Mr M gets inspected, and does a bit of an Alan Titchmarsh!!

Well another week has fairly flown by here at "Wern Y Wylan" - I told you we have a name for our property - first person to translate correctly wins a week in Paradise!

Lots has been going on, firstly Mr M got his main septic lines laid and had his first inspection - which of course he passed with flying colors! I think the inspector was more interested in discussing his machines and motorcycles, a nice guy who is our "plumbing" inspector!

So once that was all completed the trenches were filled in and the airstream was moved back in under the carport - living in the trailer is easy, but having to move makes it a real pain in the behind! but that is it, we are now back here permanently!

The other BIG job that got completed this week was our decking, we are all about trying to make life as comfortable as possible, especially when the winter arrives and the rain!  decking gets us up off of the ground and will help to expand our living area whilst in the trailer and also when we are living in the garage!

We are going to cover and enclose one end of it to give us more room to store shoes, coats, and other things that you don't realize you need to hand until you don't have them :) also the doglets can then lay out there in the rain and watch the world go by!

More wiring has also been completed, basically that is it now for the electrics and the septic, until he starts on the garage, once we are settled and ready for winter Mr M will be getting on with outside work, making the most of the good weather.

We also did some landscaping, we have raked and leveled and raked quite a few areas and we have sown some grass seed - now we just need some rain! and then we will get some green - lovely!

The weather has been holding steady, we have been treated to some excellent views from Port Orford Heads State Park.

The old lifeboat station is here too, including the house which leads down 530 steps to the old lifeboat launch.

Finally this weekend I decided we needed cake! but we don't have an oven, I remembered I had read somewhere once about baking on the BBQ - so I gave it a whirl.... YUMMY, and yes it does taste as good as it looks!

That's all for this week, Monday tomorrow and it starts all over again!!

Week 1 in the Big Brother House!

Ola people, so it's been one whole week in the big brother house, well actually just over a week, but the first whole week of Mr M's new job!

And it's been a good week, took a few days to kind of get into some sort of routine, for him not me - I just got up as normal and started work as normal! So lots has been achieved, Mr M has wired up the garage, so we now have lights in there, amazing how some lights can make it so much more livable.

It involved lots of conduit, and holes being drilled into the lovely barn, and then 8ft grounding rods were driven into the ground and grounded with copper wire.  I did see Mr M reading an electrical book the other day ;)

Today Mr M and his mate Dennis dug the trenches for the septic line (with tractor) this meant we had to up sticks and move house temporarily. Trenches are dug, tomorrow the pipes get laid and then Tuesday they are inspected, and then we can cover them back up and put the airstream back under the carport, we will then be hooked directly into the septic! YAY!!

We've gone camping elsewhere for a couple of days!

I spent most of the week working hard, during my breaks I got on with the house work (doesn't take long) and going to the Laundromat, we have got my machine working here but it's a cold wash only, tomorrow I am going to concrete in my washing line, especially as the forecast is for sun sun sun!!!

Next project after we are back under the carport is our decking! We went to Bandon and brought all the wood, found an excellent supplier (Thanks to Dennis) and Mr M has been busy getting all the framing ready, I spent the day today painting up the deck slats! it is going to be an absolute lifesaver when the rain arrives, especially with it partially covered and walled in!  We just had 2 days of rain, and the mud/grit/dirt that comes in on 3 dogs is relentless, so I will be giving Mr M a great big kiss once the decking is up! Should be by the end of the week!

Mr M has been getting some sort of organization in his garage... he has a work bench to put his notebook on!

We have been enjoying some spectacular walks after our working days, we either visit the beach or go and walk at Port Orford Heads State Park, and walk the trails out around the headlands.  Cape Blanco State Park has some great trails to walk as well, we are really spoilt for choice now, and normally we see NO ONE else :)

Apart from salamanders, we see lots and lots of salamanders!

That's all until next week folks!!!

1 Husband, 1 wife, 3 dogs and 4 chickens head South -The Move Part 2!

Well after the first move we had a frantic week of packing, packing and more packing, plus some cleaning and also catching up with an old friend from England, who happened to be in Seattle for business, 2 weeks later and he would have missed us completely!  His business trip was perfect timing, although I don't think he believed me when I told him my house didn't normally look in such disarray!

