An update - finally!

Apologies, I have been very lackadaisical with my posts recently - we have been caught up and self absorbed in the whole shipping container conversion, the experience & enjoying our new life, forming new plans and loving these wonderful long hours of sunshine here on the Ardnamurchan peninsula.

Over the last couple of days I've had phone calls from family & friends seeking long awaited updates on how we are getting on - this spurred me into action to get my act together and post you all some details.

So here is my latest update:

First up - the shipping container conversion - We are nearly finished! The whole container has been insulated, plastered and painted, it's fully wired, has had the underfloor heating installed, the bathroom has been fitted and also a wooden floor throughout. The kitchen is going in next week along with the tiles for the kitchen & bathroom - so as soon as the water has been connected to our plot we will have a working bathroom - I can't wait!!!!!!!

The outside has been weatherproofed and will eventually have some sort of cladding but that's a low priority at the moment - especially with the sudden rise in the cost of building materials not to mention the low to non existing stock currently.

After the patio window had been fitted and I'd slapped some paint on the walls, we laid the flooring. First to go down was a thick layer of insulation, then a plan for the underfloor heating layout was drawn out. This was then cut with a router for the pipe to be laid down into the insulation before the wooden flooring was placed on top.

Once the flooring was down we were able to get the bathroom in - and I get to have a full size bath! - what started as - '' hey Andrew why don't we fit a bath in there'' only really said in jest became reality and I honestly can't believe our bathroom, in a 20ft shipping container, is better than the one we had in our Cornish cottage - my over enthusiasm for it all might steam from the fact that we have been without a bathroom for getting on for 4 months. When we want a shower we head down to the local village hall and we have a portable toilet in one of the other shipping containers - which is ok but starting to loose it's novelty value especially on a cold and rainy night!

However, in order to get this amazing bathroom working we need one more thing - water!

So this week we had the ok to dig the water trench and Andrew has spent the last few days playing diggers.

We now have trenches all over the plot - including some for the electricity as well - it now really rather hazardous heading out for a midnight visit to the loo you could easily end up in a ditch not to mention the massive hole dug for our bio waste tank - would be ironic falling in there heading out for a late night call of nature!

I must admit I was worried Andrew and the digger would end up at the bottom of this big pit - it's over 2 meters deep and 3 wide - we are bound to loose some sheep in there over the next week!

Talking of sheep we have thrown ourselves into Scottish highland life with Andrew taking part in the sheep shearing for the local crofts.

There are now a lot of very self conscious sheep wandering around sporting very interesting haircuts!

Finally our new temporary home is now looking very 'Ice station Zebra' with our external router fitted to a pole high above the container - I think it looks dead cool!

(sorry about image quality - my phone wasn't playing)

So all in all everything is going ahead as planned, we are still awaiting our planning permission but everything is at least 6 months behind at the planning office for various reasons. Therefore, we have decided once we have finished the container home we will plough straight into a new project whilst waiting to start building the house - We have decided to put our lovely camper van on the market and fit out our own. Next week we will take ownership of a new long wheelbase VW crafter to turn into a camper that's more fitting for the adventures we would like to undertake. We need a vehicle we can comfortably live in for extended periods of time, will cope with a more rugged landscape - i.e. Shetland, Iceland, Faroe Isles etc basically areas above 66 degrees North seem to be calling to us - obviously these Highlands of Scotland are not adventurous enough for us!! So the plan is to fit out a vehicle that is badass enough to cope with our mad plans.

Something a bit like this........

I promise to keep you posted

Bye for now

Liz