2009

September and October

Sorry for not updating the site for a while, me and Dean are currently in New Zealand exploring the country on 23 month visa, however Corrie-anne is going to keep me updated with photos and news from the island.

Here are the latest photos from the past few months. i will be updating more just before the new year, so watch this space.

The building of the BBQ roof. The roof timbers are the first thing to go on.

Then after they have been concreted into place, the fascia boards can go on, then the tiling can be done.
Here me and Dean have used cedar shingles.

These are the main house water tanks, without their walls. Once all the steel is put in and tied then the shuttering can go up.

Terry the steel man, tieing the steel.

Here the guys are concreting the base of one of the water tanks, if you look closely you can see the wet concrete they are pouring in.

There is even steel in the water tank floor. The pic below shows the floor before its concreted.

The rain water is slowly filling the swimming pool up, but not enough yet for a swim. At least we can use the water for the building work.

One dirty job that no one wanted to do was clean the one of the water tanks under Corrie's mezzanine, we didn't know what to expect when we went down there. This tank held all the water which we collected from the road. Luckily there was only about an inch of mud in the bottom. It was like a sauna cleaning it out though. Once cleaned the tank could then be used to collect clean drinking water.

Bequia water front.

Here one of our guys shelters under some plastic to keep the rain off. When it rains here it rains.

Check this baby lizard out that Corrie found in the woods.

Here is tonga lazing around on Corrie's bed.

Sas one of the labourers on the main house base.

These are the water tank walls going up. These will be filled with concrete. All the steel in them are for strength.

The bar roof is going on, and the BBQ roof is now finished.

Maggie (the foreman's) work bench under the shade.

When the walls of the water tanks were cast the guys worked throughout the night in shifts in the dark.

And the walls filled with concrete. The shuttering has to be left on for a few days before its removed.

Trini, one of the kittens loves Corrie's swinging chair.

Corrie's bathroom is getting their slowly. Dad did all the tiling using coral tiles, which are treated on top afterwards to seal them. The shower is being the sink unit, and can be accessed from both sides.

Corrie's bedroom furniture.

Corrie's kitchen.

The living area.

Quite a large room.

if you haven't already guessed what this plant is, its sugar cane.

The view of Port Elizabeth, Bequia's capital.

April, May and June

Well most of the work that has been done these past three months are on the main house base. The jcb came in for several weeks and dug it out, then after it had been marked out the guys started digging trenches for the footings and pipe work.

Steel work was put in the trenches along with the electrics, sewage and other various water pipes that was going to supply the main house. Vertical steel was also put in for the water tank walls.

The majority of the bottom level of the base are water tanks for the storage of drinking water and the pool water.

To get the wet concrete to the trenches, a long pipe has to be made. (this one is orange sewage pipe.)

More work has been done on the garden outside Corries house, and the walls have now been stoned around that area. Dad has even put in a small veggie garden with tomatoes, lettuce, radishes, cucumber, peppers etc. And we now have a composter for all out vegetable waste. In this climate though it seems to attract thousands of fruit flies, and they seem to eating the veggie waste faster than its turning into compost.

The cat pen now has a proper door on it, after a few of out tools got stolen.

Lots of fruit trees have also been planted around the site, below you can see some young banana plants and papayas.

Dean finished off the roof on the tools shed so now we are collecting and saving our own drkinking water rather that having to buy it in for £70 a load every two weeks.

The BBQ roof is finally on, and we have started shingling it already, so next time I update this site that should be finished. The nice thing about it is that there is no wood going on the roof like the other buildings, instead you will just look straight up at the shingles.

I'm not sure whether I told you or not but Dani's dog Missy became pregnant by an Alsation, so we knew we were expecting some puppies after a few months. After taking her to the vet we were told that about 5 or 6 were due in a week. A week passed and nothing happened so we took her back to the vets to be told that it was a phantom pregnancy and she wasn't pregnant after all. We were quite disappointed as were looking forward to some new family members, and we had all spent three days building a new dog kennel and pen. Anyways after another week or so Missy ended up having a baby girl. Only one, but what a little cutie she was. She is now nearly four weeks old, but Missy doesn't seem to like her as much as she used to so Dani has resorted to bottle feeding her.

