Renovating a Gite in Brittany

Phew made it.

The ‘house warming’ party went off with a swing. It was almost exactly 1 year after I bought the house. It’s been a long and hard road, especially the last few months. Time for a rest and a little self-indulgence.

In preparation for the party in a few days and as a bit of a moral boost we got 7 tonnes of gravel delivered to smarten up the front of the house. A few hours with a rake and shovel makes all the difference – it also stops us treading in mud and muck. Most local houses round here have a dark grey granite gravel, but we chose a lighter colour to help bounce some extra light into the house, especially in the winter months. The other consideration was the size of the gravel. Too small and it gets trodden in between the treads of your shoes and too large is awkward to walk on. This size is known as 10/14 – which I believe means pieces between 10mm and 14mm.

The concrete mixer and trailer is tucked away in the long grass at the back. I guess I’m going to have to get the strimmer and blitz the garden; if summer ever arrives.

It’s certainly a huge improvement over this builders yard

Stinky

With the bathrooms operational and having been moved in for nearly a week there has been quite a strong smell coming from the septic tank back up into the house. The septic tank does have a ventilation pipe running from the output side of the tank and before the filter bed that vents up through the roof. However first impressions seem to be that this is not working correctly and the smelly gases are somehow coming back through the input side and the gas escaping through a trap. Fortunately the trap the gas has chosen is the washing machine trap in the laundry cupboard. Keeping the door to the laundry room shut helps, but it’s still seeping into the house.

As a temporary measure we’ve fitted a small fan to the tumble drier pipe to suck out the gas and relegated the tumbler to the garage. Blocking the washing machine trap might well shift the gas escape to a more sensitive part of the house !

Speaking to some friends they said that their new septic system also smelt a bit at first but settled down quickly. It does seem a bit strange to me that the gas isn’t taking the easy route via the vent.

I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

UPDATE: Problem solved.