Week three.

Monday

 

We were up quite early today with plans to go to the market in a nearby village (apparently a very good one) and go to the dump again. So we set off with a fully loaded van to go to the dump first. On the way we drove past the man who was meant to fix our water tap. He waved at us and stopped and seemed to indicate he was on his way to ours. We obviously didn't want to miss him so we turned around and went to follow him back to the house. But when we came around the corner we saw his car pulled up outside the bar! We decided to go home anyway and at least he should come today (as long as he doesn't get too distracted!)

 

Pretty fields around the village.

 

At home we started straight away with working. Pete was outside on the front wall pulling down even more clematis and making the front of the house look nice - including strimming the grass so we could actually park the van off the road.

 

Pete about to get at the front wall!

Our beautiful, cleared front gate.

 

I was inside in one of the downstairs rooms pulling up the floor boards. I thought this would be quite an easy job but they had hammered very long nails in every two inches along all the boards so was actually very time consuming. At some point in the morning M & D popped by and we said we would see them for a drink later.

 

Me working hard.

 

Eventually the water man did turn up and got on with fixing the stop tap - which meant he had to turn off the water for the village. We hope no one was too annoyed!

 

Once he'd gone we drove into Chirpan for lunch as we had no food at all and the village shop is closed on Mondays. We didn't do any shopping as we still wanted to go to the market tomorrow, so we went to the bakery instead and then drove back home. After lunch we carried on working. Pete finished the front wall and came in to finish off the floor boards - my back was starting to ache from bending over so I went and put more wood and old furniture on the fire.

 

FINALLY NO FLOOR BOARDS!

Our street.

 

We finished up at about 5.30 - a long day! - and had a quick wash with cold water. M & D came by at 6.30 and we had a beer in the last of the sunshine. As we had no food we decided to go into Chirpan for dinner with M & D. They drove in their car and we had a lovely dinner out at the pizzeria (for about 5 pounds each WITH beers!!)

 

Tuesday

We weren't up as early as we wanted - we set off to the market at 9. We got a bit lost on the way as we hadn't actually been there before, so it took a while to find it - but it was very scenic with the sun shining and huge black clouds over the mountains. When we arrived we saw where the market probably had been but it was all closed. It must be an early one. There were a few stalls open by the side of the road, so we bought some fruit and veg from there before heading back to Chirpan (the quicker way) and getting a few more bits from the butchers and Penny Market (the supermarket is sadly unavoidable.) All stocked up on food we headed home and filled our fridge for the first time!

 

M & D were working on a house in our village so we stopped by to say hello to them before getting home and having a late breakfast. We also saw the shop lady and she invited us for Bulgarian lessons tomorrow afetrnoon. We also decided to cook dinner now and have the slow cooker on all day whilst we work - a great idea!

Mmmm slow cooker

 

Today we working in the same room as yesterday - we just needed to dig down about 20cm so we can lay a new concrete floor. We thought there would be a layer of rubble and then soil - which we can keep and use eventually in the garden. But we found, once we'd started digging, that rubble actually went down about as far as we needed to dig. This was actually much easier to shovel out than dirt but we didn't know what to do with it all. Then Pete had the genius idea to fill our water trench with it. So in order to do that we got out some rock wool insulation and plastic to cover the pipe first (we have to make sure they don't freeze in winter) and then started carrying out the rubble in buckets. It was pretty boring and took a long time but it wasn't too difficult, except for when Pete had to brake through some huge rocks with the pick axe.

Cosy water pipe.

All rubble gone.

 

It was quite a cold evening and we were just wrapping up warm and getting ready to eat our slow cooked chicken stew when M turned up at the house with a man called Nasco, who could fix our dry stone wall for us. A large part of the front wall has fallen down which looks bad and also makes the house less secure. He gave us a quote - actually it was pretty expensive - but it was about 27 square metres he had to work on and he gave us a good price, so we agreed. Part of the deal with most labourers in Bulgaria is that you also pick them up and drop them home, so we drove out with M to see when he lived (in Spasovo - the next village) and agreed to collect him at half eight tomorrow.

Broken wall.

 

Back at home we ate our yummy dinner and got into bed early and watched a film.

 

Wednesday

 

So we were up early this morning and at about 8.25 Pete set off to collect Nasco (he went alone as there were going to be two labourers.) When they got back there were coffees all around before starting to work. We were in the same room again - this time digging a large trench along the back wall for the water and waste pipes to come into the house. And also digging smaller trenches along the outside walls to kind of under pin the house (we know you're meant to dig down to the bottom of the house walls but that is much deeper then we originally thought so we aren't going to bother.)

Digging - lots of rocks!