FINALLY the day arrived of the big move, coincidently it was almost 2 years to the day that we had completed on our Port Orford property, we had originally said 18 months until the move, so only 6 months out of our original plan! and what a lot we have had done in those 2 years!

The day arrived and we were all packed up and ready for the final 10 hour trip, another convoy! Special Thanks for my lovely ex-neighbor Tracy who did a mercy dash to the charity shop the day prior to the move to get me an audio book! turned out to be a really great book!!!!

We made it safe and sound, all of us, chickens included!! they traveled really well, better than I expected, we got there just before dark so they spent the night in their boxes in the back of the truck.

Then they moved into their new coop, and seemed to approve!

And then today I put up a fenced run for them, I need to add some better corner posts and we are going to make a wooden gate to match our big gates!! you know its all about consistency with this project, I was so happy to give them some more freedom, they looked happy out dust bathing in the sunshine.

We have been busy getting ourselves settled, currently all our stuff is in the garage, we are going to wait a couple of weeks before sorting it all out and putting it into the container, as we anticipate a few items in some of those boxes being needed! and already we have had a few things out of them.  Also for the next few weeks Gareth will be concentrating on getting the trailer and site ready for winter and the rain, we have some more fencing to complete, we need to get the septic run back to the garage and first job is the main electrical panel being put in the garage.  We are also going to be putting some decking out along the trailer, keeping us up and out of the dirt/mud, and it will be covered and enclosed at one end opening up our living area!  It will be made to be moveable so when we move into the garage it will be moved round to sit in front of the garage and be our "outdoor living" area there :)

Our new home is SO cosy, housework doesn't take long leaving more time for decorating with fairy lights.   I went to the Laundromat today to hang out with some locals and catch up on all the gossip! life is good in Port Orford.

We now have had our address registered with USPS so we have our mailbox to put up and will be able to receive mail, it's something you don't think about when you buy a piece of untouched land, it doesn't actually exist! we had the address registered with the county when we applied for permits, but USPS needed to register it too! we have also put a number on the gate along with our house name :) more on that in another blog!

We got our high speed internet connected, it is FAST much faster than our internet was in the big metropolis of Seattle, we also have a land line, so I am ALL set to get back to work first thing tomorrow!

Not much else to report, our move proved to be as uneventful as we hoped it would be, when we first brought our property all I could  think about was "how were we going to move all our stuff down here" but with the slow process of everything happening over 2 years, each little thing has been dealt with separately, including the move, once we finally decided how we were doing it, actually completing it was a breeze!

And so the fun now begins, tomorrow is Monday morning, back to work for me, and the start of a new way of life for him!

Molly is definitely happy to be a beach bum, her hair is looking scraggy enough to be a surfer dude!

That moment when I realized Mr M had 6 bikes NOT 5!!

We just completed THE MOVE PART 1.  We were never going to be "those people" who pay "those people" to move our stuff! we have always been fairly self sufficient with this kind of thing and so when we first started talking about this all I could think was "how are we going to get all of this, down there".  To be fair we don't have that much stuff, we are not hoarders (well I'm not) and having moved half way across the world we didn't have that much to start with when we first moved into this house.

Until this move I always thought Mr M had 5 bikes.. we moved 5 bikes so what's the issue, he must have 5 bikes... except there is 1 still here in the garage - that moment when I realized he had 6 bikes and he had snuck one in under my nose and I didn't realize! I really must pay more attention!

So skip forward to before we listed the house for sale, I proactively looked at movers, storage, pods etc.. and just about fell off my chair with some of the prices people were quoting us cha ching $$$$ mostly due to the remote location, and then the lack of available storage, and none of that is close to our new place - apart from one where they leave pallets on the floor to keep your stuff out of the water when it floods - OH please can we keep our stuff there!!

