This week we arrived in Caspe with a flatpack sofa from Ikea, since we wanted to relax on it we decided to put it together as fast as possible, trying to make it before the dark hit. We made it in the end but putting Ikea furniture together without light is hard.
We started the next day vacuuming the shed, making sure to get all the spiderwebs and other creepers from the roof. Tho found some nest between the beams, I removed an older bird nest a while back so I thought this was similar. But this contained pieces of a tampon and the plastic wrapper. Mice! We knew we had some but besides this we haven’t seen any signs of life. We now keep all the food (including toothpaste) in airtight containers. And, if I don’t forget, I place some cotton drenched in eucalyptus oil around the house. They apparently don’t like the smell and keep away.
After this cleanup we visited the building supply store as usual and after that all that waited for us was the dreaded insulation job. All the videos I watched online about insulation for roofs applied to “normal” roofs. Since we have wavy corrugated panels, placing the waterproof foil was a problem immediately. With no place to attach it or to glue/fix it to the roof we decided to skip this, since this insulation is temporary anyhow. We plan on removing the whole roof and place new “sandwich” style panels that have insulation already in them.
After failing this first part we went on placing the rockwool insulation. We cut them to size and jammed them between the beams. This all went well for the first row, but for the second we had some sagging and needed to apply some barrier between the rockwool and gravity. To solve this we cut some pieces of wood that were jammed between the beams, these sloped a bit so they fit perfectly every time.
After measuring, sawing and other carpeting words we were completely beat. An added bonus was the fact we couldn’t wear long sleeves because of the heat, and because of that we got very itchy on all of our exposed parts. So we decided to eat a bit earlier and head out to the lake with Luna. This was very refreshing! We cleaned off all the fibers and Luna cooled down as well. This night we had to sleep in the house again because we didn’t cover the insulation yet. Which meant another early morning since there are no curtains in there.
And as always we were short in our wood supply. Everytime we think we get way more than we need from Barcelona, but this is never the case. In Caspe we almost pay double, a thin low quality slat of 2 meters is about 4 euro. But in order to finish the insulation on Saturday we made do by connecting some leftover pieces.
To cover the slats and insulation we used a felt-like material. I know felt because I’ve used it in crafts before, and we saw some here at the hardware store. Normally you can use this in your garden where you don’t want weeds to grow, like a walking path with gravel. We stapled the material to the wooden slats and used the foil we couldn’t use before as a cover for the kitchen/shower area. Since this will generate some moisture we think protecting a bit more might be good.
The evening we spent again at the lake. There were quite some tourists fishing this time though. Because of that we couldn’t sit in our normal spot and instead found some rocks where we could jump off with Luna. On the way back we went to a supermarket (that we just discovered!) that sells delicious vegan burgers. So for the first time we had a real meal, it seems we’re getting used to cooking on a camping stove.
Tho dug some more holes for the solar panel structure. After changing plans 10 times we decided to pour concrete footers and attach the panels to that so they won’t fly away. We ordered the cement and sand/gravel mixture so this is something we’ll do next week.
The weather forecast showed some big rain storms coming next week. Tho had the good idea to put some roof tiles next to the house, last time the runoff off the roof made some big puddles that leaked through the foundation. Using the tiles hopefully the water can run off down the land easier.
Sunday we picked a load of figs again and talked a bit to the family that’s taking care of our orchard. Everytime we see them, sometimes twice a weekend, they are loading their van with crates of figs. This time they gave us a pumpkin from their garden and we left it at that. We get so much food that our freezer is still full from last time. This monday my parents will visit for almost two weeks, so next weekend we’re going to make them work hard 🙂