Painting the Balustrade (Again!) and a Relaxing Day. 7 - 9 Sept.

Tuesday - First job of the day was booking a train and hotel - we've decided to spend the weekend in Bordeaux. We have visited the city once before, a couple of years back, but saw nothing but the Ikea store. Its a 5 hour round trip so, with time in Ikea, not really a day-trip. Hence booking the weekend away - and this time we're going by train - an 8-9 hour round trip - but, hopefully, stress free.

The rest of the day was spent painting the balustrade and rubbing down the study window sill (like the balustrade, only painted last year). The issue with the window sill appears to have been the French filler we'd used - wherever I'd filled, the paint was lifting/flaking. This time I'll be using Wilko's wood filler - a filler I really like. Before I fill, however, I'm also going to apply some wood hardener - but that requires a trip to Leroy Merlin. Once those jobs were taken as far as we could, Sally returned to stripping the 'future' bathroom - she's finding the new steam stripper fare more effective than the old - and I gave the over stairs cupboard a final coat of paint.

Alex finished installing and wiring up the new earth rod - achieving a 25 ohm resistance which is apparently much better than the 200 ohm reading he had yesterday. He the set to adding more units to the GTL and wiring that up too.

Wednesday - A relaxing day, today. Sally did a little stripping in the 'new' bathroom and I finished the balustrade. Then off to Intermarche for a shop, followed by a walk by the Vezare. Unfortunately, the river was a sorry state compared to a month ago when it was running very high. Now it was possibly the lowest we've seen it.

Last month the river was overflowing the landing stage.

 Nonetheless, it was a pleasant walk. 




On Thursday, Sally did more stripping, completing all she could without access to the step ladders - being used by Alex. Alex finished wiring up the GTL. I took down two doors, removed damaged panelling and rubbed them down - a truly dusty job due to the previous occupant using emulsion paint.

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