DoItYourself

If this blog seems to be getting more and more like an episode of ‘Grand Designs’ then I make no apologies for this as it is merely reflecting, as ever, occurrences in the daily lives of Kate and myself. Since we began this ‘house renovation’ phase of our retirement, each day we are driving ourselves to carry out at least one job which moves the project on. 

So whereas in January this year we were taking pictures of stunning scenery in the foothills of the Maritime Alps in Italy, and by June it was the dazzling beauty of Holy Island in the Clyde, in September of the same year we treat you to a collage of some very private parts of our house – joists and roof beams. In fact there is a good reason for taking such strange pictures. They are to avoid the need for a visit from a structural engineer (and his £50 charge) who will pronounce on the merits of removing a ground floor supporting wall which currently divides the living and kitchen rooms and tell our builders what size supporting beam to put in. The picture may also give the impression of the way we are tearing apart the environment we are living in.

Take the smallest room in the house, for example, where once a toilet stood proudly beneath the window. Neither pedestal nor cistern operated properly so during our remove-anything-we-don’t-like phase a large hammer and a crowbar took care of the whole assembly in short measure. The remains now reside in our back garden awaiting some sort of transport to the local tip (there are some things that are just beyond the capacity of a folding bicycle). So having destroyed, we can move on to the construction phase and in no time at all I find myself tiling again. The experience gained in France last winter, when we tiled the vast floor area of the salle de séjour, cuisine, WC and couloir in Guy and Noëlle’s Lyon house is coming in useful here although sadly I am having to manage without Noëlle’s fine French cooking and Guy’s extensive wine cellar. But I’m coping.

Despite all the destruction, we are gradually making the house habitable, this being mostly down to Kate who goes around cleaning up the mess I keep making. She also single-handedly took on the task of covering up the existing colour scheme used in one bedroom, the stuff of nightmares. No less than three coats of paint were applied before it disappeared from sight. As a result of all our hard work we feel fairly confident as we welcome our first guests, Kate’s brother Peter and his wife Liz, that we can offer them a limited degree of comfort and cleanliness. (Please note, by the way, that we have a second and fully functioning toilet.) They may not read this until after their visit so I can reveal here that they will sleep on the £2.50 shed-bed (see last entry) and will eat at the recently delivered charity shop dining table.

Re-Cluttering

By the time we started our retirement in 2009 we had slimmed down our lives and reduced our belongings to an absolute minimum so that we could move onto our boat unencumbered, or at least as close to this state as we could manage. The apartment in London from which we moved had a fitted kitchen, built in wardrobes and cupboards so contained little furniture that was actually movable. Knowing that anything we did retain beyond what we could take with us on Cirrus we would have to be stored, at some expense, we rapidly abandoned our sofa (it was well past its best) and as many other large things as we could. The thought of paying week after week for an expensive hole in a warehouse somewhere is a pretty good motivator for this sort of thing and we felt pretty good about it at the time - de-cluttering is supposed to be a therapeutic experience - never thinking that one day, some time in the future, we would move into a comfortable house, a new space, and have nothing to fill it.

Well now we are house dwellers again, and as a result we find ourselves going through the reverse process, re-equipping our lives with domestic hardware, but this time doing it without the benefit of earned income. 

Fortunately we are the sort of people who favour economy over the latest fashionable style and for whom the pleasure in getting a good bargain never really wears off. In just a few short weeks we have acquired a three-piece suite, a dining suite and a double bed, all for less than a good pair of shoes. Until today the bed was our best bargain; we only had to buy £2.50 worth of bolts to assemble the wooden pieces we found in the garden shed. Then whilst returning from the shops Kate's eye was caught by a swiveling chair sitting on the pavement, a piece of paper stuck to the back flapping wildly in the breeze. 'FREE TO A GOOD HOME' it said and we thought aha, we have one of those. So now we have our least expensive furniture item so far. To better this we now need to find something we need and have someone pay us to take it.

