Shadesails

Climate in the south of Spain is lovely. Temperatures are usually nice, usually around 30º max, with some exceptions. For us northerners the trouble is not temperature, but the very strong sunshine. (See: Moving to Aargh 11 - HOT!) We need to stay out of the direct sun. At least, engineer Jansen does. Engineer De Waal may have Spanish genes, and does not melt like Engineer Jansen.

Shadesails! If you’ve been to Oz you know what to do against too much hot sunshine. Engineer Jansen determined it essential to shade parts of the terrace floor, as that radiates heat into the house.

Attached to the house using 12mm x 6cm wedge bolts and nylon rope.

Pergola - trusses - blocks (new!)

Our pergola is made with aluminium trusses, and basically not attached to anything. It's not light in total, but with stiff winds we've seen the whole structure being lifted up a bit, and banging down again. We did not like that much. We prefer not to have a totally fixed permanent structure. Both because we don't know exactly how and where, and want to be flexible. But also because they tax fixed structures like pergolas.

So, ingenieur Jansen went to work and made concrete blocks with a threaded M14 rod inside the concrete. Holes in the bottom plates of trusses, rings, bolts, and ready.

Truss Pergola

The pergola now is twice as big, almost, and is now two times 5 x 4.5 meter.

These shade sails are last year's, and are now attached provisionally.

We want something like this.

Retractable

Shade

The average air temperature here varies between 25° to 30°, with blue skies, cool breezes, Campari, etc. Also at night. Nevertheless the sun is rather fierce and hot when your directly exposed, and not in the shade. It is much better in the shade.

There are various options. You can stay inside, the house is nice and cool, and has shade, but that is not our preference. You can build a pergola, out of stone, wood, pipes, or a combination of materials. Or, you can install a shadesail, as we know them from Australia. There are triangles, squares, rectangles, made of an elastic but strong material, so you can give them an interesting shape when tensioned with cables..

The real ones are available here, end they are not expensive. Montage though, is.

Or you can opt for a pergola. Freestanding, attached to your house, wood, stone, pipes...

Or the "mi casa system", that a nice restaurant here has.

After asking some quotes we know now that shade is expensive. We have at least 8x8 meter to shadow, so we chose ready made shadesail fro the Lope. For less than 100 euro there is a 5x5 meters sail made of strong materials, and decent attachments. We'll manage this season, and then decide if we want/agree to/can afford something else.

Next to the house shade is desired too. We use factor 50 sun cream, but cars don't like that.