So after I priced up all the options we came up with the following - purchasing a shipping container for long term storage, and completing the move ourselves with U-Haul one way rentals (we drive it down there and leave it down there at a U-Haul location) was the least expensive option, and storage available 24*7 and think of the potential for more motorbike storage once our furniture is out of the container!

And keeping with the OCD that is Mr M, it is red to match the barn and the well house, there was mutterings about putting a green roof on it, so I quickly focused his attention back to the bigger picture!!

The move had to happen in 2 parts due to the amount of vehicles we have, so this first trip we rented a 26ft U-Haul truck and moved all of the garage stuff, machinery, motorbikes and garden paraphernalia including my green house, we both had to drive the full trip, which was 10 hours with stops, but my trip was a lot less bouncy and rattly than Mr M's.  Apparently the Gentle Ride Van U-Haul advertise ain't so much!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

We got down there safe and sound on a glorious sunny day, and parked the airstream up under the carport, our first new home!  Whilst we had been gone our neighbor Dennis put up some privacy fencing for us, to fill the gap between us and next door, it is AMAZING!!! well worth paying him to do that before we moved down!



So we are back home now for our final week, it is all go, go, go, pack, pack, packing and THE MOVE PART 2 will follow soon!

 



Ready, Set, SOLD!!

What a whirlwind of a few weeks it's been since we got back from our last trip to Port Orford.  We got back here and within the week we had the house listed for sale.  Who knew that in 11 days we would have an offer, plus a back up offer incase the first one met a stumbling block!

My first observation with selling the house is housework, it is never ending, and then having to be out of the house when viewings occur, but I did have it all down pat by the end of 2 weeks, cleaned and out in a flash!

So once we accepted an offer we go through all the process of inspections, appraisals etc. etc. and now finally we are on the downhill stretch!

Packing has been going with a gusto, had a few trips to the dump and many trips to Goodwill!

 

Still lots to do but we are making good headway!! We are off to Port Orford with the garage stuff machines, motorbikes and garden stuff soon, we have a 26ft truck, (which isn't as big as it appears in the photo) and are definitely going to fill it!  We rented an engine crane to hoist Mr M's machines into the truck, those things make light work!!

 

We will be going in convoy, Mr M in the UHaul and me in the truck towing the airstream! it is going to be a long drive, but the destination will make it all worthwhile.  Then 2 weeks today we will be heading down there for the final trip!

Until next time...

Well, Well, Well 3 Holes in the Ground!!

"Well, Well, Well 3 holes in the Ground" to quote my lovely Grampy Watts!!!

Back at the end of last October we had our well drilled, the guy who did it went down 46ft and we are getting 2 gallons a minute out of it.  That is pretty good, but not brilliant! means we will have to have 2500 gallon holding tank and *fingers crossed* it doesn't run dry!

So fast forward to now, and this latest trip, its all very well having a well dug, a big metal tube down into the deepest darkest depths of the dirt! but no water comes out of it without further intervention! We spent some more dollars and purchased a pump, a small holding tank and lots and lots of pipe!

Mr M then proceeded to put it all together and build the base etc. so that by the time we were down there it would just be a case of plugging it all together and voila! Easy Peasy! right???? LOL apart from the leaks!

So you put 46ft of plastic pipe down the hole, careful as you do it so as not to drop anything down there, or lose your pipe! Mr M made an in-genius clamp to help us be successful!

Then he plumbed in the pump etc...

And guess what - we got water! yes at first we ended up with a few more leaks than anticipated, but some magic paste and tape soon sorted those out!  Clever Mr M!

And finally all this needed to be enclosed, Mr M had built the well house whilst we were at home, I spent a couple of my lunch breaks down in Oregon painting ( didn't I do a good job) and we put some insulation on the inside in case we do actually get a frost.... and then put it all together!! looks so cool and YES it does match the pole barn :) Consistency people, Consistency!!

We also got my chicken coop put up whilst we were down there, it is up at the back of the property next to where my vegetable garden will be! I will be putting some fencing up around it to allow them more scratching area! I am happy that at least when we move they will have a bed for the night!

 

 

Well that's all for now folks, we have our house on the market and it really is getting real now! We are both very excited and anxious to get our house sold and move on to this next chapter!!