Head scratching!

So, the plan for today was to make a start in the apartment, as we decided that with it being a potential revenue stream, it was probably most important.

 

So, after Helen had been for a run... again!... we had the usual breakfast and while Helen headed into the dungeon to do battle with the internet connection, I went downstairs to the apartment, tape measure in hand.

 

I decided first to sketch out a plan - while not pokey down there, it needs careful consideration as to how to furnish it, so after much measuring, plotting the room on the PC, and then surfing (not sure that's the right verb, think drowning is more appropriate) the web for furniture, by lunch time I had come up with a plan - a plan that, after lunch and and a walk through, Helen gave the rubber stamp to.

 

Pleased with my morning's efforts, I fetched my tools from the man cave and set to clearing the living room and kitchen (first job...a new kitchen!).  I have to admit that at this point I've really struggled with seeing past the dodgy plastering in the place - it goes completely against the grain for me to move on past it without re-plastering, but we have agreed that with the timescales were working to and the time it would take to get it tip top being at odds with each other, we have compromised on a... let's say 70% refurb of the apartment. This includes: re-painting, a new kitchen, new sofa, new shelves and TV unit, a new chest of drawers, new wardrobe and re-grouting of the bathroom and fitting new bathroom 'furniture'. That should be sufficient for us to feel happy about charging people the (modest) kind of money that the previous owners were charging for the previous incarnation.

Next year will see a re-plaster, a new bathroom and a new bedroom ceiling. That will complete the transformation and probably increase the rental income a touch too.

 

Having got past this psychological barrier, my motivation was renewed, and I promptly threw the cooker and fridge onto the nicely tidied patio (did in say new fridge and cooker too?), then disconnected the sink and started to dismantle the cupboards - only to find some under pelmet lighting. No problem, I thought, simply knock off the correct trip switch upstairs and disconnect it.

 

Well, that would have been simple enough had the person who labelled the fuse board not used illegible hieroglyphics!

 

Huh?

 

 

After two hours of both Helen and me taking it in turns to turn off trip switches and run around making notes of what did and didn't work, we had traced most of the crazy wiring and we now know how it works - well, kind of. At least now when guests ask why something isn't working we can do more than just shrug.

 

We've sent an email to the previous owner (an electrician) to try and sort the last couple of mysteries out, but we're not holding our breath for a response any time soon - I think his emails have the same attitude to routine as his wiring!

 

At least now we can get cracking in the apartment and I think Helen will feel happier knowing I'm not outside working in the sun (although my 'office' for the next few weeks is considerably brighter than hers).

 

The good news is that Brad (we're calling him 'Mr Satellite') should be here to install our new top-of-the-range, high-speed internet next weekend. The bad news (aside from the crazy price we have to pay for it) is that it could end up being on the same day as our furniture arrives!! The removals company have estimated Sat 24th as delivery day - 10 days from now, and a whole month since we last saw our belongings.

 

I have to thank my wife for being patient with me today while we worked through this crazy electrickery! She had to stop her day job prematurely, but I'm sure she will make up for it when the super-fast internet arrives...

Rain stops play

I awoke this morning to the sound of rain drops pattering slowly on the skylight outside the bedroom. Ashamedly, I have to admit to feeling some relief as it gave us the perfect excuse to stay indoors and do less strenuous work today.

I dragged myself out of bed, went downstairs and put a pot of coffee on while my computer booted up. About an hour later - and half an hour into my office work for the day, Stuart also came plodding down the stairs, surprised to see that it was raining out.

While I settled back to my work, he booted up the laptop to set about working on our website, our holidaylettings.co.uk listing, and other admin tasks.

I was quite surprised when even Stuart admitted to being cold in the office - and he got up from his desk to investigate the small wood burner that still exists in this room. I was a little dubious as to its safety/ability to work as I didn't think that the previous owners had used it. However, my doubts proved unfounded as Stuart quickly lit a fire which drew well and before long we could see little puffs of smoke floating past the window as the room heated up nicely. A great result!!!

