Block work moves forward at a steady rate.

The walls of the extension continue to rise, if somewhat slowly. The first snap below is from the front of the house, from the road. The two apertures will form windows for the guest bedroom. The run of the wall that joins the original structure on the right is where the guest bedroom en-suite will be,

The snap beneath that is from the side of the house. The right hand aperture will also be part of the guest bedroom and be formed as french windows. The aperture on the left is where the new front door will be. SO, this "side" of the house, will become the "front" of the house with both pedestrian and vehicle access being from / to here.

From here on they are going to need scaffolding.

Sheila writes

And this week we become experts in Staircases

We’re up and down them every week, staircases I am referring to, but how much thought have you ever given to them. Well turns out we gave ours very little thought expect to pick out fab sweeping structures saying oh that looks fantastic, perfect for our house.

And so now having made decisions about the inside and outside colour, our windows and tiles we turn our attention to the stairs. We met with a manufacturer/designer/one man show last week who was very nice. As he is trying to work out our budget, he shows us our dream staircase only to respond to our “oh wow, yes please” with a comment “that’s the Ferrari of the staircases”. So, I says to him what we are looking for is a Ferrari style on a golf budget. He thought I was being funny.

We now know everything that’s needed for a cantilever staircase – and we’re not having one. We know all about nosing’s and risings and if you pour enough wine into me, I can share all that knowledge with you.

Another meeting today with a staircase manufacturer in Killarney and we are making progress on the decision. Mostly likely going for an open thread staircase in White American Oak with a glass banister and wooden handrail.

All we need to decide is the height of the goings, the rising and the number of steps. Simple really.

The Audi switches nationality

So of you find this outside your home it is only us visiting.

Work resumes

We believe the solution to the structural problems is with us and affordable so a couple of workman are back on site.
We are not expecting too much to get done before the Xmas closedown but still encouraging to see a restart.

Nothing much to report

I posted on November 13th about the dry rot in the original building. Since then there has been next to no work done on the site.  A conservation expert believes that the roof timbers can be treated and there is no need for a new roof. The builder disagrees.
The structural engineer has come up with a plan to replace the first floor joists and to strengthen the weak corner wall. The builder's QS has priced this for the builder, but the builder has not shared that with us as yet. We thought we'd hear last Friday and then it was today, not.
It is a tad frustrating.
Meanwhile her is a photograph of our favourite pub in the village.

Ballyferriter towards Mount Brandon

I am working on the principle that living here, with this view, is worth the unplanned cost of new roof and flooring joists...

Site visit and news of dry rot

The work to refurbish the original house has uncovered dry rot in the roof. We are waiting on reports from a dry rot expert and a structural engineer to see what is needed. Worst case (money wise) is a complete replacement of the roof.

There is also a problem with the structural integrity of one corner that needs to support a steel beam. Again we await the engineer's report.

The "sad" looking stage of progress

Foundations and more

It was great to get back from Dublin to see the footings done and most of the internal demolition completed. We'd been advised that the first point at which delays might occur was when digging the hole for the footings. There was a danger of it filling with water if the water table was too high. Looks like we avoided that.

This past weekend was a long weekend in Ireland as Monday was a public holiday. A quick visit to the site on Tuesday showed no signs of activity. I am pleased to report that work resumed today and real progress was made with the block work that will form the walls of the new extension.

October 31st 2018

New identity

Surprise Sunday Bulletin

Tomorrow we are off the Dublin for the week so I thought to check out the building site. Low and behold, work was going on. The front and rear extension both gone.
I hope they proceed at a good pace whilst we are gone.

Photo taken midday Sunday October 21 2018

That's more like it

A perimeter wall has now been demolished to give the contractors easy access to the site and a low wall, that divided the garden, has also been demolished. The new extension goes beyond that wall and so it had to go.
The weather is set fair for the next couple of days so I hope to see more good progress.

Now we know we have moved

Pete and Mike are in the house

The pace of these builders is hectic

Two days in and already they have erected five sections of a site security fence. They must be exhausted.

Sorting out postal redirection Irish style

We decided that we would not change our postal address. Too much hazzle and sure isn’t our post box only at the other side of the village. It will give us a good reason to walk up to the house each day and keep an eye on the building work.

As the postman was delivering post to a neighbour at our new location himself says “oh shall I catch him and tell him that we are now living here?”. Great idea says I and so off he goes to catch the postman.

