The end of the rainbow.....

My goodness so much seems to have happened since I last wrote about our home....

It really was time to make the move, meanwhile our rented accommodation will be kept on until the natural end of the lease.

There are a couple of reasons for this, the main one being we have no idea how much water we use but do know the major uses are doing the washing and showering. So for now the washing and showering is being done at the rented place. Hopefully by the time we have finished the inside showers and the final water tank is in place and connected we will start to have the Autumn rains.

The designated day arrived as did the really hot weather, I would not recommend moving when the mercury is showing high 30's. Deb and Robert (Fred was supervising) arrived early and very kindly helped us shift the really heavy stuff. Three trailer and pick up loads later and most of our chattels are here. Just some of the clothes and sundries left to shift and a lot of unpacking and sorting out to do.

No matter we are finally here and I have to say it really does feel like we have found the end of the rainbow.

If that hasn't been excitement enough Rick has finished the outside shower, YAY, all bar the floor tiles and I think you'll agree has done an amazing job.

 Attaching the shower head to a series of copper pipes which Sid (the builder) first thought was Ricks trombone!

Fred doing final inspection of the drain pipe

 And finally the inaugural shower

Ricks final touch, for now, was the hanging the maiden hair fern. Natural grey slate will be used for the floor so we are doing our best to keep the concrete as grease free as possible.















And then the new concrete water tank arrived......

 Backed into place

 Rick controlling the winch and tipper, John the deliverer used two very thick steel poles as rollers.

Slowly the really heavy tank slid off the lorry and settled perfectly onto the pad Rick had prepared earlier.

Just need the plumbers back now to fit up the South side down pipes... then bring on the rain.

And then we had 'fun' with the telephone and internet connection.....

We patiently waited for the chap to transfer the  phone and internet connection from our rented place to here... and waited and waited. Eventually we got a massage (wishful thinking!) we actually got a message to say the appointment had been cancelled and it would be done in a couple of days time. Well many conversations later we still haven't got a phone.

The original electricians told us they could put in the phone connection, unfortunately unbeknown to us they ran the line from the house to the nearest stobie pole. Which (for those not in the know) is where our electrics run to. And therefore a very dangerous place for anyone to work, should the electrics fail for any reason the person working underneath could be electrocuted! So we now have obsolete telephone points in the house.

We have held off on the telephone connection as we may have to run the whole thing through our internet connection the signal for which has yet to be checked out.  Are you still with me? 

So now we have a temporary internet connection which can be topped up like a mobile phone, which hopefully bodes well for the permanent connection. Fingers crossed..... and deep breath!

The vineyard visit

The grape harvesting season is here!  

We were chatting to a couple of friends (who have lived here quite a while now) about the process and learnt their son is the mechanic for one of the local vineyards. They very kindly arranged to take us down one evening to have a chat with him and watch the harvest. It was fascinating.... 

Pictures are in reverse order!

Starting near the end of the process with a gondola unloading the picked grapes into the truck trailer ready for transporting, in this case, to New South Wales. A ten hour drive away.

The truck and trailer are driven onto a weigh bridge and careful note is taken of the various weights. Each gondola load is also weighed so the final weight of the grapes can be calculated

Before this happens the load is sprayed with a sulphate based chemical to stop the grapes fermenting on their long journey. Apparently this comes out during the finings stage of the wine making,

I just could't resist the sun set which did get more colourful as the evening progressed.

Will B (the mechanic) drove us to the harvesters, due to the hours they work the work force is mainly made up of students and backpackers. The grapes are rarely picked during the day as it is the hottest time of the year. So work starts at about 6.30 pm, it is still pretty warm then and goes on through the night until the 'run' is complete. The harvesting season does vary but generally last from 6 weeks to just over two months. Makes you feel weary just thinking about it!

View from the top of the picker, in the distance are the lights of another harvesting team.

A team of three people are used, one for the tractor with harvester, one tractor with the gondola and normally a young lady acting as picker keeping the harvesters machinery free from leaves and other vegetation. The tractors are driven very slowly along the vines, gondola attached to one and the self centering harvester to the other. We were very surprised to see the way the vines are treated. The harvester centers the vine and using fairly stiff rubber fingers 'wacks' and shakes the vines freeing the grapes and some leaves etc., This is bashed onto a series of conveyor belts, some vegetation blown away and the larger vegetation picked off by a 'picker' finally being loaded into the gondola.

Apparently hand picked grapes give a different depth of flavour to the finished wine but is so labour intensive and time consuming this process is only used for the best of wines. Which now makes sense as to why some wines are far more expensive than others.

Some huge thank yous go to David Brown (vineyard owner) and who took time out during this really busy time to talk to us about his vineyard; to Will B, who spent a good couple of hours very patiently answering our questions and showing us the harvest. And to his Dad, Graham for taking us there.... and home again.

It will be though but we will be doing our very best to support our local producers........ hic!

Yeay the kitchen is tiled and the hot water service is in......