Warmth! For free!

 

By around 12pm I was getting a bit stir crazy so decided to walk to check the post. Our post box is situated on the gate all the way at the other end of the drive (well, you wouldn't expect the postman to have to walk/drive all the way to the house, would you?). Stuart decided to come with me to stretch his legs and we had a pleasant walk together (by this time the rain had dried up but it was still damp under foot). Once again, however, we were disappointed by a decidedly empty post box (we've checked it each day since we arrived). I was beginning to think that somebody must have been stealing our post ...

By the time we got back to the house it was nearing lunch time, so we powered down computers and took a break for lunch.

After lunch and a half hour or so more work, we decided we needed to go shopping to get some supplies and to go to the bank to request Bancomat cards for our accounts. Currently, although we have money in our Italian euro accounts, we don't have any easy way of withdrawing it or spending it in shops, so we are still either using the cash we brought over with us, or else spending on UK credit cards at goodness knows what additional expense for the currency conversion.

We got ourselves ready, hopped in the car, and as we drew to a stop at the end of the driveway, what could we see but a full post box!! Stuart urged me not to get too excited - but I could see a handwritten envelope through the gap in the post box! I rummaged around in my bag for the key and quickly jammed it into the lock to see what was inside. We had a sum total of: 4 letters addressed to Keith (grrr), one letter addressed to me from my bank in the UK, a doctor's letter that had been forwarded from our Abingdon address to Stuart's Mum's address in Birmingham, and then onto us in Italy, and... a hand-written envelope containing a 'welcome to your new home' card from Sarah and Dave. It felt lovely and ridiculously exciting to receive our first post over here!

So, after a successful trip to the supermarket we parked up in the main square in Pescia to go into the bank. It was 4pm. The bank was closed. We were somewhat bemused (not to mention frustrated) to find that the bank closes at 3.50pm - having only re-opened after its 1h 20m lunch closure at 2.50pm. In fact, on Friday afternoons it is only open from 2.50pm to 3.35pm.




The bank reopens for an hour after lunch - and on Fridays only for 45 mins - it hardly seems worth it!

 

That's 8.30am to 1.30pm every week day morning; 2.50pm to 3.50pm Mon-Thurs afternoons and 2.50pm to 3.35pm Friday afternoons.

Oh well, at least we know now, so that's fine.

Feeling slightly deflated at not having been able to accomplish the banking task, we returned to the house with our shopping only to find that the Internet was being so frustratingly slow that we couldn't accomplish anything. I couldn't even log on to check my work emails as it was taking so long for it to connect that the secret-special-code generated by my RSA token would expire and be counted as invalid each time.

In the end, we conceded defeat and sat down with the pile of information and brochures that the previous owners left in the apartment for guests as a 'welcome pack' so that we could sort through it all and think about what we would want to put in such a 'welcome pack'.

In the interim, Stuart managed to get some contact details for a British guy who specialises in providing Internet upgrades (via satellite) in the area. We were surprised when he called us quite late into the evening on our landline (from his exercise bike in the gym - now that's dedication!) and things seem hopeful that we might be able to be provided with a better connection within the next couple of weeks. Until then we just have to put up with the slowness and unpredictability of it!

Tomorrow looks like it might be drier. Let's hope it's more productive too!

~ Helen

Another day, another toy!

So today is/was Monday, our first official day at work here in Tuscany. Despite that, we stayed up quite late Sunday night AND drank too much wine - neither of which we would dream of doing back in Abingdon in our 'normal' routine. Not sure how long it will be before anything feels 'normal' again let alone having any kind of routine, but hey...adventures aren't supposed to be easy...right?!

We planned to try our damnedest to get up this morning in a 9 to 5 frame of mind to make a start at something vaguely like routine. Helen got up bright and early and I saw her through one squinted eye disappear in Lycra, obviously off for the run she threatened to go for yesterday - seems some of us made a better job of the work day mindset than others, I on the other hand went back to sleep until she came back.