No problem says postie, sure don’t I know where you are now, and I’ll be more than happy to drop off your post here in future.

Postal redirection sorted Irish style, no need to fill in pages and pages of forms.

Signed a contract with a builder!

Sheila writes...

Crazy or what but we’ve signed a contract with a builder. Although not crazy because we did actually want to sign a contract and get the work started. So, on Friday 12th October we met with our preferred builder and the architect and spent two hours working through a contract, called a Blue Form. There are 40 clauses in the contract – who knew – but all seemed reasonable. We negotiated over a few of them but no major stumbling blocks.

One interesting element was that there is a penalty clause if he doesn’t finish on time. However, the finishing date is 30th August. Quite a long build and to quote one local who we told it was taking 45 weeks replied with “bloody hell, what are you building?”. The builder seems a nice enough chap but sure we are only in week 1 of the project, plenty of time and opportunity to fall out.

Now onto phase two of the project which is interiors. Our next task is to make decisions on colour of walls, type and colour of flooring, what style and make of windows we would like and on and on and on. So much so that a white board has come into play.

Location of the rental

The white board is proudly sitting in the kitchen full of decision that we need to make in a timely manner, so the builder can keep to the schedule. If we delay him and the project is delayed the penalty clauses will not be applicable.

Another upside to the long build is that the rental house is so big we feel we are in luxury accommodation. That’s not to say it is very glam or anything, but it is officially classified & marketed as a five-bedroom house with two bathrooms. So much room in fact that himself and myself can spend hours apart and still be in the same house.

No 6 Tithe Saoire Na Cluanite

Project flit

Today we vacate Carrigeen in preparation for handing over the site to the builder tomorrow who is going to transform our home.

So, a little over two years since getting possession of the house and moving all our stuff from France, we are emptying it out and may well be gone for a year.

The builder has a 45 week schedule, and even though the schedule includes a handsome contingency for bad weather, we'd be optimistic to believe it will happen to plan.

The "flit" is just 1km to a house we have rented at the other end of Ballyferriter. In this way we will keep some continuity with our engagement with the local community and be handy to keep an eye on the works.

Watch this space.

The day we shook hands with our builder.

The project to renovate and extend our house in Ballyferriter reaches another milestone. David, our architect, has been working on and preparing the tender pack for our project for the past 6 weeks. We have worked through an enormous amount of detail on the layout, what tiles we will put up, what sanitary ware, where the sockets & lights will be situated, the windows and much more to produce a complete tender pack for builders.

The tender pack stretched to over 40 pages of detail and was sent to 7 builders. Four local builders, one in Tralee and two in Castlegregory. It’s a sign of the times on the Dingle peninsula that all four local builders were too busy. We did get three quotes for the job and after a little discussion between ourselves and David we entered an exclusive conversation with one builder.

Several meetings between “us and them” followed in which we came to understand the implications of a high-water table, external and internal insulation, concrete beams and so on. We indicated that the first quote was way off the mark and so was the second quote…. And yesterday we trashed out more detail and squeezed the project just inside our budget line. And we shook hands on the deal.

Two years after buying Carrigeen we embark on the renovation work. In truth we never imagined this project when we bought the house but then we never imagined a yes vote for Brexit. So here we are with an amazingly exciting 48 weeks to come. Yup, 48 weeks 45 weeks is the timescale of the project (although that includes 12 weeks for weather contingency and based on the storm Helene that went through last night is sensible) and getting a start in three weeks’ time.

Denis Dowling Construction is the builder and our hope is that we are still talking to him at the end of the 48 weeks. He plans to begin work on 9^th October or rather we hand the house over to him on the 9^th. Sometime September 2019 we may move back to Ballyferriter West and our newly renovated home, time and weather permitting.

We move out into rented accommodation in Ballyferriter “East” on Monday 8^th. The rental house, “No 6” as we have christened it, is a bigger house then we have now and probably will have! Another upside is that we can stay there for as long as we want, and we can fit all our furniture for storage into it.

And having shook hands with the builder we are now off on holidays to France today.

The letterbox saga

Well drilling extra holes in did not make any real difference and so...

Things are moving on as we have found a builder and one who can start next month. A bit of haggling to do before we sign the contract but we are pretty much there. Also, we have found a house to rent while the work is being done. It is pretty much the same distance from the centre of Ballyferriter, on the Dingle side, as we are on the Dunquin side.
("Centre" being defined as the door to Murphy's pub.)

