The window sill in the bedroom downstairs in the first section was made up of some rotten wood with stones and general dust and muck underneath, we had been discussing how we would like it, I suggested putting a stone paved window sill, Rachael preferred a oak sill, so, yesterday I set about removing all the old timber and stones etc to get back to the stone wall in order to put the new sill in.

As I shoveled the stone and muck out after removing the wood i felt a flat surface under the spade, i thought it may have been tilled at some point with the old terracota tiles, as i removed more I realized it was all one piece of stone, when i cleared it and brushed it off there was a bonny medieval stone sink, what a bonny item.

Thanks Tom and Bon Voyage

We have now finished the floor, Tom as been a great help, and he is now stopping on until Thursday so we can get even more done.

Tom on the barrow

Getting rid of it was a problem, they don’t have skips here in France, at the back of the castle is a large area that we intend to make in to a patio, so we decided to pile the rubble in to a mound running across the back that would create a divide between the patio and the field. This was fine, but there was far more than we anticipated, the mount was done and we still had a lot to get rid of, so with the need to keep things moving i decided to just tip the rubble on the patio area and work about it later (bad decision) I figured we could just hire a mini digger and level it out when we are ready to do the patio, the area just became overgrown over time and it was difficult to keep it tidy.

Then last week a slice of luck, our neighbours were having a car park put in, and this enormous digger turned up to do the job, we had a chat with the diver and asked him how much to clear and level it while they were there, €90 and 45 minutes later it was done.

You cant see the castle in the photos as the moat is lined with tree’s, the castle is behind the tree’s in the first photo etc

One of the reasons for starting here is this section is the only section that had a partial roof, the roof supports that you would find on a conventional building would be A frames, on our castle these are quite unique, they are more like a arched (bottom of a boat) type affair (see photos) this design is unique to this area, two of these where in a bad state of repair, the others where fine, after much deliberation we decided that we could eliminate one and repair the other.

Because the chateau is a listed building we could not use the conventional French tiles with flats and rounds, it had to be rounds on top and bottom, this can be a pain as using rounds on the bottom is prone over time to slide down the valeach (a planking put over the main structure of the roof ready to lay the tiles) luckily when we consulted the local builders merchants, they now do a round under tile that as a lug at the back that sits on battons to stop the old problem of slipping.

One of the biggest problems facing us on the roofing,  because the castle as a moat to three sides it was not possible to scaffold, after much scratching of heads and coffee we decided the simplest solution was to put the grenier (loft) floor in and use this as a platform from which to do the roof. This we did and it worked well.

It is important for me to keep as much originality as possible, some of the surrounding medieval buildings, the lodgy etc have  adopted a more modern style, completly flat roofs, short overhang and guttering, we kept the croakied lines of the old oak beams and kept the traditional large overhang and no gutters.

Finally we had a roof!