 

Breakfast ensued shortly afterwards and then Helen fired up the computer that we'd lugged from Abingdon, to Birmingham, to Bristol, through France and into Italy.

 

I headed out with new strimmer with the aim of clearing/finding some space to A) put compost bins and B) plant veg at some point.

 

We decided that the next tier down in front of the house was probably the most sensible area, so I clambered down and started the strimmer. I soon realised that beneath the 5ft brambles and weeds were offcuts of tree, lumps of stone and other detritus in the shape of old garden furniture and other rubbish. The strimmer proved not so good at cutting any of these items and soon the blade was knocked loose and in slow motion, off fell the blade, along with the bolt holding it on and the two metal washers, right into the scrub I was trying to cut! I can tell you that my patience was tested at this point as I'd been cutting in the heat for some time by now and was sweating so much I couldn't keep hydrated...I counted to ten and headed back to house to acquire permission to buy another petrol-powered tool. Permission was immediately granted from a somewhat downtrodden wife who was finding working from home with a sometimes agonisingly slow internet connection and in a chilly, dingy office room nothing short of soul destroying - all this compounded by the fact that I was out in the sun 'enjoying' myself.

 

More detritus.

The 'office' really is quite dingy... Especially compared with the sunny garden.

 

 

So, leaving Helen home alone for the first time, I headed back to OBI to buy a hedge trimmer and some hand tools for cutting/raking.

 

Upon my return I found Helen working outside having had an 'episode' involving some kind of temporary vision impairment caused we think by the darkness of the office and the brightness of the window next to the PC screen. Hmm, may have to rethink the office layout!

 

So, after lunch on the patio I set to work with the hedge cutter, the sound of which I think soon sent Helen back indoors.

 

You'll be pleased to hear that the new toy made light work of the brambles and greenery, and the rakes helped hugely to clear things - although the more I cleared, the larger the whole job seemed to get.

 

Getting slightly clearer.

 

An old rabbit or chicken hutch and run was uncovered.

 

 

Somewhat disheartened after a hard day's toil and only being about a quarter of the way there, I retired to the coolness of the house with a large bottle of cold water and passed the baton to Helen who had just clocked off the day job and wanted to burn some extra calories out in the last of the day's sun.

 

While I moved furniture around upstairs and hoovered all the spiders up so that we could swap to sleeping in the larger bedroom, Helen set to work with yet more weeding. After a walk around in the house she decided the area as you approach the house where the old lean-to fell down (and where the new extension is eventually planned to go) most needed her attention. Very surprised was I when I went out a while later to see the whole lot weed-free! It's looking another notch better now, and definitely improves the kerb appeal.

 

 

Weed-free area. Still not exactly attractive, but better than it was.

 

During her clean-up, she found evidence of a porcupine lying on the ground in the shape of a discarded quill. We've yet to see much wildlife (guess they're all out partying while we're asleep), although I did see a snake in the very place I was rummaging around for the strimmer blade and washers earlier, as well as a slug of about 9inches!

 

 

Porcupine's calling card.

 

This whole place really is a mammoth step up from what we had in Abingdon, but I'm sure we'll get to grips with it and when we do, there will be no way we'll let it get out of control - this tidying process isn't something we want to repeat again in a hurry! It is definitely a long-term project, and we somehow have to get to grips with the idea of slowing down a little and not trying to get to the end of everything we start by the end of that same day - it's just not possible on this scale. A life-long work-in-progress is what this is, so after a chat over a cold beer we have decided to take a day off this weekend for something more fun. The weekend still seems a long way off yet though!

Back breaking

Today’s weather was better than expected – cooler and cloudier than recent days, but still relatively warm and for the most part dry.

We opted, therefore, to get straight out into the garden after breakfast and do as much tidying as the weather would allow. In the end that turned out to be quite a lot as there wasn’t so much as a spot of rain until around 5.30pm – by which time we were more than ready to call it a day in any case.

