November '11

No. 11
The back wall had been completed when we came back from our visit to the UK. Now it was time for the main floor supports to be propped up with a thousand acro's, for the steelwork and blocks to be laid, then the concrete to be poured. Thsi all happenned quickly which was just as well because juast after the concrete had set, we got our past missing 4 months rain in one afternoon.

Finca, dogs and weather
Early in the month, while it was still warm, we found that to dogs were all content to spend some time with us and just lie around the barn soaking up the sun. It was as if they new that the weather was going to change, which it duly did just in time to do more damage to the already poor crop of olives we have this year.

By the time I got the big roller out to flatten the ground under the olive trees, so we could collect the fallen olives more easily, the rain had started. Within a couple of days it was too wet to roll the ground. It all just got stuck to the roller, so we only managed to roll half of our terraces. Then we had a couple of days of gales which knocked a lot of olives onto the ground, meaning we couldn't collect them from the un-rolled terraces.

Anyway we managed to collect over 3/4 ton in a couple of sessions, but they were poor quality and we put them in the general Cooperativa batch, so we didn't get any oil back for our own use. We will just have to live off the remains of last years batch of oil.

Mainly Rain
Just after the middle of the month, we had quite a wet weekend. 8 1/2" on Saturday and over 12 3/4" by the end of Monday. The village looked like Venice on a hillside on Saturday afternoon. The rainfall in Mas was one of the topics of the news for the next few days. The road down from the village to the finca was covered on stones and gravel up to 6" deep and over 30 yards long in places and the recently laid tarmac on the track above the finca was washed out in a number of places.

PG got a nice picture of the clouds rolling up the hills behind the finca which looks suitably autumnal.

Top floor gets started
As soon as the rain had passed, the builders were putting up the pillars for the top floor, then it was time for the acros and the framework to support the top floor. The house is starting to take shape.

Cacadors
The hunting season is well underway. Every Thursday and weekend, shotgun and volleys of rifle fire echo's around the campo as the hunters set about the local wildlife. Wild boar being the main goal. Once these lot are tested for nasty diseases, the will end up in the hunters freezers. Many thanks to Leila Lleixa Lleixa for letting me use his photograph.

October 2011
December 2011

PB