One particular item we parted company with some years ago was the television set. This was partly because the last set we did own and use was rather ancient, so no great financial loss was incurred when we parted company with it, partly because we came to recognise that our viewing habits were embarrassingly unintellectual and partly because we felt that none of the content offered on any station we could receive really justified the cost of a licence. But then of course we were still working, with leisure time largely restricted to evenings and weekends, a whole different lifestyle to the one we lead today. So when, after moving in here, we discovered two solid looking TV sets lying about the house we thought it might be a good time to see what had changed in the land of UK broadcasting. As retirees we could expect our tastes to have changed significantly and in the interval since we last had a set of our own surely we could expect the content to have improved too.

The first thing we discovered, in our naivety, was that we could receive nothing on the sets bequeathed to us because the analogue signal in this part of the country has been switched off, just recently apparently. This might explain, of course, why the sets had been abandoned in the first place. Nevertheless we have decided that we'll give TV another chance so, taking our sanity in our hands, we popped into our local Tesco store and invested in the latest technological marvel. The first thing we noticed was that unlike all televisions we have ever owned, this one came in a box which was light enough to carry out of the store and take home on the bus. Rather more mystifyingly, the box is stuffed full of acronyms like HD, DVD and USB which have almost nothing at all to do with the picture we might get to look at on the screen. We know we can expect, when it is working properly, to find our old friends the BBC and ITV have proliferated alarmingly into more channels that we know what to do with. However first of all we must deal with the work of our old friend Will Botchit again who, for reasons best known to him and his maker, seems to have disconnected the roof aerial from the socket in our living room wall. A trip into the wildest parts of the attic will be required to try to rectify this and just at the moment, other more pressing tasks come to mind.

It is a fact that one of the unexpected aspects of the house renovation is the mental stimulation the process is giving us. At any point we look around us and there are just so many jobs we could be getting on with that it becomes a real struggle to focus on the priority of the moment and not be distracted. For me the trick is to make lists, lots of them, plan each day the evening before, and stick to the plan, ticking off each item when it is complete. This is taking its toll on us both. Kate secretly took this candid picture as I was pondering what to do next, trying to remember what I had intended to do with the piece of wood lying in front of me. Something to do with the stairs, I think, which we have 'remodelled' by removing the banister and stripping back to the bare wooden treads.

Ship to shore

Malcolm: Cirrus Cat's new home is surrounded by a rolling, wooded landscape, calm waters rippled by the breeze only for part of the day when the tide is full. For she is now in 'cat country', a place where only shallow draft craft can navigate and she is alone with her kind, catamarans, trimarans and other more bizarre craft. When we visited her there we had only a brief time while she floated to unload all we needed. There are the shells and special stones we picked up on faraway places, things we plan to display in our new home, and even the mattress Kate and I have slept on came home with us till next year.

Kate: The change of environment from the boat to a house after fifteen months of retirement on a boat was remarkable. We haven't had much time to think or sort our belongings. We unloaded tools, bedding, books and other items such as clothes we had collected during our period of life as liveaboards. The weather had been kind and the rain held off until we were on our way back to Yeovil.

There is major work to be done in the house. We have to fit a new kitchen, new bathroom and refurbish everywhere. We've stripped wallpaper, today Malcolm took out the toilet, yesterday the cistern for the cloakroom and we are waiting for Andrew and Geoff to come and knock the living room/kitchen wall down after building consent has been given by the inspector. They will install the downstairs toilet, Malcolm will fit the sink, tile the walls and floor and a million other things. Today he also fixed a bed together which had been put in the garden shed. The bolts were missing but we managed to get them from a supplier of fixings and attachments near here.

We are blessed with all sorts of large diy stores and specialist shops close by. Living on the boat in Scotland, Wales and parts of the English coast we have sometimes found it hard to find shops, although there is usually a Co-op store for food. This embarrassment of riches is alien to us but ideal for our purposes. The joy of going to Screwfix, for example, is that we can benefit from our son Mike's discount as an employee of the place. His knowledge of their stock is encyclopaedic and he can teach his Dad a thing or two about tools and fixings.