For the most part I weeded all day - outside the apartment and on the path running to it, while Stuart moved the pile of accumulated 'stuff' from the garden to a spot beneath a tree next to our parked car (and the left-behind car - which we noticed today has not had valid road tax since 2009...) and erected a tarpaulin to keep it relatively dry.

Weeding in progress - tarpaulin covering pile of 'things' in distance. Wine bottles in middle of the picture from one lunch sitting (just kidding ;-).

I also managed to get the washing machine on this morning, although was somewhat shocked to find out that a cotton wash at 40C takes 2.5h to complete – our machine in Abingdon was doing the same in just 60 minutes. Once the wash had finally finished I hung it out to dry – not in the sunshine today, but there was quite a stiff breeze and it dried very quickly.

Washing between the olives.

Tidy path!!!

Today's weeding pile.

We’re still finding it hard to get our heads around the fact that we live here - it still feels like a rather strange (and very strenuous) holiday. It was only this morning that I realised I should probably unpack my toiletries bag as, actually, I'm here to stay! We’ve also continued to live out of our suitcase since we arrived…

Hopefully our furniture from the UK will arrive soon – and it will make a world of difference to have our own stuff around us rather than the pieces of furniture that we've inherited from the previous people. Perhaps then we will feel more settled. The latest we heard from the removals company was that the lorry had been held up by the police in Italy, which sounded a bit alarming – but apparently this is something that happens from time to time, and they should be able to give us an idea of a delivery date early this week. 

Mum and Dad have booked flights to come and visit us in October, which is really nice. I look forward to them coming out and showing them around - and hopefully by then we should have made the place somewhere to be proud of.

Tomorrow will be the start of my ‘working’ week, doing paid work for VB – as long as I can get the Internet to play nicely. I imagine that I will find some time at lunch time and maybe in the afternoon/evening as well to do some bits on the house/garden though, as it’s hard to ignore! Stuart will still be devoting his time full-time to project-Italy J

~ Helen

Burn baby, burn

We woke at 5.30am this morning as day was breaking – there are no curtains or shutters at any of the windows in the house, so when the sun decides it’s time to get up, there’s little you can do to avoid being disturbed by the stream of daylight. Of course, we put significant effort into trying to ignore it and go back to sleep, but eventually conceded defeat sometime around 7.30.

After a slow morning of breakfast and catching up on yesterday’s blog posting, we got ready to go out shopping – on the list for this morning’s shopping trip: vacuum bags for a Henry hoover, a garden incinerator, a strimmer, a gas lighter and a fly swat.

We were heading for ‘Obi’ – the Italian equivalent of B&Q which we knew was in a complex of shops on the outskirts of Montecatini Terme. Unfortunately, we didn’t know exactly where near Montecatini the place was, and thanks to some very ambiguous signage we took several wrong turns before we finally found our way there. That was frustrating, but it was on one of our many wrong turns that we stumbled across this stunning place – we’re not sure yet what it is/was, but it’s very beautiful:

This is where a wrong turn takes you!

 

We finally found Obi and soon found ourselves standing in the strimmer aisle facing a baffling array of different makes and models . As strimmer novices (we had an electric garden strimmer back at home, but nothing as heavy duty as the ones we were looking at here), we felt ill-equipped to make any informed decision. Of course, the fact that the labelling was in Italian didn’t help matters, but that was probably the least of our difficulties. We eventually decided on a middle-of-the-range petrol-powered model and were about to pick up the box when a helpful assistant interjected, horrified at our choice (apparently that one was ‘no good’), and instead guided us to a different model which he assured us was much, much better. It was roughly €20 more expensive, but still among the cheaper of the ones on offer.

So, strimmer in trolley (along with the essential safety  mask, petrol can and oil for the motor) we started to look for the other items on our list. Unfortunately, other than a fly swat, Obi was unable to help us with anything else, so we paid for our goods and headed back to the car.

