Archive for the ‘Building’ Category
Took the dogs for a walk up to the top of the ridge at the back of the house this morning. My aim was to get a photograph of the valley with the early morning sun lighting it up. Well I got there a bit early and had to wait half an hour or so with the sun rising behind me and the light chasing the shadow across the valley towards me until it got to my house. Mine is the nearest one with the green roof. Click on the picture for the big version.
I had to chuck away some of a previous lot of milk I got from Hanife because I didn’t use it quickly enough so I froze three litres of the last lot. It didn’t really work out though, the cream sort of went into little bits like it had curdled and kept floating on the top of a cup of coffee so I didn’t like that. Well this time I let it stand in the fridge overnight before doing anything with it then I scooped all the cream off and kept it in a different jug before again freezing three litres. I got over a pint of cream off it so I’ll have to make an apple pie and some other things to eat it with.
Did a bit more laying of the stone this morning then went down to Kas. It is starting to get really warm down there now, it’s so pleasant sitting in one of the tea gardens having a drink and a chat and watching the world go by.
A big international cycle race was coming past Kas today, very exciting for lots of people but a complete pain in the ass if you wanted to get anywhere because they closed the main road for about 3 hours. I was lucky to be able to blag permission from the traffic police to cross the road and come up the ‘back’ road to my village. Some of my mates had to stay in town until they opened the road again. I got caught with it last year and had to wait an hour and a half before going on my way.
My best friend in the village, Suleyman, has a new tenant in his first floor apartment, Ali is his name and he and his wife Filiz speak excellent English and I like them very much. Well Ali Bey’s son in law has a hotel in Kalkan so I thought I’d include a link to the website for it. I haven’t been there yet but I’ll go and see it next time I’m over that way. Looking at the website I’d say if you want some really nice traditional Turkish hospitality at a fantastic price this is the place to go.
Update: Just been informed that the link to the hotel has stopped working, sorry about that, I’ll ring them and find out what’s happening. Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible.
Update 2: The message you now get when clicking the link translates as “The website is undergoing maintenance and will be published soon with a new look.”
My neighbour Mustafa came past the back of my place the day before yesterday so I told him about his dog. He said that four or five dogs had been killed by the poison so somebody is going to be on the receiving end of some retribution when they find out who did it. While we were talking I took the opportunity to ask him if there was any spare milk now that his cow has had a calf. He told to come and get some so I went yesterday with an empty five litre yoghurt container and his wife Hanife filled it up for me. It costs me six lira and it’s lovely milk.
I’ve been repairing the veranda roof for the last three days. I painted all the wood that I got with stain on Thursday yesterday started to lay the shingle roll. With a superhuman effort I finished this evening at six and tidied up a bit, fed the dogs and went to get a well-earned beer from the fridge. No cold beer! I’ve had to put a couple in the freezer so while I’m waiting for them to cool I’m writing this, then I’ll have a shower and they should be just right by then. I’ll have a beer and a good sit down as my old Granny used to say.
Windy wasn’t the word for it this morning. I got up at 6.15 and took the dogs for a walk up to the end of the road and back, takes about an hour, and on the way back there was one point where we couldn’t make any headway. The wind was so strong that it stopped me and try as I might I couldn’t move forward. It was only a big gust of course and I was soon able to move again but my hat blew off twice.
Anyway we got back to the house and had breakfast after which I started a little job putting a new cutter wire into the strimmer, the plastic stuff doesn’t last five minutes with all the rocks in the garden. As I was doing it a gust of wind came and with a lot of noise lifted the shingles, roofing felt and boards off the veranda roof frame and three of the boards disappeared over the back of the roof and landed about twenty yards away. March winds eh?
The veranda roof is something that I made myself and to be honest I was quite proud of it. I wasn’t expecting it to have to withstand hurricane strength winds though and had used fixings that I thought would hold it all together. Well I was wrong. Here’s a picture of the newly complete roof in June 2007:
I was delighted and proud of it, I thought it blended well with the house and it seemed quite strong enough however this is what happened this morning:
You can see that there are a number of sheets of oriented strand board (O.S.B.) that are missing as well as the shingles and roofing felt having been peeled back. I suppose the wind got under the edge and once it started lifting there was no stopping it. Well I got some wood ordered this afternoon to repair and strengthen the construction of it and I’ll pick up some more roofing felt and a few rolls of shingle tomorrow morning. I think rolls of shingle will be better as it is easier to hold down. I’m also using 2″ screws to hold it together now and reinforcing the edges so the wind can’t lift anything.
I suppose there is always the possibility that, having made it much stronger, the whole roof will take off next time. Well we won’t have long to wait because there are some more strong winds forecast for Monday, I’m keeping my fingers crossed.
Cukurbagli's Blog 
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