Malcolm: One thing we have brought along with us from the boat is our fine gallery of beach pictures, a collection which started many years ago but the circumnavigation gave us the opportunity to add new exhibits as we moved around the country. On the left is one from Vatersay, a sister island to Barra in the Hebrides and since 1991 connected by a short causeway and a tarmac road. Each picture has its own character and each is different. In fact no two beaches are ever identical.

On the right here we have the broken shell beach at Eoligarry on the northern tip of Barra, a beach which is used as a runway for scheduled aeroplane flights from the Scottish mainland.

Kate: We are learning to slow down a little but are both driven to get well on with the renovation project. We feel much satisfaction at the results of our hard work. The physical aspect of it compared with our mentally challenging last few years of paid work brings visible rewards. Although the house is a bit of a wreck, we know that we have made it cleaner and can envisage a great improvement when our work draws to a close and we head off for a sailing holiday again.

Malcolm: Another thing we are having to come to terms with is that we are living in the former home of a certain Mr William Botchit. Will, who fancied himself as something of an electrical DIY-er, clearly knew absolutely nothing about amps and watts and probably thought that all electricity was the same flavour and so long as sparks come out of the end of the wire. Although there is nothing wrong with the house as such, which was built properly, strongly and correctly about 40 years ago, I have rapidly become adept at picking up clues that tell me where the electrical botches are to be found so that I can make things safe.

But at least Will went to the trouble of fitting a rather nice burglar alarm control panel in a cupboard upstairs. Full marks here mate. Pity you didn't actually connect it to anything else, like the doors or the windows, for instance. But the alarm itself works. It starts howling whenever I inadvertently switch it off for more than twenty minutes. Now where did I jot down that reset code?

Wallpaper

Living aboard Cirrus, or indeed any boat, one comes to take for granted that many of the ordinary daily tasks we carry out, simple things like washing, getting water or shopping, either take longer or involve surmounting difficulties that simply do not arise when you live in a house. I know this may be a generalisation - those living in a cottage on a remote island where water has to be drawn from a well and the shops are a ferry ride away would say they have difficulties to surmount - but my point is that when we moved into a house located in a sizable town and we suddenly found ourselves with an endless stream of water emerging from every tap, supermarkets of all descriptions an easy walk away and our very own machine for washing clothes, we did not immediately take it for granted. In fact we were surprised and delighted. This is not to say that life is necessarily better though, it is just different. The extra time it used to take us to shower, for example (in the morning you get dressed at least twice - once when you get up to walk across to the marina shower block and once again when you exit the shower), this never seemed like time wasted; it is merely part of the live-aboard experience.

So, reveling in the live-in-a-house experience as we are, for the first week of our land-based life we hardly leave the property. Having for the past few months dwelled on and looked forward to getting started on the house renovation, we now throw ourselves at every job that needs to be done with no idea of pacing ourselves at all. In time we will adjust and find the right balance between work and leisure but it will probably take us weeks to learn how to do this properly.

Take the walls, for example.
 Many of our rooms have wallcoverings that we dislike (a stronger word is really needed) so the wallpaper stripper, a machine that generates enough steam to melt the entire wall if used carelessly, is deployed all over the house. What is revealed is an art form so little appreciated that I thought I would have a gallery of my own right here in this blog. Feel free to wander around.

I am convinced that in the right setting these images would be masterpieces of the WallArt genre which might sell for millions and hang in the most renowned galleries in the world.

OK, so maybe the time is not quite right for this at the moment but I'm sure their day will come.

This floral one is intriguing. Over a period of years the fleur-de-lis pattern has penetrated from the surface of the paper right through into the plaster, tattooing the wall to which it was fastened. One wonders whether this was what the wallpaper manufacturer intended to happen, to leave a permanent record etched in homes around the world.

Less artistic, perhaps, but no less intriguing is this message found hidden beneath the stripy covering in our hallway. We will forever ponder the fate of Deb, wondering who she was and what she had done to earn the epithet. Did she have a happy life? Was she aware that her life might be exposed in this way? We may never know the truth.