Next, we tried Euronics for vacuum bags for the Henry hoover that we had inherited at the house. Euronics failed us there, as did another electrical shop (when we showed the shop assistant a photo of a Henry on my mobile phone to help with the description of what we were after, he looked gobsmacked – almost as if he had never seen a hoover with a face on it before…).

We also drove round and round (and round) trying to find shops selling hardware and/or garden supplies to attempt to find a garden incinerator, but again, the shop assistants we asked (and showed photographs to) seemed baffled by the idea of a container in which to safely set light to garden waste.

We did manage to pick up a gas lighter though - I should explain that we wanted one of these because the gas oven at the house seems rather temperamental in deciding whether or not to produce an ignition light. While cleaning the hob on Friday I managed to get electric shocks off the thing twice (despite having thought that it was disconnected from the mains) - it seems as though the whole thing is live, yet producing an ignition light is a hit-and-miss affair...



The voltage detector pen lights up when it nears the top of the oven.

Eventually it got to lunch time so we called time on our search for the elusive hoover bags and incinerator and retired to the house for a snack and the obligatory glass of wine (who am I kidding, the obligatory bottle of wine – well, it is still the weekend…).

Over lunch, inspiration came to Stuart: we could burn things in the concrete construction that looks like it was at one point a barbeque. So once the food and wine glasses were cleared away, I got busy with some weeding and Stuart got busy starting a fire.



Man at work.

 

The former barbeque ended up working very well as a means by which to dispose of tired and unwanted wooden furniture (er… and some shrubbery on the wall above it). 

The pile is slowly diminishing.

Once the burning was under control, Stuart got to grips with his latest toy power tool and set about strimming the tall grass that was growing in the middle of the track all the way along the drive and making a start on the garden area in front of the house.
 

New toy.

 

Man still at work.

 

Overall, it's been another tiring day - a little frustrating and somewhat less productive that I had been hoping for, but we there are some small improvements to show for it.

We both made the amateur mistake of working in the garden this afternoon without thinking to apply sunscreen.  With so much to get on with, we managed to completely overlook the fact that the sun was blazing down on us and even though it didn’t seem as if we were out in it for all that long ,we both have rather pink arms and shoulders. Won’t be doing that again, Factor 30 from now on.

Having said that, tomorrow is due to see a change in the weather, with some cooler temperatures coming in and some rain expected either tomorrow or Mon/Tue (it will almost be like being back in the UK!), so tomorrow may be a day for concentrating on the holiday apartment and on trying to get our website finished.

Fully furnished!?

Change of author this evening folks, though I won't apologise at this point for any bad grammar and the like as no doubt I won't be allowed to post this until the editor next door has cast her skillful eye over it.

So... what a day... where to start!?

Let's start at the end for a change (well the day hasn't quite ended so I'll write up until this point).

Our day ended when the 'bar' opened at 7.15pm, with a lovely view and about half an hour of sunshine before the sun dipped behind the mountains opposite. We quenched our substantial thirsts with a couple of large, cold beers and a bowl of crisps.

Looks idyllic, right? Wait til you see what's just out of view.

All very lovely, I'm sure you'll agree, but prepare yourselves for what preceded it...

So now you know how it ended, let's wind right back to the start of the day so that you can see how we arrived there.

We both woke early this morning, our brains working overtime with thoughts of the day ahead. After a brief attempt to get back to sleep, we gave in and decided to start the day with an early breakfast and get straight off to the house - we had clearing to do, and lots of it! We are SOOOOO glad that we had access to the house this morning rather than at 6pm today (as would have been the original plan), what with no bed linen, no electric or internet, and copious layers of dirt to clean and tidying to do. When we were sold the house 'fully furnished' we didn't fully realise that meant 'including all our old rubbish'... Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself.


We arrived at the house at around 8.30am after Helen had taken her first ever drive on the wrong side of the road. I forget how nerve wracking it is when you haven't done it before, as I've done so much for so many years, but I know how much of a big deal it was for Helen to jump into the driving seat for the first time - one of many uphill challenges we're bound to face, so I'm very proud of her taking the bull by the horns.

