Challenges

We moved to the property in December 2005. It was very cold, neither of the gas fired instant water heaters worked and although we had a 14KW log burning stove, we'd left it too late to acquire any logs as these tend to start selling in about September. Ironically, our nearest neighbour to the West (Jose Maria) had suffered considerable damage to his orange trees from snow the previous winter. The upshot was that he decided to replant, and the week before we moved in, had burned all the trees where they'd been felled in the field. If only !!The house was very damp having been empty for over a year so the solutions were to buy two butane stoves for space heating and to replace one of the gas heaters with a 100 litre immersion boiler. I managed to locate a tonne of logs a few weeks later but as they had to be hauled from about 20 miles away, I had to pay a bit over the odds.That sorted, we spent the rest of the colder months drying out and tidying the house to make it habitable.Of course, every time we emerged from the inside of the house, we were reminded that on top of getting the rest of the house to our liking, we were going to eventually have to face the somewhat more daunting challenge of what to do about the great outdoors.The order of battle was dictated mostly by the fact that one of the reservations Margaret had about the move to Spain was that she missed her garden in UK which she had transformed from an eyesore into a picture of colour during the previous few years.

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Comments

PRO

Craig McGinty October 15, 2008 at 9:32am

Hi Roger, that is quite a garden to leave behind! But looking forward to reading more about your Spanish adventures.
All the best, Craig
Bigyin October 15, 2008 at 5:58pm

Here you go then Craig. It'll be a bit of a chronilogical diary (to keep you on the edge of your seat :-)
PRO

Craig McGinty October 15, 2008 at 7:15pm

>> It'll be a bit of a chronilogical diary

If that's the case then make sure you link between the different stories, give me a shout if you need a hand :-)