In reality WallArt is a transitory art form that lasts only until we have made and applied our own choices on decor. We find our tastes veering strongly towards the plain, pale colours always recommended in TV home improvement programmes and we swerve in horror away from the strident designs we have found around us here.

Adjusting to life on land

Our Round Britain is complete and suddenly we are rocketed into a new world, one that is not continuously moving. We are so used to the movement - tiny shifts in stability in response to small, wind-blown ripples across the sea or occasionally significant lurches to one side then the other as Cirrus is lifted, first one hull then the other - that even after several days on dry land our legs are still responding to phantoms, muscle-memories of movements. We stagger about the streets. For those experiencing this the effect is quite bizarre but when it happens it is important to appreciate that those close by will not be experiencing the same phenomenon. To them, the floor is not bobbing up and down, randomly, and it is no use discussing the experience with them; sympathy will be lacking.

With Cirrus on her mooring we set off on heavily loaded bikes to catch the Cremyll ferry across the River Tamar to Plymouth and turn our heads to look back at her, our proud home since April this year, as she floats serenely in Millbrook Lake, an area of shallow water perfectly suited to catamarans and similar craft. As the tide ebbs away it will lower her hulls gently onto soft mud where she will sit upright waiting for our return. We have a complex journey to undertake now, one involving trains, bicycles and a boat which ends at the door of our new home in Yeovil. We are conscious that what we have achieved sailing-wise during 2009 and 2010 is something most people would not understand, let alone attempt. To sail our own boat around Britain's shoreline, unaided and for most of the time alone, is something we are now realising we can feel proud of. It is something we might never do again ourselves but nevertheless we know we could, if we so desired. We surmounted the challenges and lived through them. Timely it is, therefore, to thank all those who have encouraged and supported us on our travels by reading this blog and sailing with us in spirit.

It is dusk when we open the front door to our new home and roll the bikes inside. We can expect that these machines will be worked hard in the weeks ahead as we get to know our way around, popping into shops or just visiting our sons who live on the opposite side of town, for bikes are our sole means of private transport at the moment (discounting our legs, of course). 

We are soon to discover that Yeovil has a surprising secret. The route by road into the town centre or across town to our son Mike's apartment is heavily trafficked and an unpleasant ride on a bicycle. There are hills and potholes to negotiate and unforgiving drivers who care not for the lone cyclist. Our discovery of a traffic-free route, specifically constructed for pedestrians and cyclists who can use it to navigate along the River Yeo thus avoiding hills, cars and lorries alike has brought a whole new dimension to our lives. The route is only lightly used by cyclists, I suspect largely because it does not appear on any town or street maps. Yet it provides us with a pleasant ride which gives us access to the central shopping area as well as the larger out of town stores.

More importantly to us at the moment, the route passes close by Yeovil's B&Q hardware store which is a Mecca for collecting ideas and getting many of the essential bits for our home refurbishment project.

Simple, clean designs like this attract us so we stop and squint... yes, this might be fine for our proposed combined kitchen/living room, the room, I might add, that we have yet to create by demolishing an internal dividing wall. Having now started the 'destruction' phase of the renovation plan - stripping wallpaper, ripping apart cupboards and panelling - next comes the knocking down walls phase for which we shall need professional help. We expect that there is a long period of living with the untidiness, the dust and the dirt yet to come before the re-construction phase starts, the new flooring, the painting and decorating. 

Until then we find ourselves living in less comfort than that which we are used to from being on board Cirrus. The fridge and washing machine arrived yesterday yet we still have only a few basic pieces of furniture. What we do have is lots of plans to change almost everything we see around us but we are warm and dry, enjoying another challenge and getting to know the place which is to be our home for the foreseeable future.

Whilst living in Italy during last winter we did most of our shopping at a Ventimiglia supermarket which goes under the name of Lidl, this being conveniently close, the cheapest option around and it was also the shop which stocked items which were least 'foreign' to our tastes.