So, the sun was out, the air was fresh, our bellies were full of breakfast and we had the bit between our teeth so we started off by going all guns blazing into the downstairs bedroom/office to get our technical hub and connection to the world set up. That took us a little over an hour, so from there we headed straight into the living room/kitchen area - the most chaotically messy (and dirty) room of them all.

Just to reiterate - NONE of this stuff belongs to us.

After an hour or so of sorting and cleaning we headed out to the local supermarket - once again, Helen again opted to drive (very proud of her for giving it a go and very well she took to it too, even if she did accuse me of not taking my passenger/navigator role seriously enough). The plan was to buy supplies not only for lunch but also for cleaning - but not before we had headed to customer services to attempt to acquire a discount card for the supermarket. Discount cards are only available to residents and offer substantial savings as well as an accumulation of points. The lady at the desk spoke no English but gave us a form to fill out, and between us, our broken Italian and Google Translate on my phone, we managed to acquire ourselves said card and off we went merrily on our way to fill our trolley with discounted goods feeling we'd achieved enough for the day already!

By the time we got back to the house it was time to break for lunch. Being excited Brits abroad, we sat in the full heat of the midday sun and ate a prawn salad, cheese, crisps and piccante peppers stuffed with tuna (a bit random we'll concede, but the kitchen was far from fit for cooking at this point, so lunch needed to come ready-made). Oh, and we had a bottle of white wine of course, and very respectable it was too - all the more so for being only €1.80 a bottle!

While we're on the subject of drinking wine in the sunshine, a word of caution: 25C sunshine focused through a glass of wine directly onto the skin of the hand HURTS!! I managed to do this to myself three times before I realised why my thumb was stinging while absent-mindedly playing with the stem of my glass.

Ouch - that sun is hot!

So, after an all too brief stop for lunch, Helen went inside to test the phone line and call her folks back in Bristol. Success! Not only do we have electric, hot water & internet, we also have a landline - which is something we didn't even have in Abingdon for at least two years prior to leaving. (Let's hope Italians don't suffer from the same cold calling as we do back in Blighty.)

Helen looks worried not because she isn't enjoying talking to her Dad, but because she's looking at the pile of rubbish that needs clearing...

Finding no more valid reasons to delay the inevitable, we thew ourselves head long into the cleaning and tidying again. I headed into the 'man cave'/shed and left Helen dousing the kitchen in the Italian equivalent of Flash liquid and Dettol spray. Several hours later, we had a clean(er) kitchen (certainly fewer mouse droppings in the kitchen cupboard), a tidy man cave and that ENORMOUS pile of crap that we showed you earlier!

All-new, improved, tidied man-cave.

So now you know how we earned those beers at the end of our day, but we can't finish the post without picking out some of the highlights of the 'treasure' we found in the house and shed/man cave... (If we could only find a car boot sale somewhere we'd be richer than in our wildest dreams... SURELY!)

So, here's the run down, in a kind of Generation Game style:

Lamp shades

Cuddly toys... (in a bin liner)




A desktop computer, complete with printer AND juicer

A selection of pine furniture that would bring a touch of class to any home

A selection of power transfer adapters so HUGE that you need never be without the correct one again!

Which one is it?!

A cuddly bear in a casserole dish


And not forgetting a full pan of used frying oil, just one previous owner - too disgusting to show on this blog, or even to take a photo of to be honest.

So that's it, day one of our new life.

Tomorrow we plan to devote some attention to the garden.

Stay tuned for days two, three, four and more.

A delay, breaking and entering, a trip to Ikea and an enormous task ahead

I felt bad about the state we left our house in when we moved out in Abingdon, as I hadn't managed to get around to cleaning all of the kitchen cupboards, the windowsills or the skirting boards and our Hippo bag hadn't yet been collected.

At least we didn't leave it like this:

We have a lot of clearing out to do.

