Rainy Season coming to and end...

Our October trip was right at the end of the rainy season - and it gave us a chance to enjoy some of the specatular lightning shows, and intense rains.


These first two photos are looking down from the top most veranda to the edge of our driveway, seeing the intense water rushing there.






This actually is a bit of a concern for us since it will be important for us to add significant erosion control. We notices the permanent ruts from this in our January 2010 trip. So some solutions to do there...

This last photo is of the waterfall adjacent to our land; and from whence the Casa Torrente de Agua comes from.

Thanks for reading!

Jim and Dick

Dining at Home - Photo blog

Killing the Tree of Life

Hey all, one of our issues locally in Playon Sur Parrita Costa Rica is that Frutas Selectas del Tropico replanted the pineapple plantation at the base of our mountain with bananas.



Soon after the baby banana plants were growing, they put in the ILLEGAL airstrip for their crop duster. Now, on one hand, they are wickedly inconsiderate, starting up at 5:11am and spraying till about 9:00am nearly every day. The biplane has no muffler, and can be quite irritating.



But, bananas don't grow well naturally in Central America, and require annually increasing doses of fungicide to remain productive. The fungicide they use is extremely toxic, and damaging to surrounding property. Our own workers vehicles paint has been destroyed in just a couple of passes of the plane. The pilot isn't careful, and sprays this poison on their own workers in their feilds, on school children on their way to local schools, and on cars, pedestrians, etc on the main road adjacent to the banana plantation.

A year ago our community began checking out the operation there, and found that Frutas Selectas Del Tropico put this airstrip in illegally, with no approval for their air operation. They've paid off local officials to continue operation after we, working with our Tico neighbors, brought this to the attention of the national authorities.



During our January trip, we had some relief, with the pilot not starting operation so very early. But nonetheless, he did spray.





From our veranda (living room) we have a way-too-good view of the illegal airstrip. In these photos, you can see the plane spraying the field below. Notice the tree in the first photo. Its shape reminded us of The Tree of Life.

You can see him applying spray right by it.



While our local community (Alazan, Playon Sur, El Tigre and Parrita) have made headway; this situation is by no means resolved. We would like Frutas Selectas Del Tropico to choose another crop whose maintenance does not pose local human and wildlife health and safety hazards.



We've learned that the major purchaser of these local products is Del Monte Fresh Produce. We have mailed a locally (Costa Rica local) video to Del Monte and ask our friends to write to them, pointing our that their grower is posing environmental hazards to an otherwise quiet group of communities in Costa Rica.





Thanks.



Jim and Dick

New View Photos

The January trip was filled with amazing weather. It was clear and sunny the whole time, with fog some of the nights, but no rain.


This little photo series just shows some of the great open views with the clearing so far. There won't be much more, but we sure enjoyed the breeze that this bit of work has brought to the living room veranda.

This afternoon photo is very similar to the one below, but you can see how hazy it got over the coastline with the humidity that rose that day.

This last photo really captured the horizon line and clouds looking south over the pacific. It was a great morning shot!

View Clearing

During our January 2010 trip we spent a good amount of time working on clearing some of our view scapes.

One of the challenges of carving out a home site in the jungle is that the trees are filled with bajuca vines - the sort Tarzan used to swing from tree to tree in the jungle movies of old.

In previous trips we spent time clearing, and this was no exception. this top photo is of a helper we hired who was good at climbing trees. We had cut the vines off at the ground during our October 2009 trip, and had thought they would die off and fall. But in this case, they had twisted around the branches, and showed no signs of dropping. So we sent our hired helper up on our extension ladder and climbing gear to cut and untwist all the vines to clear the tree.


This second photo is the before shot.

This third photo is the after shot. As is often the case, we clear one only to find more to clear. But; our goal is to open up, not to have no folliage at all. After all, our monkey friends need this as well!

The whole clearing event took about 3 hours, and while the tree was being cleared, Dick was hard at work electric chain saw at hand trimming down below.