When did you last think about your letterbox?

Assuming you are in the UK and within an urban / suburban area, it is in your front door, right? Perhaps it is in the centre midway, perhaps near the bottom, sometimes it has turned 90 degrees and is in the side of the door, but it is there, and you make use of it without even thinking about it. A truly taken for granted part of urban life in the UK.

Not so in rural Kerry, leastways not in our bit of the Kingdom. The house we bought, now our main residence does not have a letterbox in the front door, nor the back door – not anywhere. The suggestion that came from the local Post Office was to leave a window open so that the postal delivery person could pop the mail through it. This felt very wrong to our London urban sensibilities and so we opted to buy a post box and mount it on the gate post.

Stainless steel in place

Cleverly (we thought) we bought a stainless-steel model as we recognised that it would be contending with the wet, windy, westerlies that form a key part of the Kerry climate. Our smugness soon vanished, right after the first period of heavy rain. Sufficient rain found its way in to the box to sodden everything in it.

This week we enjoyed that latest episode of sodden mail and decided to do something about it so off we went to the (very good) local hardware store to get a replacement. They had two models on offer, so I asked an assistant if either of them was weatherproof.

Once he had finished chuckling at the very idea he admitted that neither of them would contend with West Kerry’s driving rain and he recommended that we drill holes in the bottom of the one we had to let the water out. Another customer of the shop, waiting to ask the self-same assistant for help with paint, added that she had taken this course and it worked for her.

Back home, drill out. Slightly surprised to see that the box already has two holes in its base… it now has six. I have my doubts if it will make a difference. (Note to self – make sure the new front door has a letterbox.)

Progress report: creating a new home

Planners of Kerry

Any local council has to manage the development and redevelopment of the housing stock. It is an essential component of modern living. A trip along many rural roads in Ireland will find a landscape littered with "pre-planning regime" bungalows that do little to acknowledge their context or their neighbours.

When those rural roads are in an area of outstanding beauty and topographical importance and the need to control development becomes an even higher priority.
Certainly in our part of West Kerry, diligent planning officers work hard to make sure that any development complies with the comprehensive guidelines created by the county council.

Although there are a few stunning examples to the contrary, the guidelines push design toward a very conservative, regional vernacular style. Our first planning application was refused and knocked back to us with reference to its design and scale  being inappropriate to the location and existing house.
In preparing our second application we downsized the proposal and removed the offending design elements, e.g. a first floor terrace, and added a couple of vernacular flourishes. It was clear that any idea of making a radical architectural statement was not on the cards. The decisions for the second application focused on defining the inside of the house. We  were looking to create rooms we would enjoy living in that also fitted the way we live now and anticipated our future needs and expectations.

From the outset the key element in the new layout was to locate the bedrooms on the ground floor and the "living" rooms  on the first floor. This arrangement "reveals" the view across Smerwick Harbour and, by introducing windows to the east side of the house, a view of Mount Brandon.

It was frustrating to have the second application also refused. Our reading of the given reasons, alongside the response of our architect, encouraged us to appeal the decision at national level.

Lodging the appeal in early March we were told not to expect a decision until September and that fewer than four out of ten appeals succeed. We were delighted to hear in late June that the appeal had been heard and we had been given permission to proceed, as submitted.

Now in early August we have a pack of documents ready to put the construction job out to tender. Let's hope we find a contractor who can offer a quote in the vicinity of our budget and who can start this year. Builders apply now!

Carrigeen as it is now

The front elevation of the permitted development

A ten day road trip that marks a beginning.

The recently acquired Audi earned its "rite de passage" with a road trip of close to 3,000km (see how european we are) with the car fully laden, including a stacked roof rack, almost every step of the way. The last time we owned an Audi we did barely 3,00km in a year.

Journey one, Saturday July 21st - Dublin to Beckenham via Holyhead.

Overall the trip was to oversee the removal of furniture from The Knoll and to complete the sale of the house. The first step was to get ourselves and our fancy "van" over to the UK. Before hopping on the boat to Holyhead on Saturday we had a fantastic Friday night with Bonnie Raitt, James Taylor and Paul Simon no less. Not a bad way to kick start a crazy ten days.

Once in Beckenham we identified everything we wanted to transport to Ireland, what would go in to store, and what we would dispose of. The "immediate transport" pile proved to be more than we could cram in the car, even with a roof rack, so we boxed things up and had them collected by TNT to deliver to Ballyferriter.