The building of the dog pen.

While we are on the subject of dogs, Dani found an abandoned puppy about 6 weeks old on a nasty road bend next to his squashed brother or sister, it was infested with fleas and a fungi to the skin. Dani couldn't leave it so she brought it up to dad to 'chop off its head' she wanted to put it out of its misery. Of course dad couldn't do that so we ended up looking after it, getting rid of its fleas, worms etc and getting it healthy again. It was putting on weight but its tummy seemed to be very swollen and hot all the time, we couldnt understand it, he wasnt in pain and was always playing and seemed happy. Anyways a few days ago its belly over night shrank and the next day it became ill and sadly we lost him. He was such a little sweety though.

Corries place it more liveable now, and as we brought our tennis table from the UK, we often have a game on the weekend.

Dad started on Corrie's bathroom again, because she is still using ours at the moment. Should be finished in a week or so. The tiles are actually from coral from Dominican Republic, called Coralina tiles.

The painting of the gingerbread......
They started off being painted green, then we went to Brown, then to a more neutral colour, because we couldn't make our minds up. Well they have certainly had enough coats of paint on. ;)

The guys make all the steel up at the top of the site under a bit of shade. They cut every piece by hand and bend and fix it together. It normally takes several guys to lift it because its so heavy.

Corrie brought in this strange looking caterpillar the other day, you couldn't really tell it was a caterpillar until it moved. These aren't the size of your normal caterpillars back in the UK though, they are thicker that your thumb and about 11cm long. This one coloring made it well camouflaged.

And while we are on the subject of little critters, here is a little lizard close up on my banister outside. This one was rather brave as the camera was about 3cm away from it and it still didn't run away.......then again maybe it was playing dead........with its eyes open.

It was Corrie's Birthday last month so dad decided to rent a chalet for the day at a newly built resort in Bequia called Bequia Beach hotel. www.bequiabeach.com. Its Situated in friendship bay and has about 35 different rooms. In fact it's so lovely as the accommodation is at such a high standard to the rest of the place in Bequia that I have to show you some pics. The little chalets even had there own private pool and each chalet consits of 2 ensuite bedrooms, living area and kitchen.

The rest of the hotel.

It was carnival here in Bequia last week and this year me, Dani, Corrie, our neighbour Bonny and our friend Alex decided to try the Jouvet out. It started at 5am in the morning, so we were all up early, and cosisted of following a very loud truck up the street for a few hours, whilst every threw paint everywhere and watched the sun come up. A rather strange start to the day I have to say.

Here are a few pics, before, During and after, and then a video aswell just so you can experience it.

Danie looking down at the base. Eventually where she is standing will be in the porch area of the main house.

February and March

I guess you have probably noticed I have slightly changed the site, just be warned though that I still have some more work to do to it, so if things aren’t working I will try and sort them out soon.
I’ve also added larger images this time instead so you can see more detail.

So Corrie has finally moved into her place which she’s very happy about. No more sleeping on the floor from now on. It also seems to be have become the new hang out place for the family with an Xbox, TV and tennis table in it and so much more space than the chalets. We still haven’t completed the toilet, so for now she is using ours still.

Here is her mezzanine. In the future this will become a spare bedroom and office, but for now its full of furniture for the main house.

Dad tiled the floor with Coral tiles, actually made from coral. These were then sealed so that dirt didn’t get into them. Dean boarded the roof with ship lap boarding and trust me thats a big roof. Dean also made the balustrades.

And these are some shots from downstairs. The furniture is all rustic looking and made in viatnam.

I’m not sure how many of you have been on or seen Princess Margaret’s beach, but I thought I would put a photo of it on here anyway just to show you how beautiful it is, and how close you can actually anchor to it.

It was once called Tony Gibbons beach but after Princess Margaret swam on it many years ago, it has now been renamed. You can actually see the beach from the house, and it only takes about 10 mins to walk there.

The cats sure seem to like the new bed. Here is Tonga, Tabago and Trini asleep on it the first day it was moved in.