Meanwhile, I watched one of our other Tico workers sharpen a machete using an electric hand grinder. Pretty slick result so I got out our grinder, put the right wheel on it and did all three of our machete's. They've never been sharper. Ah, yes, better living with electricity!!! So we both took turns chopping and clearing vines further left of our viewscape, that should afford better views on our next visit.

Thanks for reading!

Jim and Dick

New views of house - from downhill looking up

Hey friends and followers!

Well in January we finally had cleared enough that I was able to take some never-before-seen photos of our casa.

From this perspective, downhill looking UP, you can really see the layer cake. Missing of course is the interesting roof detail, but this is more than enough of a new view.



This first photo kind of puts the whole building in perspective. You can see the connection to ground, and generally see the posts in the downhill side. There are more posts higher up hill supporting the middle (2nd) floor.



So if you count floors from top to bottom the way I do for this house, 1 is on top, 2 is middle and 3 is lowest (and technically below grade from the perspective other other side of the place).


Of course in this second photo, I backed up and thus there is more vegitation between my camera and the casa.

In this third photo we get a perspective that really shows how high up off of ground the first (top) floor veranda is.

You can see how the top of the stair is off to the left, and cantelievers over the second (middle) floor.

Current work is occuring on second floor, left with tile going into the bathroom. There are some subsequent blogs to post that will provide more on that.

There are only the two sliding door on the second floor with a narrower veranda, mostly for sitting out and enjoying cool night air, or rain storms, or ocean liners looking south to the Pacific.

In this view I wanted you to see the (perhaps) famed bodega. When you look above you can see a big area to the left. That is really a no-mans land. Not sure how that will evolve, but ideas are finally brewing.

Meanwhile, you can clearly see the cage on the right for equipment. That ensures no critters will get their mits on the generator (currently for sale), or the AC compressor units. The black door you see to the left of the cage the solid door entry into the dry bodega (one with a dehumidifier inside). And far left on that bit of wall you can see the water filter that keeps all the running water inside clean.

Painting of all the galvanized (silver) and primed (red) metal work will start next week, right after Easter. That'll take a couple of weeks, but when we next travel down (May) I'll take new photos of the completed project. I'm hoping on that trip I'll have some time to get some drawings which will set the new entry to the bodega level, and set the stage for future development of that level.

Finally, if you scroll up to the very first photo, look bottom right, below the third (lowest) floor. It is in that space that I need to add tank space for grey water, so that we can create a waste system that essentially keeps the bottom of all the posts moist.

I hope seeing the place from this vantage point gave all of you some perspective on how this structure looks when all seen together.

Thanks for reading!

Jim and Dick

Laundry Counter

One of our goals since we brought the laundry equipment online was to get the long intended countertop done that was part of our original design.

We had thought we would have Gerardo build it out of metal, but found translating our design into an understandable working drawing just wasn't working.

We wound up heading into Ferreteria Garyba in downtown Parrita to look at lumber options and found the hard true 2x4 lumber - heavy as all get out! Just a few pieces were enough to render our design into a functioning and sturdy countertop. Our design had to allow access of the washing machine hoses to the wall box to afford ready access to the shutoff (we keep the water pressure off when not in use) - and so an access hole needed to be against the wall in the countertop.

Similarly, we needed access for the dryer plug in, and the height of that outlet was about an inch below the finished surface. So we needed a method of access from below that allowed a finished counter to be on top, but still be able to easily unplug the dryer when needed.

All along we intended for a sink to be placed in the center. This to allow for soaking laundry when needed and hand washing with warm water.



As you've seen before, we had to apply plasterbond to the fibrolit surface we applied to the top, in preparation for tile.

We had arranged for Nelson to apply tile to the countertop as well as apply a troweled on texture finish to the walls. This was done in April, well after we left from our January trip. It had been our intention to face the countertop with teak, but unfortunately that was lost in translation. Nonetheless we think the tile facing looks quite nice.

Later on we'll add a door, hopefully teak, below the sink to block off the plumbing between the washer and dryer; and give that space a more finished appearance. We'll decide on paint color and apply it during our next visit.

We'll also install the sink and faucet during that trip which will finish that room.

Thanks for reading our blog, more later....

Jim and Dick