The removals firm arrived first thing on Tuesday and by 17.00 (how very european) the contents of the house was on its way to storage, most likely not to be seen again for 12 months. All in all a very smooth removal of furniture although... It's about 5pm and Sheila is resting on one of the beds we are leaving behind when I ask "did you empty the wash basket before the movers packed it up?" When she answers "No" we both have a good laugh as we try to remember what clothes (dirty) are now packed away for a year...

Tuesday evening sees us left with one sofa, two beds, a lamp, no dirty clothes and enough cleaning material to open our own Molly Maid franchise. 

Journey two, Wednesday July 25th - Beckenham to Fishguard.

Then, fully laden, we chose to return via the late night Fishguard to Rosslare ferry. We took our time to drive the 420km to the ferry terminal as we were booked on the 23.45 departure. 

Departing Beckenham three hours before schedule, and a clear M4/A40 to Fishguard means we are in Pembrokeshire early afternoon and 5 hours to kill. We treated ourselves to a super meal in St David's at a restaurant called St David's kitchen. If you ever find yourself at a loose end in that area we recommend a visit.

A fascinating addition to a cycle lane near the port at Fishguard. Investigating this further we decided that the photograph includes the full length of the designated cycle lane. No wonder they need a bench to rest on.

Journey three, Thursday July 26th - Rosslare to Ballyferriter.

The short, overnight trip docks at 04.00 and by 04.20 we were rolling along the highway at the start of the 340km trip to Ballyferriter. We fondly imagined stopping along the way for a leisurely breakfast but, with a fair day and nothing on the roads we found that we just kept rolling along. With little more than a fuel stop, we pulled in the drive of Carrigeen just five hours later. But that was not the end of our travels.

Journey four, Monday July 30th - Ballyferriter to Dublin.

Some of the "immediate transport" stuff was destined for Dublin, so off we went, car still packed, but not quite so full as before. The trip was not solely a delivery run as we had tickets see (and listen to) Graham Nash at the National Concert Hall on Thursday. This turned out to be the final gig os a six week tour and was a pleasant celebration of all things GN - the Hollies, CSN&Y and his solo work. Needless to say that the demographic of the audience meant that at the interval there was the unusual sight of a long queue for the men's toilets and none for the women's.

Journey five, Wednesday August 1st - return to Ballyferriter.

No roof rack, rear seats upright, we conclude the road trip. Along the way we hear that the sale has completed and we are done. We have moved from England to Ireland. Our life in England as we know it is over and a new adventure begins.

Carrigeen, Ballyferriter West - before...

From Dia Dhuit to Diamonds on the Soul of our Feet

The week began with Sheila starting her Irish classes at the local college and end with dancing in the Isles to Paul Simon. Average week then really. Sheila writes...

As you might remember Ballyferriter is located in an area called An Gaelteacht which means that Irish is the first official language. And most of the locals will speak in Irish to each other but English is also spoken, particularly when you look blankly at them when they say "Dia Dhiut". I thought it would be good to be able to have even the basics of conversation and certainly show intent on learning what is after all my native language.

I should say at this stage that I did Irish classes in school but like most of my education it went on over my head and little stayed in the brain. And so, at 9am on a beautiful bright sunny morning I head off for my first lesson of the week. By 6pm I am shattered, the brain is frazzled, and I can only nod a yes when himself asks me would I like a glass of wine.

There were 10 people in the class and we had the most brilliant teacher in Caitriona. A woman gifted with immense patience and who guided us through the whole week so that by the end, sure we were fluent. Well fluent in that we could say our names to each and say what lovely weather it was.

Himself had his official retirement do in London so did a flying trip over on Tuesday and back on Thursday. The evening part of it coincided with the semi-final of the world cup. In case anyone had their head in a bucket for last week that match involved England. Peter has no interest in the football however the three friends he was having a retirement meal with are ardent supporters. Once England made the semi-final a refined meal in a central London restaurant was changed into a BBQ at The Knoll with beers. In truth everyone was happy although the football result was not.

In the middle of all this we are hunting down kitchen and bathroom suppliers, talking to flooring installers, learning how a heat pump works, calculating the costs of underfloor heating and measuring up the tiles needed.


Friday saw us head to Dublin for the Paul Simon concert. This was billed as a farewell tour and he was supported by Bonnie Raitt and James Taylor.  I mean what a gig. Bonnie "greased the pan" for her two friends with fantastic guitar playing and singing.
James Taylor was amazing.

