Fallen buildings - the way ahead

 It's a bit like buses - you wait for ages and then three come at once. My blog is in the doldrums for months, and then I write three long posts in rapid succession!

Following our drive to render our French acre less of a jungle and more of a garden after the months when we were forced to neglect it, I thought I would share our plans for the building that collapsed last autumn. This disaster I covered in a post dated 21 November 2019. But perhaps I should begin by showing you what it used to look like when more or less intact (it's always been a bit dilapidated.)

This is how it looked in July, among the overgrowth. Believe it or not, we had already by this time done a lot of clearance. For example, here's the pile of rescued timbers in our garage, ready to be sawn up for firewood.

We realised we had to do something. Left to itself it would not only have a look of neglect but would be actively dangerous. The mortar used when it was first constructed was little more than mud, and would soon be washed away, so that eventually the wall would fall. So after some deliberation we called in the man who a few years ago rendered our drive passable, digging it out and filling it with gravel, so that it was no longer a muddy farm track unreliable in wet weather. (That's an understatement - when it rained a stream flowed down the track from the lane above and there were times when it took several hours to drive 100 metres. On more than one occasion we almost missed our ferry at Calais.)  

 He took on the idea of developing the old bakery site into something we could actually use and would look good as well. He would cap and repoint the wall to be proof against the weather and therefore secure, remove all the remaining debris, put in a slabbed area using the original footprint and connect it to the patio with a gravelled path. 

Our job meanwhile was to put a tarpaulin over the top of the wall and remove the great pile of mouldy faggots still lurking in the building and burn them. The placing of the tarpaulin (just a big sheet of plastic which we'd saved from a previous roof job) was a  bit of a palaver involving ladders, rope, heavy stones and wooden props - a typical ad hoc job!

Front...

 and back. 

The removal of the faggots was hard work, repetitive and dirty. Load after load went on to the bonfire over several days. 

Half way!

 Faggots cleared - phew, what a slog that was!

We hope the work can be done in October or early November, because as the year progresses and the weather gets colder it  it will be impossible to do the pointing, and obviously it would be best to avoid subjecting the wall to another winter.  I am pleased, though, that we can turn the old ruin into something positive rather than simply repair and make good. We feel we have a responsibility to the place while it belongs to us, but there was no way we could afford to fix two old outbuildings, and  this one was of no real use. Now I am having all sorts of thoughts about the refurbished site. It would make a rather good stage or auditorium...perhaps we could have a musical soiree at our house like the ones others have hosted! And this gives me the incentive to clear the area of rampant ivy... When it comes to our place in France, there is no end to work.