the mylibrarything in the RH column), as so far all garden books I could find were concerned with the average British postage-stamp garden that are typical in new-build estates.  I was so looking forward to getting some real hands-on advice on how to do it, by the time I got to chapter 4 I was already feeling let down that I had bought a rather expensive collection of mother-hood statements, that must have been old hat even when Capability Brown was a lad.  Nevertheless, when I had put down the book, I picked up my pencil & paper and started to draw up my large-garden plan, and from that transfer it to 'sketchup' format.

As we will have to put so much effort into clearing the garden (over the next 10 years!)I want to make it as low-maintenance as possible after that (a bit of an oxymoron when talking of gardens), and to also put in the garden a few keynote Tuscan elements, ie Cypress trees, Olives etc, and to reflect the fields around the house, a large area of untended wildflowers.  Karin (http://www.casaspertaglia.it/) has a friend who is a garden designer, and now my ideas are on paper I've suggested that she comes to the house for an hour to give us the benefit of her experienced eye.

I finally plucked up courage to unwrap the bath and make sure it wasn't damaged after our little trip home last week.  Its taken me this long as I'd seen enough of it last weekend to last a lifetime, but I knew I had to bite the bullet and check all was ok, ie before we lugged it another 1000km across Austria and Italy.  I needn't have worried, it turned out to be very very well protected, and a once-over with a damp cloth made it look a million-dollars, and to put the icing on the cake all 4 legs and fixing bolts were in the accompanying box. Hurrah!

The electricity problem rumbles on, apparently the ENEL man turned up ages ago to connect us, and went away again without doing anything, now they say they will come back and do it asap, as long as we pay them 299 euro!

It’s a jungle out there!

As I already said, chicken-house has a big garden to the rear, more than 25m wide, and probably 70-80m long (I say probably, ‘cos I haven’t actually had the energy to get to the top), and yes top, because this garden is at a 45-degree slope.

When we first viewed the property (in April), the garden seemed ok, big but manageable, full of weeds of course, after so many years of neglect, together with a few fairly well established trees.

The day we pitched up after the contract signing, it was a whole different ball-game, due to this years wet spring/early summer in Tuscany, the nettles were over 2m high in places, and therefore needed some heavy machinery, hence my call to Riccardo who recommended his friend Alessandro Graziotti, who runs the biggest farm machinery business in the area, who, as well as selling tractors also does brush-cutters.  What a great guy, gave us a fantastic deal, and even threw in safety visor, lub-oil, extra blades etc, and the whole deal was done in a mix of pigeon Italian English.

Back to the house, and between rain-showers I learnt how to use this petrol powered beast WITHOUT chopping my toes off, then set to work to clear some space.  Unfortunately the rain was back for real, but no time to waste, hence my kinky get-up in the plastic poncho (a strange present given to me just the week before in a Bulgarian energy conference).  It was a slow and laborious job, struggling in the wet conditions, I eventually gave up on the plastic-line fitted as standard to the beast, and decided to fit the fixed blade which I reluctantly agreed to buy from Alessandro (I was even more protective of my pinkies), but barring the odd foul-up this was a whiz, as frankly the nettles were more like small trees than grass, and this blade took them out in a flash.  So, as the sun came out later, one could see a wide swathe of forest that had been laid low by my efforts, and I was very happy to have mastered my new toy and keep all my extremities intact.

Next day, my previous efforts had only helped to uncover a few fairly large trees, living too close to the house, so I set to work with my new little axe, quite a task on a not so little tree.  I’d barely worked up a sweat chopping off a few of the easier branches when up popped one of my neighbours wielding his chainsaw.  Without a word of warning, he revved it up and down came the tree, quickly sectioned into pieces, then he waded into the mass of dead nettles to tackle a few more.  In 15 minutes it was all over, he said his farewells, I was profusely grateful and got on with the easier task of clearing up the mess.  I resolved there and then that I must get a chainsaw of my own, as they were even more fun than a brush-cutter.

Jumping forward a bit, for our next visit in August I had been a bit pro-active, and bought some serious weedkiller (trade name ‘Roundup), which was supposed to kill everything in its path, but not the soil.  As with most ‘magic bullets’ it wasn’t cheap (ie 30 euro for a small bottle), I know it has to be diluted before application, but it still only covered a strip 4m wide by 25m, if it was going to work, then clearing this garden was going to get expensive.  Anyway in the week that we were there I couldn’t see any discernable change in the vegetation I sprayed, this certainly wasn’t as effective as ‘agent orange’!

I am therefore resigned to the fact that there will be no quick fixes with this garden that every square metre will have to be reclaimed by hand. So, since we’ve been back in Slovakia I’ve seen a small 4hp rotovator on sale in my local DIY store, I’m therefore resolved to get that soon, and add it to my growing collection of boys-toys (by the way, I did buy myself that chain saw too).