Paul Simon was fantastic and sang all the classic songs which, on a sunny Dublin evening, was wonderful.

The following morning, we headed off to Ballybunion for an evening of song from Christy Moore. Christy was in fine form, both singing and with his understated but spot on,political comments. It must be decades since I was in Ballybunion and I am hoping that it might be decades again… avoid at all costs.

The news for Sunday was that it rained! I know Ireland and all that, but we are in a drought, except in Kerry where it poured for most of Sunday.

First Week living in Ireland

And so the first week of living in Ireland permanently is over and we ask ourselves where did that go and how come we had not a minute to spare. How did we ever fit in time to go to work…?

We departed Beckenham at 7am on Saturday 30^th June and hit the road for Holyhead. It was a perfect day for a 7-hour journey, bright sunshine and only the occasional traffic issue. Our aim was to arrive on the island of Anglesey in time for lunch. We had seen a recent restaurant review of a place called The Marram Grass Café. It was a superb review and we thought sure why not let’s try it, https://www.themarramgrass.com/ and the food was absolutely sublime. Although the service was on the chill and casual side but definitely worth the wait.

We stayed overnight in the Dublin flat before hitting the road for Ballyferriter. The four hours of driving a fully laden car seemed to fly by and before long we were in The Kingdom, as native Kerry folk and the tourist industry are wont to call it. Sunday was nothing but relaxing as we looked to organise ourselves for this next stage of life.  This included a long walk on the nearby beach and a hop over to Ventry for a pint of the black stuff at Quinns.

Our first challenge was to prepare for our meeting with David Morarity, our architect. Now we have planning consent we need to move the remodelling of Carrigeen on to the next step, and that means making lots of decisions, materials, finishes, fittings, colours. We spent most of Monday and Tuesday pouring over all the Grand Design magazines and assorted kitchen and bathroom brochures that we had accumulated from the start of the project. Developing our “mood board” was a joy and great fun.

On Wednesday we had four hours of discussion with David that commenced with a bit of self-congratulating at winning the appeal and gaining an over rule of the local planning officer. ( We used “victory” quite a lot.)We moved on as quickly as possible to a redesign of the internal layout. The time spent living in the house and wondering whether we’d get permission to do the build, gave us a chance to rethink some aspects of the layout.  Besides the musings over where to put sockets, wall lights, we needed to make decisions about heating systems, window types, what flooring we might choose. This is all to prepare the “Tender pack”.

This next stage is to put together a detailed specification of the build so as to put it out to tender to contractors for quotes. We needed to include all the details of the elements that have an implication for the work. By being as certain and detailed as possible at this stage minimises the number of changes we look for

during the build. As David M pointed out, making changes now, on paper, costs nothing whereas making changes onsite, during the build will cost – time and money. We now have a fairly good idea of how it is all going to pan out and what it might look like. If we can find a contractor who is ready and willing, we could see the work start by October.

These three days felt like a real start to living in Ireland and having Ballyferriter West as the location of our main residence. Even though there is every chance that we will end up spending much of the next 12 months not living in the house as it is pulled apart and remodelled with the planned extension.

Planning Appeal Won!!! Building Project Begins

We have news… We won our appeal with An Bord Pleanala and so this warrants a note. An Bord Pleanala is the state planning authority and their word is God. Fiona Fair, our new best friend and clearly the greatest surveyor the world has seen, says “I disagree with the planning authority that the proposed extension and alterations to the host dwelling is unacceptable and incompatible in terms of design and scale and would constitute an incongruous feature in this scenic rural landscape”. And goes on to say, “I am of the opinion that the extension proposed is well considered and architecturally designed to a high standard”.

How right is she, we totally agree with her and it encouraged us to bring out the champagne. You can see the proposed extension and work here: https://www.facebook.com/DavidMoriartyandassocArchitects/ Scroll down to his post of 22^nd June for our house.

Many of you will know that we started this blog in France as mini postcards to two of our favourite people in the world, my Mum and Mary T. Sadly both are no longer with us and that made it very hard to continue writing the messages. However, a new chapter dawns and we are going to record the trials, joys, tears and challenges of a building renovation project here in West Kerry. I say this as a warning to anyone in case you want to duck out now!

Next step is to meet our architect to agree the building regulations specification but more importantly spend hours pouring over interior design magazines to choose floors, windows, kitchen and bathrooms.