At about 1 o'clock M turned up with two men and a GPS thing. They were here to plot our land - which we had already organised and paid for when we were in Brighton. As our land is an L shape we have 6 corners - we walked around to each one, got the correct spot on the GPS and then Pete hammered in a stick. Genuinely the land is even bigger than we thought we'd bought!! Obviously a twig hammered in the ground is pretty easy to loose or move so our new priority was to get something more solid in - we didn't have the time to put up a fence at the moment (getting a toilet is more important) but we decided we would cement in some proper posts tomorrow. After lunch we carried on working. Nasco was also getting on well with the wall - they'd taken down the huge section that needs rebuilding.

Our first corner pegged - half that wall is ours!

Action shot

At 3.30 I cleaned up a bit and headed off to the shop for some Bulgarian lessons. When I arrived D was actually in there chatting with shop lady so I joined them and had a coffee. I wrote down a few new words and had the dictionary out to translate! I was still at the shop after Pete had dropped Nasco home, so he joined us too. We stayed for a while and then headed home. 

 

The wall is down.

Thursday

 

We were both up early and Pete left to pick up Nasco at 8. Back at home we did some bits around the house like fill the water tanks and empty the toilet. After this we jumped in the van and drove to Chirpan to buy some fence posts. We were in the builders merchants, looking up in a dictionary how to say sand and cement, when D came in - he had seen our van outside. He helped us ask for what we needed and also told us they only sell sand loose - luckily he had some outside his house in SG he said we could have some of. So we set off towards home, stopping in SG to finally empty the van at the dump and to pick up some sand.

 

It was a warm day and when we came home we found Nasco and his worker asleep in the grass! We are paying them per square metre so it doesn't make any difference to us. We mixed the cement in a wheelbarrow (Nasco woke up and helped us with this as he obviously thought he could do it better!) and we cemented in our corner poles.

 

Great view from the top corner of our land!

 

After we'd had some lunch it was already getting on and we were feeling a bit lazy. We made coffee and chatted to Nasco for a bit - I say chatted, we tried to understand what he was saying and then ended up pointing at tools and saying them in Bulgarian! We did do a bit more digging in the downstairs room but finished at 4 when Pete took Nasco home.

 

In the evening M & D popped by with the shop lady (who used to live here) and she told us about all the animals she used to have and told us which trees to make sure we keep.

 

Friday

 

Yesterday Nasco had asked Pete if he could drive him to Chirpan before work. A bit cheeky of him but we used the opportunity to go to the market - so I came too and the boys got in the back of the van. We had organised a BBQ on Sunday for 12 people so we we bought alot of veg - so worth waiting for the market as it is SO much cheaper.

 

Back at home we cracked on with our work - as did Nasco, who was working much harder today. We were now in the other downstairs room doing the same thing. This was much more difficult though as there was no rubble - just very compact earth. Pete was braking it up with the pick axe and I was shovelling it out - it was very hard going. Not much to report from the day - we just did alot of hard digging.

 

Hard digging.

Slowly getting there.

 

At about 3 we got bored and decided to see if we could make a hole in the house to actually get the water pipe in. Pete was in there with his hammer and chisel and on the inside we got out quite a few rocks - the walls are 50cm thick so there was a long way to go. We decided to try from the otherside, when Nasco caught on to what we were doing and got involved! He had broken through, after a while of smashing rocks, and we finally had a hole for our pipes!

 

Pete, worker and Nasco.

Hole in the house!

Wall is looking great.

 

Once that excitement was over I went down to the shop for some more Bulgarian lessons. Pete joined us later, after dropping Nasco home. We were also joined by M & D and another English girl who I will call DW! She used to live in SG but is looking for a new property - maybe in our village. We invited everyone back to ours for a drink and we had a really fun evening drinking and being merry.

 

Pete stroking Mimi - the cat that will soon have kittens!

That's our house - top left - and you can just see the tent behind the trees to the right.

Saturday

 

We had a day off today . The kittens were born in the morning and they are SO CUTE. But we have to wait at least 10 weeks until we take them from the mum :( We did a huge shop for the BBQ tomorrow and DW came by to introduce us to another English couple who live in Spasovo. Oh I forgot to tell you that Pete has got a paid job!! M & D sold a house just down the road to an English family, who are using it as a Holiday home. They want to pay Pete to look after the garden - mowing, weeding etc. It's not loads ofhmoney of course - but much better than nothing! Anyway, so Pete went down there for a couple of hours to weed the flowers beds. Not much else to report from today.

 

Having a coffee in Chirpan

Pete hard at work.

Sunday

 

This morning we were up early and having been preparing for our party! We have 10 people coming and it should be great. Will tell you about it next time.

Ready to BBQ!

 

xxx