Fly screen 4b

Yesterday: 123 staples. Well, no. As you ar sanding, more show up. 8 more!

Fauna

There is quite a bit of fauna around here, like conejos (rabbits, Zoomba's favourites), pájaros (birds, we even saw a hoopoe in the garden and some storks flying over the house) and serpientes (snakes). The snake in the picture is about one meter long and a greenish gray in reality. Presumably a grass snake (serpiente de hierba).

Fly Screens 4

Are you sick and tired of my window frames and fly screens too? I am sympathetic with me too. This wood may be sanded heavily... It is not rotten! Only the top layer is weather-beaten.

 123 staples. PIGS!


Correction: 131. While sanding 8 more showed up.

 Lucky this is a window that is accessible from the outside. (Bath room 2)

And the fly screen, also made today. Of the last bits of aluminium corner stuff. The aluminium is now all used, all 15 pieces of 2 meters. And the Lopez is out of stock, because we bought the whole supply. And, as everyone at the aluminium center is now on holiday new supplies will only be available in September.. That is not even "mañana"..

Fly Screens 3

, it keeps a man occupied.

Garage 2: Ramp

Today the ramp is ready. Outside and inside the garage, to pass the irrigation channel.

And not a day early, because:

This bit of concrete was put in only this morning.

Garage / Balsa

Today the garage is taking shape. The "rejas" (grate) are mounted, and the door was installed.

The growth has been removed with a small digger.

Zoomba supervising the job.

Et voilá.

Unfortunately, the "balsa" is no "balsa". It probably just is an old walled vegetable patch, that is easy to flood for watering. The wall I thought to have found was just hard soil and loose stones. A pity on the one hand, as there is no nice reservoir that is easily turned into a swimming pool. On the other hand, there is no concrete floor that is too shallow to remove, and we're now free to choose a spot for the swimming pool. Provided we reach an agreement here, of course.

Oh, and the water conduit now is in the ground, and is not baking in the sun any more.

Fly Screens 2

Now the screens for the two big windows. A bit bigger aluminium profiles, 1.5 cm. Each a day work, but they work! Immediately after installing a few flies could not get out.

A bit of a nasty surprise with window number two: I had not seen that there is a sill/beam on the lower end of the window that sticks a centimeter beyond the window frame when the window is closed. So, you cannot install the fly screen in the window frame, because this beam will push the fly screen our of the window frame. Which explains why the old fly screen was loose on the underside, too. It was stapled onto the window frame, but also detached when the window was closed.

So, the fly screen needs a hinge at the top, so it automatically gets pushed out a bit when the window is closed. No problemo señor.

Fly screens

Now the old fly screens skilfully have been removed from the window frames, the mosquito's game was on. And yes, there are mosquitos here, now and then. Probably related to the irrigation of the orchards here. Sometimes some puddles of water remain. I am very attractive for mosquitos. Even with evening showers, and DEET. So, a new job: about ten fly screens need making.

Bought aluminium angular profiles, 1cm x 2 meter, labelled "hoekprofiel". Yes, the stuff is imported from The Netherlands. And a whole roll of fly screen screen, 30 meters for 40 €.

The first fly screen took a whole day, the second just a few hours and only a quarter of the curses. And it turns out quite well, thank you. Dark wood with a strip of aluminium looks quite good!

I had expected the tensioning of the screens would be quite a job, but it isn't. The screen stuff is not elastic. Only a little bit. So it's quite right when first put in it's frame. Which was nice. And it saves a lot of cursing.

Juan Moreno

Not far from new home there is a splendid restaurant: Juan Moreno. Not the average Spanish restaurant, but a very adventurous one. And it's damn good, as we can vouch for after just one visit so far. But more surely follow.

Aperitif. With CO2 smoke and cooling.

Crisp with sardine built-in.

yes, a blue wine. Naturally so, according to the label.

Tomato, mackerel.

Foie gras. Sorry.

Smoke on the water... food.

Sorry, this was finished before we thought of the photo. This is a prawn of Garrucha antenna left.

Merluza / Hake / heek.

Oxtail. Top! (Volcan de rabo)

Lemon gin.

Broccoli mousse dessert. And yes, it is broccoli. Daring dessert.

Yum!

Oil part 4

This was worrying, after the 100% tung-oil coat, that I did not wipe afterwards.

The lesson learned I think is that you better use a diluted tung-oil, so you cannot put on too much oil too easily. And later applications of 100% tung-oil only rub the oil in lightly with a cloth, and properly wipe it later.

After a new coat of 50%-50% tung-oil - Xylazel this is the result. There are some dull spots left, but I'll remedy that later.


 Great web site/shop about tung-oil, and even the "boiled tung oil": http://www.hout-olie.nl/