Ian returned from the UK via the super fast train from Malaga to Cordoba. This train goes at the speed of light, cutting the journey from over three hours to under an hour. Well, it might not actually be the speed of light, but it is jolly fast! He then got the bus back to Villagarcia direct from Cordoba. This meant that he was home at 5.30 which actually wasn’t bad going.
I think that he was pleased to see how the building work has progressed. The main bathroom is almost finished and they are working on the new bedroom. We’ve asked for a few extra things, which will add to the time a bit, but it makes sense to do them now. Although I think that we’ll be looking at few extra weeks, what we’re doing is going to make the difference between something that is just ‘nice’ and something that is ‘great’.
We’re going to have the bathroom sink set into a piece of marble. While this sounds expensive, it won’t be as it will be an off cut from our local marble workshop and this will means another small wall in the bathroom so there’ll be a wall either side of the sink.
We’ve also asked him to make a feature of what was the door between the kitchen to the workshop. This is going to be blocked in, however it will be blocked from the the workshop side and we’ll have a recess in the bathroom. He’s going to put opaque glass tiles in here which will give a little light and will also make a make a nice feature.
We’re also having a new boiler, so we’ll have two boilers one for the new kitchen and one for the bathrooms. These will be housed outside the house. We’re also having the piping put under the ground rather than running it along the side of the house. This will look much neater and also will be safer from damage. These are just small bits and pieces but they are going to make all the difference.
We’ve decided to get a new door to go up under the stairs. We weren’t going to, but the builder is strongly recommending that we do as the old one does look pretty awful, but also it is drafty. He has suggested we get a really cheap one now, and we can replace it in the future with a better one. He has had a really good idea. Wood is expensive here, so to save money, lots of people have a sort of mesh across the inner panel of the door and put curtain material behind this. This will be ideal and should only cost 100 euros or so.
Lastly, we are going to ask him for a price to take the wall thing down in the yard – the wall the incorporates the well. We were planning to do this in the future, but I think it might make sense to do it now, when we have builders on site with all their stuff and the fact that there’ll be loads of stuff to clear, so this can get included with that. We’re not decided on this yet, it depends on the price.
Hopefully that will be all for now! I will certainly be glad when this is complete – but it’ll be worth it (hopefully!!)