Our week was another busy one, both on the building site and socially. We are making slow progress with the house foundations in some incredibly hot weather, but we've also taken time off to enjoy the island. It’s been lovely.
The early part of the week, Keith and I progressed with the form building. I know that he explained what this is in his blog last week, but for those of you who cant remember or even haven’t read last weeks entry - it is basically putting together accurate wooden forms into which we are going to put metal bars (rebar) and then pour concrete which will form the foundations of the house. Due to the nature of our plot, with undulating mounds of earth and bedrock, coupled with sloping land towards the sea, these have to be stepped. Thankfully Keith is a whiz with the calculations for these. I am basically happy just to do the manual work and “assist the “boss””.....well most of the time! The aim is to finish all the forms and put in the rebar this week to ready ourselves for concreting the following week. This is definitely doable and then the foundations will start to take more shape. So Keith, Ben and I will plod on...
On Thursday our friends Sally and David from Morzine arrived. They came in their newly converted white VW campervan. It was their first trip to the island and they have had the most amazing weather!
Their adventure began when we were all lucky enough to join the Wainwright’s and some of their family on the Cairns. The Cairns are some small islands just off the North coast of Coll. We walked from Sorisdale across the headland to the North shore beach where Rob picked us up in his boat.
Rob looked like the Milk Tray Man arriving on his black speed boat! Visiting the Cairns was a first for me and it was amazing. Apart from some snorklers we had the islands to ourselves. I had an epic 25 minute wild swim (Keith would have preferred me to have worn a wetsuit, but then he is a worrier!!). The currents pushed us along through rocks and over amazing underwater forests of seaweed (sorry no underwater photos). After the swim, we relaxed on the rocks and had a picnic. It was idyllic. The tides here are enormous (almost spring tides) - currently about 4 meters and as we sunbathed, the beach started to disappear into the sea. David and Sally abstained from the North Atlantic swim (they've spent too much time in Dubai) but everyone had to wade out to the boat when we left. Throughout their stay I did try to persuade them to join me in the water but apart from David's quick cool down dunk, there were no takers!
As we had guests, we took a few days off to enjoy the weather but also to show them the island. We walked on various island beaches, all mostly empty and bathed in sun light. As ever, I added a few bits of driftwood to my collection...
Sally and David loved the island and they were very lucky to see it in such great weather. One evening we ate at the Coll Island Cafe and had a delicious meal, another we had drinks on the Strachan’s balcony at Hyne (their lovely new home) with the Wainwright clan which was great fun, and then of course there was the Lions match to watch last night. Exciting game and great result. What more could you want from your first visit to Coll!??
The forecast is looking a little cooler this week, which will make working on the building site a lot more pleasant. Men have it so easy - they can just take their tops off, us women are not so lucky, and I now have so so many tan lines!! Saying that though, I don’t want any of the cold/sleet and windy weather from April again.....
A friend mentioned me that often on reading our blogs that it is easy to forget the stages of development so here is a time lapse of the shed build...
David was keen to get some photos of their camper van for his blog (he writes a blog on early retirement - link here from his last one if any of you are interested ... https://www.iretiredyoung.net/post/early-retirement-costs-targets-june-2021 ), so Keith and he took the van "off roading" down to our beach at sunset for a photo shoot ...
That's all from me so I hope you all have a great week. Leaving you with yet another fab-tastic Coll sunset... x
Fab photos. Idyllic or what?
Carolyn
Very envious off this trip to the wee Islets, sounds great, blog a little shorter this week, you must be needing to get back to work :-)
Glad you have had such great weather, hope all goes great this week, Davids camper looks a belter, and lastly get a haircut young man !!
All the best
What a great place to swim! Very envious!
Can only imagine how lovely Coll would have been during this amazing run of weather. Good luck with the ongoing build. I would have definitely joined you for a dip. Catriona x