I spent the last week in Morzine, camping out in my chalet. Not the sanest idea I have ever had but it was fun (and cheaper than a hotel) but with no running water in the chalet yet it was a bit on the dirty and dusty side.
I arrived on Sunday night, around 8 ish, about an hour or so before it got dark. Just enough time to have a look around and set up camp.
I have tiles ! I have a chimney!
I was not staying at Robs place this time as he had paying guests in for a couple of weeks. I waved my hello's to Leon, the neighbor and considered introducing myself to Robs guests, no it was a little late, tomorrow would be fine. About midnight Leon, led by Robs intrepid guest, came looking for suspected burglars! Quite what Leon though was lost on me as I hastily introduced my self with assurances that I did in fact own this chalet and I was not a burglar.
Monday
Woke up later than I intended after a much colder night than I anticipated. Bright sunshine. Drove down to Thonon, about 30/40 minutes away to the big DIY shop. Asked for some cable 16mm2 red 16mm blue and some 25mm2 earth, It took the assistant nearly an hour to coil up these three bits of cable and I pottered about looking patient, collected odd bits of electrical goodies. Then off to the plumbing section and load up with a toilet. Nice suspended one, exactly the same one Rob and I had installed in his chalet all those months ago when we built his first bathroom. Now with a few bits of wood and some other stuff the trolley was rather unwieldy so I decided to check out this lot and come straight back in for the bath and sink. Check out OK load the car, come back to the shop to find it has closed for lunch! Will not open for another 2 hours!. Fine I have enough stuff I will come back tomorrow. So drive back to Morzine.
Its now about 1 ish by the time I get back and I make a start on the bathroom to be. Well just the toilet is not going to get me very far and it is obvious that the hole in the floor intended for the toilet is in completely the wrong place without major pipework. So in order to keep it simple I decide to break another hole in the floor to get the toilet waste pipe through. Having already decided on the layout of the bathroom, bath against the wall on the right toilet against the out side wall in the middle and sink opposite the door against the outside wall. I took the plunge and started to break a hole in the floor. Relatively straight forward, no major reinforcement issues. But I could not position the toilet finally without the bath. So that would have to wait. What now?
OK what about electricity. One of the tasks I wanted to do this week was finally get that big cable through the gaine and bring the power inside. No joy. I spent an hour or so heaving around the cable and messing about. It was having none of it. The carpenters have rigged up a plug wired into the temporary supply so extension leads will have to do for now. OK, if the main cable will not go then maybe the 16mm and earth will. Bit luckier this time and I was able to thread the cables through this bit of gaine.
You can see the earth cable coming through the hole in wall there.
No luck with the big cable though. OK I bought some stuff to remake the door in the garage, so I set about rebuilding that. I have gone from a super heavy weight piece of removable wall to a light weight door that actually opens on real hinges!
Tuesday
Woken up at 8:00 by the carpenter poking about checking that his guys had been working, he informed my that I had left my car windows open all night and that it was raining, great. I drove back down to Thonon in a damp seat in the pouring rain, bough my sink and bath, which was very difficult to maneuver through the check out. My car passed its design criteria with flying colours, a bath can fit comfortably inside (with all the seats removed) Back to Morzine, off load and head down to the local DIY store to get some timber.
I obviously bought the most expensive timber in the entire world and some blue insulation. The timber I wanted would be described in the UK as rough sawn, which I now believe the DIY shop provided on the other side of the road (the shop is split in to 2 sections one on either side of the road) what I got was planed timber, not really the sort you hide away in a stud partition wall. Never mind it was wood it was going to be fine.
Arriving back at the chalet I noticed a strange damp patch on my drive. It had stopped raining but this patch was spreading from beneath the rock walls that have been newly installed. The problem was it was not water. It was sewage. Sewage from Robs chalet bubbling up from under the wall and running down my drive. Great, another problem. Hervè was going to have to sort this one.
So with the bath in place, I could work out where the toilet should go and fix it to the wall (surprisingly close to directly over the hole I had broken in the floor!)
So I started on the stud walls.
I laid out and screwed down the sole plates first, apparently you should do the roof plates first but with one person this is impossible. So I opted for the more practical approach which meant the floor first then screw the uprights to the walls.
Wednesday
Visit to Hervè and he assures me that some one will come out to check the leaky sewage, sure enough in the afternoon a guy comes along assures me that yes it is merdè, and that he will be along with a digger to fix it tomorrow.
Also asked Hervè about the water, when is it going to be turned on? He will ask the mayor and get back to me.
With the uprights on the walls using some temporary braces and chocks I manages to wedge the roof beams/plates up long enough to screw them in place then I was able to install the other uprights. With these in place the noggins can be cut and nailed in.
Some of the noggins are a bit wonky but everything was plumb and pretty sturdy.
I then had a go at the floor of the bathroom. The blue insulation is 50mm thick and the timber is 70mm thick. It is actually finished floor level, so the bits under where the doors will go may have to come out or maybe I will raise the floor level a touch to go over these bits. The blue insulation went down really well once I had got the right technique for getting round the cables. Rather than trying to cut grooves in a single piece just cut the piece and then the groove is just a notch in one side. works well.
While I was busy with all this the carpenters had arrived and were busy inside prepping the walls for the layer of T & G. A lot of preparation. The also put in the chimney.
Thursday
Still raining, so I finished the stud walls and started on the support for the sink. Using the only wood I had It turned into quite a monster.
Still, it works, although I am not sure the sink it quite right.
Back to the local DIY shop for some more bits of pipe work and I managed to plumb in the toilet.
Rains all day, no digger to fix the sewage and no water guy although Hervè says he night be out on Friday or Monday, we shall see.
Friday
My last day, The water guy tuns up, now, Rob and I have always disputed with Herve that that the builders actually installed a stop tap for my chalet. Hervè insists that they did but we have never been able to turn it. We know where is should be, there are 2 plates in the road one for Robs chalet and supposedly one for mine but mine has nothing under it. We have told Hervè this but he assures us its OK. So the water guy comes around and after putting a tap on the water pipe in my chalet spends about 45 minutes fishing around with this enormous key on a pole trying to turn a stop tap (that might not be there) at least 2 meters down a narrow pipe. Eventually he gives up declare that its "impossible" and disappears. What?? What now?
I have to leave and everything is still up in the air.
OK so I have half a bathroom, but still no electricity and no water.
But I now have a roof and I have keys to my front door!
