Reparando las vigas

(Domingo 19 - Sábado 25 Mayo)  Our crew is working hard to finalize everything. Unfortunately for us and them, Frank has rented his new house and needed to borrow Luis, our foreman, and one other fellow for two days to finish up details there. This put things behind here. It would not matter to us except for the fact that Luis has promised to start another project up in Coscomatepec, so the crew can be here only one week after this.

This week's work has centered on reparando (repairing) the rotted ends of the decorative roof vigas (beams) and furthest out tablas (boards) above them at the edges of the north and west roofs. The prior configuration of roof tiles had been constructed in such a way that rain dripping off the roof had run back, keeping these areas almost perpetually damp. To fix this, the guys cut off the beams back into good wood. Wood delivered from Alejandro's mill in Coscomatepec was trimmed to size and cut to the length needed for each beam extension. The decorative curves and notches to match the existing beams were crafted on the outboard ends. Then, using a very long 3/8” bit we had brought from the US, two deep holes were bored in each viga, and corresponding ones on the repair pieces. Rebar stubs were driven into the holes and the new beam ends sledged into place. Then to firm everything up further, heavy mending straps (some brought from the US, others found at Home Depot—otherwise unavailable here in local ferreterias), attached with lag screws.

In some cases, channels bored by polilla ants (aerial termites) were found in the beams, and festermicide was injected in the holes. All the wood was treated with festermicide, and the new vigas were stained and sealed with Thompson's WaterSeal. The other job this week was the construction of our little bodega (small storage area), which will be a place for tools and outdoor supplies. A short footing between the laundry and BBQ was poured, block walls constructed, actually incorporating part of the BBQ structure, and on saturday the roof slab was poured.

Mauricio, our welder. stopped by to measure and get Dan's ideas for designing the doors for our bodega being built between the laundry and outdoor BBQ/fireplace. They will be similar to our protective door gates, but covered with heavy gauge sheetmetal. We bought our washer and dryer from Home Depot, to be delivered next week thursday, and picked up lumber for shelving jobs Dan plans once the crew is gone. This week we had Home Depot deliver two unfinished cabinets that will be incorporated into a seating/storage area in the master bedroom.  Still lots of scraping being done on the outside walls, and late on Friday afternoon Dan finally arranged with a dump truck crew to remove our hugour huge pile of escombro (building debris) in the street beside the house.

Still no action from the local water commission, although we were able to finalize with the arquitecto that the sewage line will run to the east to the main existing line deep under Calle 11. Luis measured and found that the drop between the bottom of our registro and the surface of the calle is 1.4 meters, so the fact that the main line there is 3 meters deep indicates that it is a workable plan. They know that our crew will only be around another week, so we have hopes of having the city crew here early next week. Grocery shopped to fill our freezer and refrigerator again. We feel so wealthy having many fresh fruits and veggies in the frig. Items we never afforded so frequently in the US.

Vacación y regreso

(Domingo 28 Abril - Sábado 18 Mayo)  April 27 we left Fortín by way of taxi to Orizaba, where we took a bus to Mexico City airport Here we walked across the street to the Hotel Aeropuerto where we stayed the night. On Sunday we got up at 3am to be the required three hours early for the flight from the AICM to Seattle, WA, via Dallas. Flights were good except for very rough weather for about ten minutes over Texas on the second leg. Dan's daughter, Heather, picked us up at SeaTac and we stayed with her and the two girls for three nights. Next, our friend David (and tenant at our house on Fidalgo Island), picked us up there and drove us to Anacortes. Here we stayed until Dan's daughter Harmony picked us up and drove us to her home on Mercer Island to visit with her three children and husband. She dropped us back at the airport in Seattle on monday evening to catch the midnight plane to Pittsburgh, PA. Dan's daughters toured us around the Seattle area environs a bit, and we visited the grandchildren's schools. We really enjoyed our time with them. In Anacortes we visited with friends who stopped by and did some weeding and mowing in the yard to help David out.