Where do we start?!

We got into the house (eventually) today because Stuart received a message from Richard this morning telling us that the notary needs to register the mortgage in advance of the meeting at which we complete the purchase. Since this has not been done yet (we don't know why), the meeting won't be able to happen until some time next week.

At that point my heart missed a beat as I imagined us having to stay in hotel accommodation (complete with noisy Dutch teenagers - but that's another story) for the rest of the week! But Stuart read on: Keith and Geri are happy for us to start moving our stuff into the house ahead of next week so that it won't interrupt our plans. They themselves are no longer in the area (we've no idea exactly where they are - some reports suggest they are on their way to Poole, others suggest they are going to New Zealand for a holiday), so they have appointed power of attorney to another ex-pat in the area who will act on their behalf at the meeting next week.

So that all sounded fine, panic over!

Stuart emailed Richard back to say that it all sounded good to us and to ask when we could get the keys and from whom... The next thing we knew Richard was phoning to say that nobody seems to know where the keys are (he doesn't have any, Michelle, who has the power of attorney, doesn't have any...) and nobody seems to be able to get in touch with Keith & Geri by email, phone or text.

Richard suggested going up to the house to search under plant pots - and said that if all else failed he would come up with a crow bar and get us in.

We duly went to the house, spent a long while looking under plant pots, moving rubbish bags, turning over buckets and stones (disturbing lizards, spiders, ants and a snake in the process!) but to no avail. Eventually Stuart went to the car and unloaded his bag of tools (what a good job we brought them with us in the car for the road trip), and with a combination of some power tools and brute force, he eventually managed to hack off the padlock on the side shed and let us into the house.

We were horrified by the mess and piles of stuff that greeted us! Even pairs of shoes, coats, half eaten packets of cereal and half eaten jars of jam ranged amongst the rest of the belongings left for us to deal with.

We eventually found the keys to both the apartment and the main house in a bowl of keys - together with about 10 other unidentified sets of keys.

Did I mention that they have also left a car?

It looks like it hasn't gone anywhere for a long while - it's covered in mould, with rusty hub caps, spider webs, grass growing around it and even a wasps nest on the wheel arch. It was unlocked of course - but judging by the creaks and cobwebs didn't seem as if the door had been opened in a long while:

Amongst all of the piles and piles of stuff in the house we didn't find any bed linen. Since we are due to sleep there tomorrow night, we decided a trip to good old Ikea in Pisa was in order so that we could get ourselves a duvet, some new pillows, sheets, pillow cases and duvet cover.

Ikea is exactly the same the world over, it seems. All the stock is the same, there's the same annoying one-way-only route around the shop and the same dawdling people getting in your way when all you want to do is go straight to the 'market' and then to the check-out. I don't think I've ever seen people with their dogs in Ikea in the UK though - spotted three sets of people who'd brought their pooches into the shop with them today.

After making our purchases we headed back along the autostrada back to Pescia and to the house to unload our shopping until tomorrow. This visit to the house was rather more fruitful as we managed both to turn the electricity back on and to get the modem up and running so (in theory at least) we should have power and internet when we move in tomorrow!

As of now we don't know of any means by which to get rid of unwanted goods - we haven't come across any rubbish tips (or skip hire companies for that matter!) so we will have to work out how to dispose of things.

We're both itching to get our teeth into the clearing and cleaning and tidying process - it's exciting to think what we will (we hope) eventually be able to make of the place, but it seems like an enormous mountain to climb at the moment. We should find out soon when our furniture is due to arrive - simply having our own things in the house will improve it no end (that and a good clear out and clean, I just hope we can finish clearing everything before our furniture all arrives).

The weather has been glorious today - mid to high 20s C and sunny. Can't quite believe that we'll be getting lots more of that to come and the English person inside me wants to rush outside and make the most of it in case it rains tomorrow - I need to retrain my brain to realise that we'll be seeing more of the sun over here!

~ Helen