The Swimming pool bar and the bbq house have had their pylons put on. Here is Maggie our foreman at the end of the day admiring his work. Dads making the roof for this as I write this, but we are waiting for a saw blade to come from the uk, so it will be at least another month before this goes on.

The Garden outside Corrie place is slowly coming on, in fact it’s very nearly finished now. Just a few more plants to add and a bit more stoning and I think we are about done. A nice arch has been put over the walkway down to the bottom chalet, this will eventually be a strong door.

This is the BBQ house below with the cat pen underneath. The cats have now moved into their new home so Corrie is close to them now.

You can see below how high some of the surrounding walls are on the property, this is because there was so little land on top of the hill we were building on, that we had to lower and flatten it, and push it out to the walls. I think it looks like a little castle or fort, especially with the bbq house.

The photo below shows some of the landscaping that the guys have been doing. We have been getting the top soil over on the ferry from Saint Vincent for the finishing of the gardens.

The JCB has been working on the foundation of the main house. Yes can you believe it we have started the main house. I think the dates at the moment for completion of the builders work is next August.

After seeing the same views day in day out of the harbour and the ocean, you start to forget how lucky you actually are....maybe even take it for granted. Here is the harbour over Easter and a lot of yachts.

Here are some of the yachts practising before the race.

View from the BBQ house.....red sky at night.

Mum and dad sat on the steps taking in the suset.

View of the pool and inside the pool.

Dani was very fortunate to get a job on a large motor yacht called Le Grande Bleu, owned by a Russian billionaire. She took off on it for a month whilst in the Caribbean and the Bahamas, being a masseuse, personal trainer and aerobics teacher. Le Grand Bleu is the top boat with the 60 foot yacht and motor boat.

A few weeks ago I hear this horrible squealing outside on the balcony. I ran outside to find that one of our local Bequia cats had caught a baby humming bird. I brought it inside and was convinced it was dead. After about 5 minutes it started to fly around the room, It took over half an hour to finally get it outside and then the first thing it did was fly on a nearby branch and hang upside down like a bat…how strange. It was sooo cute though, the smallest bird I had ever seen.

Now if you are squeamish or hate creepy crawlies, I wouldn’t bother reading any more. If you don’t mind them then read on.
When we came to move some plywood sheets a few months back, we found a huge nest of termites in between the sheets. Even though the wood had been treated in a poison they had still managed to eat quite a lot of it. There were so many termites that it was like a running river moving across the board. I was so fascinated with them that I had to take some photos.

Xmas till January

Before I start I just want to which everyone happy new year for 2009. And my new years resolution for this year is to..........update my site more often. ha ha.

The house is coming a long fast. All the guys have moved out and are now working outside on things such as finishing off the bbq area, stoning some outside walls and concentrating on building a huge wall that joins on the existing perimeter wall.

We had a 40ft container of furniture come in about a month ago, with all Corrie's new furniture to go in her house and the bottom level of the main house. But literally every nook and cranny was filled in that container, so it took about 5 hours to unload. Of course we didn't have anywhere to store the furniture, so we had to put it in Corrie's bedroom and living area until, the mezzanine is finished then it will be stored up there for about a year until the bottom level of the main house is built.

Two lots of steps have been cast. The steps leading down towards the wooden decking, past the bbq area. This is the access to the swimming pool for whoever is staying in the bottom chalet (Dani's chalet), and it means that guests don't have to walk past the bedrooms of the main house and the other chalet, so it gives more privacy.  Whiskey our Carpenter put the block work up at the bottom, filled it in, marked out the steps with plywood shuttering, then cast the steps on top afterwards.

And the second lot of steps that have been cast are the main steps that lead from the pool and patio area up to the main house. Eventually these steps will allow you to walk to the living area of the main house. (when its built) at the moment it leads up into fresh air, and probably will do for another 6 months or so.

These steps took the most time, because the amount of steel that had to be put into them and all the shuttering which was involved underneath. If you haven't worked it out already. These steps are the roof of Corrie's mezzanine, in her place.

Deans finished the wooden octagons, containing all the electrical work and holding the lights up, and now he's moved onto boarding up the roof of the Mezzanine (under the steps). This roof goes over Corries kitchen and upstairs so we thought it would look better in Ship lap boarding rather than a huge ugly space of concrete. Another week of that and he should be finished. Then its on to the banisters for Dean I think. (I wonder if he's getting sick of woodwork yet).