But didn't work for long as something keeps tripping the electrics.... hay ho... before I relay the tale of woe (well it's not really that bad) some photos I found on Ricks camera. Hope there's not too many photos... 

Down pipe waiting to be connected to the tank. You can just see the really neat job Rick did of connecting the gutter pipes.

Carport blocked off ready for the concrete pour.

Ok so these two pipes and for the tank over flow (should we ever be lucky enough to get that much rain) and for the first flush. Idea being the first lot of rain washes dust etc., off the roof into this pipe and we undo the end to let the 'stuff' out leaving only clean water to fill our tank.

And the down pipes are finally all connected on the North side of the house, buried and fitted to the water tank. To the right is the rather rustic cover for the pump.

Herbie and his digger making light work of leveling the site for the CFS water tank

The joy of being able to drive on to our newly concreted and very smart carport

The fitting of the evacuated solar hot water system

Very proud of the new copper pipe work

YAY the water pump connected and working from the buried rain water tank. Which by the way is half full.

The new 22,000 litre poly water tank in-situ for the fire service to use.

 This is connected to the bore water and once the special outlet pipe is fitted it will be up and running and we can sign off on the building, submit paper work to the council and hold our breaths waiting to be inspected.

So back to the electrics..... This is the second time  we've lost power to the back end of the house when something new has been plugged in. The Sparkies came out first on Friday and after much scratching of head and changing once again of the trip switch it was decided the team needed to be called in. So Monday bright and early (I've given up hope of ever being able to sleep after 6 am again!!) we were back at the house. Rick took off to the Mount to return a tile cutter and try and return two boxes of the kitchen tiles, and I waited for the team.

In the end everything which could be tested was, and the only thing which was done differently was the re-routing of the en-suite lights. They now tie up with the bathroom ones and for some reason our Sparky could not explain everything seems to be working. Most odd but everything crossed this new trend of electrics working continues.

Oh and we have tiled the kitchen, Rick did the cuts around the plugs for me as I'm not confident enough with the angle grinder to cut a neat line yet. The cooker hood needs to be lowered a tad and connected to the outside world then we'll be totally up and running. SOOOOOOOOO excited....

So now the migration to our new home is under way. The telephone will be transferred next week and we are keeping everything crossed we will also get the internet... we'll see.

Concrete, almost a hot water service and bath time in the back yard

A sudden flurry of activity at the new home as our builders arrived and started to finish of the jobs they'd been contracted to do. In addition we had asked them to put in a concrete path and carport. The ground was leveled then adjusted so it sloped gently away from the house and was boxed in. The plumbers were also there to bury the down pipes for the rain water, concrete path to be laid over the top. They had an hour to get it all sorted before the concrete arrived.

Laying the concrete was incredibly labour intensive and involved lots of polishing, smoothing, wetting down and waiting. Dave explained that working the concrete brings the air bubbles up, pushes the stones down and gives a smooth hard surface. It took Dave and John the bast part of a day to finish the job.

Very smart carport with great acoustics surprisingly paw print free!

Rick and I have ordered a second concrete rainwater tank  for the down pipes carport (south side of house) to drain into. This should arrive in three weeks time.

In between Dave and John were doing the concreting they also, very kindly started to level the ground for the new water tank. After a discussion with the Concrete Tank supplier Rick realised more work needed to be done. So he got a shuggle on with the tractor and started to level the ground where the tank will rest.

Well we almost had a hot water service installed but first of all our plumbers got called away on an emergency. After all we didn't have a busted water pipe. Then one of the team forgot to return from holiday... he couldn't get the sack as he is one of the partners. But I think you get the idea of how laid back the team are. And then when all the team were assembled the hot water service, which had been on order for a whole week, couldn't be located! Good grief... we were first told it had to come from Melbourne, that story was updated to Sydney and finally the suppliers sent a van to their other branch at Mount Gambier to collect their one. Meanwhile 'our' one turned up!!

Our plumbers are in great demand and had to go off to other jobs. And so we wait...

Meanwhile the leveling continues

We also needed a 'fire water tank'. As we are in a BAL 19 (what ever that means) fire zone there are certain rules we need to comply with. Like installing a 22,000 litre tank with a petrol driven pump. We are lucky as this will be fed by our bore water. As you can see it's not the easiest of things to manouver into place. Easy the suppliers of the tank, said, borrow our special trailer, back into place, drop the trailer flap then roll the tank off.  Hmmmmmm, not as easy as the instructions sound but Rick did well not to flatten anything in the unloading process... most importantly himself.

We also took some time out from 'house work' as when the temperatures were in the high 30's there is not a lot anything wants to do. First thing in the morning, the coolest time of the day, the birds gather to hunt and bathe. We caught sight of junior Kookaburra quietly churring in the tree, patiently waiting for food.

Then these little Eastern Rosellas had a wonderful time having a bath, really funny to watch.

Sometimes it's good to sit.......