Now it has to be admitted that Lidl is not everybody's cup of tea but over the months we gradually became 'Lidl-ised' and used to some of their more strange offerings, not least because reasonable Italian wine could be purchased at 90 cents a bottle, something around 80 British pence at the time. Finding a Lidl store within walking distance of our new home, therefore, was a strangely exotic experience. Of course once we had explored the place and familiarised ourselves with the loaves of German black bread, the side-sleeper pillow and the jars of preserved cherries it began to feel quite homely to us. As a source of fresh produce it just cannot be beaten locally although sadly the duty imposed on wine in this country means that we cannot return to the drinking habits we acquired in Italy without bankrupting ourselves.

Long Ships

Much water has passed beneath our keels since I wrote for this blog although in reality it is only a few days. Time has stretched itself in our memories.

Milford Haven gave us a surprise when we visited the town's museum, housed in one of the old dock buildings and entry only costing £1 for 'concessions' (the current politically correct term for someone over sixty years of age).

Featured large in photos and stories relating to Milford Haven is the Brunel-designed ship, the Great Eastern, which was berthed and in fact ended its working life here just as the construction of the present dock was nearing completion around 1890. In its day this was the largest ship ever built so with its four tall funnels and enormous paddle wheels set on each side when it was sitting on the silt at Milford it must have dominated the entire town.

The Great Eastern spent most of her twenty-five year working life on Atlantic crossings, eventually as a cable-laying ship, but she was built on the Thames at Millwall in London, very close to where our journey started in April 2009. The ship is remembered there by the preservation of the wooden 'ways' down which she eventually slid and sections of the large chains which held her back still lie on the river bank. In some way, therefore, our own journey seems linked with the launch and with the repose of this massive ship.

Although it is in Milford that she will be remembered most, the Great Eastern was eventually towed to Liverpool to be broken up. We reckon Cirrus still has some life left in her yet so we turned south from Milford Haven to face the last two significant challenges before we can consider our circumnavigation complete - the Bristol Channel, a passage of over a hundred miles of sea exposed to the westerlies and with strong tidal currents, then Lands End, the ultimate headland.

And it was whilst looking for a way to break the journey up into manageable chunks that we noticed a tiny sliver of land placed conveniently midway between Wales and Cornwall that might just give us shelter for a night. Which was how we ended up anchored off the island of Lundy.

Despite Lundy's isolated position there is an archeological record of settlement and land use here going back over four thousand years, partly due to the fact that it holds a strategic position too, a convenient mid-channel shelter for an invading fleet.

For us, however, Lundy is significant in another way - it can fly the flag of St George from its church tower. Rather surprisingly it dawns on us that Cirrus has not been in England since May 2009 when we sailed north from Northumberland's Holy Island. First Scotland then Northern Ireland, Isle of Man and Wales; there is just so much of the British Isles and so many of its people that are not English. Our chosen route has given us a new perspective on the country we live in.

In the end the Bristol Channel treated us quite well, light north-westerly breezes, although the long ocean swell we have been experiencing since leaving Northern Ireland still lies underneath any surface choppiness. 

Best of all though were the dolphins, a pod of thirty or so mobbing us off the coast of Newquay. Close under our bows swam beasts of all sizes, including some very small youngsters tucked under their mothers' tails, all clearly delighting in our twin hulls bouncing through the water above them. These were Common dolphins, smaller and markedly different from the lone Bottlenose dolphin who guided us into Padstow the day before. Whether or not these animals can experience human emotions is debatable so we can only hope that the encounter brought as much joy to them as it did to us.

Our evening arrival in Padstow was heralded by a brass band playing on the harbourside, just what we needed after a day at sea. But despite the tourist throng who watched our every move from above, all became quiet as night fell, the musicians departed and we spent a peaceful night at rest.

Lands End lay waiting for us the next day but by the time Longships lighthouse gave us its 10 second wink, as it does to all passing ships, we realised that we had finally rounded our most scary headland safely, in the rarest of weather, almost calm conditions. Our timing was not perfect and we motored hard against the tide for most of the way, but rather this than rough seas any day. It was evening when we finally dropped our anchor in perfect calm just outside Newlyn harbour, not even needing the shelter offered by this busy fishing port.