Dad has finished tiling the floor with mum, and corrie had the lovely job of filling in the grout between the tiles. She's very good at it now, I even tried for an hour and I gave up. I guess practice makes perfect.

I've been all over the place really, doing a bit of everything, varnishing, painting, sanding, more painting, wiring up the electricity for the mezzanine area, lots of tidying and been helping Dean a bit with his wood work. I've also been doing a lot of work on the boat, cleaning it up and making it look like new again.

At the moment dad is working on the kitchen so not long and that will be finished. We got some furniture out to have a look at and see how it worked in the kitchen. It looks great, its very traditional looking oak furniture and units, with a granite work top. Kind of something you would see in Goldy Locks and the three bears, not very Caribbean style, but it certainly looks good.

Dad has also decided to sell his boat Rainbow Spirit, which after 12 years of use has really served us well and kept us safe on our travels. Its time to go though as he feels that it isn't being used enough and that he would rather live on dry land a bit now. So if anyone is interested in a 45 foot Oyster to sail their dream, or even around the world, then get in touch. You can also view pictures on the website,  www.oysteryachtrainbowspirit.com. Its anchored just off Princess Margaret's beach in Bequia, so in the Caribbean.

If any of you guys reading this fancy a visit out here before the house is built though, there is a lovely house or apartment (which ever you prefer) right on the water front edge with beautiful gardens and views. Its right next to the beach and literally a few minutes walk from the town, so perfect for a holiday. The website I have just designed for it is www.mimosa-house.com. The rates are just a guideline so if you fancy staying for a lot less then email me and I will see what I can do.

Christmas was very nice. We had an end of the year party for the guys. They cooked the food and we supplied the drinks, dessert and more importantly the rum. There was lots of speeches (ha ha which I avoided), lots of dancing and it was just lovely. Dean managed to get a video of some of it, so take a peek. The main guy making the speech is Magnus our foreman that keeps all the other guys in check.

Here is the link - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSe6drUQNvc

or you can watch it on the site below.

One of the guys called Baba (because he's the youngest) cooked the food. Local rice, salad, chicken wings, and soya for us veggies. We didn't know what to expect but it was really really tasty.

Dad even had a lesson in conch shell blowing from Marlon. Traditionally when fisherman brought fish into the harbour, they blew on a conch shell, to let everyone know that they had fish. The tradition still goes on today, however it think the island may have been in a bit of confusion recently because every day the guys are blowing the horn up our place.

Whiskey the carpenter, with me and Corrie on their last day.

Above: Sas, one of our labourers doing some break dancing in Corrie's place.

Left: The guys working on Corries place before we started our work. You can see the steps leading up to the Mezzanine which I think eventually will become a second bedroom. The main table in the house is built from concrete and steel around one of the roof supports. This will eventually be tiled. This is quite an old photo, but I wanted to show you the guys in action, rather than a posing shot.

Below: Clockwise from Dean, Whiskey, World and Beak.

Dani's dog Missy is almost full size now, so I thought I better put a photo on her as the last time you saw her she was a very small puppy. Talking if animals, Trini, one of the female Bengal kittens likes to sit in the most strangest of places. The latest place being the top of dads desk chair. She can quite happily  fall asleep in this position for hours.

The harbour got very busy over Christmas and new year, with cruise ships. Even the world came in and stopped for about 4 days. A lot of private super yachts came in as well, Dani was working in her spa the one day and Michael Douglas was sat outside having a drink. Unfortunately, Catherine didn't come to get her nails done. It was rumoured that a few weeks before, Angelina and Brad were in the bay as well on another luxury boat.

It was also my birthday on the 5th of Jan, so I took the day of work and was pampered by Dani at her spa, Dean took me out to lunch by the Beach, and then on the evening we had a nice family meal and a surprise birthday cake.

Here is another video of the building site, it takes you down to the pool, past the pool bar and into Corries place. If you wonder why no one is working, its because its a Sunday.

The link to video is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smDAWW1ME3A

or you can view it below.