Two of Carmen's brothers, Gary and Guy, picked us up at the Pittsburgh airport – a 4.5 hour drive to our northern Penna destination in Potter County. We first stayed with Gary and Alice in Coudersport. They toured us around each day. We visited Letchworth Park in New York state (the “Grand Canyon of the East”), Pennsylvania's own grand canyon (Pine Creek Gorge near Wellsboro), and the bible camp at Mahaffey, where they volunteer often. While touring the Allegheny countryside which we loved, we saw lots of wildlife, including wild turkeys, deer, opossums and more. By contrast, we have rarely seen wildlife in Mexico. Saturday they drove us to St Marys where Carmen's sister, Cindy and her family live. Here many of the relatives gathered for a day of eating and chatting, which always makes for a great day! That Sunday morning there were actually snow flurries! Alan & Cindy and their two children took us to the Elk Country Visitor Center in Benezette. We visited the newly constructed interactive & educational facility, situated on top of a hill, where we could listen to the elk sounds and then push a button which then put our picture on the display while we recorded our attempt at calling an elk. The elk were all in hiding this cold and windy day.

Cindy drove us on Monday to Guy and Mary Lou's home. Carmen had told Guy that we would help him plant his garden. Little did she know that it would be two gardens of more than a quarter acre each. For only two people? Well – he plants to give to relatives and all who stop by his free stand out front of the house. After purchasing seed, while Guy, when necessary, ran the tractor, we three planted two varieties of sweet corn, green stringbeans, yellow waxbeans, peas, sunflowers, dill weed, pickling cukes, beets, carrots, three types of squash, and both red and white potatoes. We had perfect weather! Cool mornings and sunny afternoons! We were grateful for the exercise. We did a short walk up his back hillside of forest and a wild turkey ran, then flew up in front of us. While sitting on Guy's porch, having a picnic with Cindy and Alan, on the hillside across the road, two woodchucks came out of their holes and cavorted about for us. The first breakfast at Guy's, four deer walked past the dining room window. Wish we were there when the wild strawberries were ripe! Guy drove us back to the Pittsburgh airport May 19. We certainly enjoyed visiting with everyone! Wish we lived closer, but we just do not get everything we wish for. Now, we're hoping for some visitors from the north, to show them around our part of the world.

Our return flight home went well until we hit Dallas/Fort Worth where we had a 13 hour delay. We went thru three different planes, three different gates and three different flight crews for various reasons. Instead of our planned night in Mexico City and a bus ride on home after a night's rest, we took a straight 37 hours getting home from the time we left Guy's house. Actually that is not exactly accurate, since American airlines did put us in a hotel for three hours during the night. We got home just as our work crew was leaving, so Dan drove them to their bus.

So many stories could be told about our trip to the US, but this blog is actually more for the story of getting our lives and house in shape here in Mexico. So...

While we were gone, our crew often spent nights in our house, for which we were thankful. Having them around was more secure than having the house empty every night for three weeks. The guys used their own linens and food, and used our stove and frig a bit. It surely kept our kitties happier, having them around. Frank & Ania supplied the cats with food & water, and kept the litter boxes clean, while Artemio watered the plants every day.

Our crew accomplished what we expected in our absence. Now the whole house has been scraped of old paint. The west and south walls are painted with our bright blue new paint, along with part of the west side of house and the whole east side of house. Festermicide was painted on the exposed wood on the under side of the porch roof. The crew finished painting in the master bedroom, the one they used in our absence, so it is now finally ready for us to move into.

The tiles over the big double gate to our back yard (car parking area) were removed and the roof there rebuilt. All the broken tiles on the lower roofs were replaced, and all the clay tiled roofs were pressure-washed and sealed. Tiles, old and new, that we are keeping for future repair jobs were moved into the rooftop water tank area for storage, out of sight. All the old remaining tiles were moved to Coscomatepec, a gift to the workers to use/sell as they see fit, and the outside barbecue area where the tiles had been sitting was cleaned up.

The new walkways in the front garden are just about finished. All in all, everything appears to have been well cared for in our absence (none of the plants died during the hot weather we missed here), and it seems we are in the home-stretch on the renovations here. We must say – it felt so good to be back home again here in Fortín. We both wondered how we would feel about our move here, after visiting our former abodes. All is good.