Raising the roof!

I did not sleep very well strange because I felt perfectly comfortable under the net. We went to bed about 11ish. The first time I looked at the clock it was midnight, then 1.30, then 3.30 and the next thing I remember it was 6.00 and light. The frogs had been quite loud during the first part of the night but quietened down in the early hours of the morning. How civic minded!I heard no other strange noises, as I have on many occasions before, and put it down to the marvellous sonic repellers we got last year. It turned out, however, that they had not been on. Will had switched them off before getting in bed.There was a bird fluttering around in the house but as soon as I got up to open the front door it flew out of a tiny gap by the back door. It came back in again later. It must have been used to doing it while the house was empty and knew there was always a good supply of bugs hanging trapped in the cobwebs on the ceiling.We had no set plan for the day. We got the gas fridge going and I started to do some more cleaning. The flow of water coming out of the tap in the house is not very strong and when the tap is at a certain angle you can hear it pouring out of the overflow pipe on the roof. I went out to look and said to Will that I couldn’t see where the water was going. It didn’t appear to be running off the roof and into the gutter and I was worried it was running into the wall. Will went up to have a look. It did eventually flow off the roof. It was just taking its time.We looked at the side of the house where the worst of the water damage was. A few years back we had raised the corrugated iron on that side so that rain water would flow off the roof but with the continued collapse the roof was now lower nearer the wall and so rain water flowed onto the wall. Will decided we should raise it even further so went off to cut some posts while I did a little more cosmetic enhancement in the kitchen.After awhile he came back for me and we went to collect the posts he had cut, and so the repair job began. It was not easy. We had to remove the raising blocks we had added a few years ago and had to get at some awkward screws to release the strut on which the corrugated iron was fastened, free of the verandah roof beams. There was a pile of junk in the way which needed to be cleared. We did this carefully just in case it was a King Brown palace! We saw no snakes but a couple of centipedes, spiders, termites and ants of various sizes.We ended up with various posts leaning at different angles holding the roof strut up. It did the job we wanted but looked a bit untidy.The worst bit was the north eastern corner. We removed a cupboard that was against it and found strange mushrooms growing out of the wall behind it. Will had the great idea of using the car jack to raise the roof struts here and then we cut a post to fit exactly under it. It worked really well and the post was vertical. We decided to go back and refit all the other posts this way.After much effort we were finally happy with how it all looked and are sure now that rain water will flow away from the crumbling walls, that is, if it is gentle rain...a storm might be another matter.It was 2.30pm and we had not stopped to have any breakfast or lunch. We had open air showers and then drove into Stanthorpe to get some shopping.We came back and went for an evening walk out to another rocky escarpment on the property. We came upon a blue tarpaulin all bundled up. Will prodded it and was sure there was something inside. I wasn’t sure what we were going to find but hoped it was not grisly. In the end it just turned out to be a tarpaulin but we noticed a wire between two trees and Will thought someone had been camping there.More intruders!?We walked back to the house, steak, chips and salad for tea.I think we deserve it!

Fixing Frogknot.

Unwelcome guest!

Just as I am rigging the mosquito net...I spot this on the window sill. It wasn't very big (5cm). Will showed it the door!

Frogknot at last!

Frogknot

We left Dulcie about 10.30 this morning.“It’s going to be lonely here tonight,” she said just to make us feel better about going.We had to drive via Gatton to pick up our friend Andrew’s chainsaw. We had heard from another friend, who lives near Frogknot, that the drive up to the house was blocked by a fallen tree. We arrived in Gatton about lunchtime, got the chainsaw and headed up the Great Dividing Range towards Clifton. We stopped in Warwick about 2.00pm and had a pie for lunch then continued on to Stanthorpe.It was a lovely journey and it was good to be finally heading out on an adventure.I had not seen any kangaroos yet, alive or dead (roadkill) but we saw 2 dead ones by the road just outside Stanthorpe. Other weird things we saw on the journey included an another old ‘prospector’ bloke standing in a roadside layby with a surf board under his arm, a nomadic Buddhist walking along the road dressed only in orange and a man on a unicycle!?We drove through Stanthorpe and on to Glen Aplin where we stopped at the service station to get some petrol for the chainsaw.It wasn’t far from there to Frogknot.Frogknot is the house Will built with Andrew. They started in 1996. Will says it is still not finished. It stands in 40 acres of bush. The corrugated iron roof is supported by posts cut from the surrounding trees and the walls are straw bale. It has solar panels for electricity and water is pumped from the dam (pond) just beside the house.We started up the drive, which is about 1km long and twists and turns up the hillside. It was quite overgrown again after we had spent a day a few years back clearing it. We soon came upon the tree blocking the road. It was not too big and only needed one cut and we were able to lift the rest and swing it out of the way.We carried on up the drive. Roxy coped well with the road and the wheels did not slip once. As we came over the brow and the house came into view. We saw two large kangaroos bounding away as we approached. Last year we had spent a week clearing the area in front of the house and it still looked pretty good.As we got closer Will could see something was wrong with the roof. The ridge capping was at a weird angle. We pulled up outside and got out and could see that the walls had sagged even more than they had in previous years. We opened the door and went in. It looked pretty good inside and seemed just as we had left it but a large lump of plaster and straw had fallen out in one corner.There was a new crack in the back wall which Will was really upset about as that is a load bearing wall. He went straight up onto the roof.That is where he discovered the awful truth that someone had stolen the newest solar panel and in doing so had removed the ridge capping allowing water to pour into the side walls making them slump further and into the back wall causing the new crack.He refitted the ridge capping and came back down. We discovered that whoever stole the solar panel also took 2 broken chainsaws and a big metal drum! Thankfully they had not found the water pump.I don’t know how he did it but within an hour Will had the remaining solar panels connected to the battery and we had power again. He then refitted the water pump and we had running water. We lit the fire in the aga and I swept the place out. Within a few hours the place was looking much better.The area around here is called The Granite Belt. All over Will’s property there are large granite boulders lying around. We walked out at sunset to ‘The rocks’, an area of large granite boulders that look out across the valley.Will was happy to see in the garden that the mandarin tree had finally produced delicious fruit. I reached out to pick one and pulled back when I noticed a small green frog sat on the one I was about to pick! There were weird orange beetles all over the bush too and Will said they were Stink Bugs and they squirted foul smelling liquid if you got too close. Nice!As it got darker the frogs started to call and they are much louder than I ever remember them from my stays here in winter.It’s now 8.45 and the light is still on and we have internet connection, and hot water. I have not seen any huntsmen, or king browns. It’s looking good.I shall be sleeping under a mosquito net tonight...not only to keep out mosquitoes but anything else that is nocturnal and crawls!