The first shepherd.

So first a story of old. The Yorks have had many a family holidays and many a family skiing trip, 5 I think. For me they have been wonderful times bonding with our two children, great snow on three occasions and blue skies and sun every time. Absolute bliss and would love to ski again if my mind can convince my knees they are up for it.

Ask any member of my family the thing they remember from all those trips and either child will tell you the story of the time we picked daughter up at Charles De Gaulle airport. I refused to pay the high premium of the short stay car park, of which I discovered there were two on the airport ring road, both offering 10 minutes free parking with no restriction on return. I decided for the hour wait for daughter’s arrival to park for 9 minutes, drive to the next car park, and so on. On the 3rd or 4th pass the barrier appeared to be stuck and I was close to having to pay so chanced an exit without sticking my ticket into the machine. Barrier came down and appeared to fair worse than the top box as it flew forward now being detached from the usual mechanism. The French attendants didn’t seem that bothered, swore at me a lot in French that I didn’t understand and re-affixed it without too much bother. Daughter and friend joined us and we drove on to our destination, Valmenier, in some pretty foul whether. At some point we realised, alerted by furious waving of French drivers, that our top box hadn’t faired as well as we first thought and was now spilling its contents over the motorway. Our daughter still blames me for the loss of revision notes for less than perfect higher results.

The point in telling the story is we have tried throughout life to enjoy it to the fullest and we have lots of stories like this of when we’ve pushed a boundary and the result hasn’t been quite as expected. Some have been worth the gamble other have left us with a story of a glorious fail like that above. And the next paragraph is me letting you into the start of the next one.

I have bought the kit for a shepherd’s hut. Now there’s a sentence, coupled with my knowledge of building structures and the words son spoke to me today on the phone, “I was thinking of going to Gigha to do some random shit with a hammer” that has all the ingredients for a story. Let’s see together how it unfolds.

The kit is from a company called Tuin, https://www.tuin.co.uk/shepherd-hut-600.html if anyone’s interested, and the instructions can be found further down the page in the form of PDF. I am still trying to figure them, so if anyone reading this has built such a structure and can debrief me go ahead.

First decision is to try and find a suitable position and lay a foundation for the hut. Next, whilst there is advice to insulate the floor there is no clear instruction on how to do so. The insulating is left to the individual to make their own decision. In our case, knowing the high rainfall of the West coast of Scotland we are already discussing the addition of marine ply to the underside that allows us to first install a DPC and then drop insulation into the cavity before installing the floor.

Likewise planning to upgrade the roof structure with a galvanized steel roof over the kit provided structure with a layer of insulation in-between. Walls likewise need insulation and I’m sure the previous fitting out of the garage at Nethermill will give us some clues to this.

Karen is going to start a Pinterest board that I have asked permission to share on the blog and I will provide pictures as soon as delivery occurs. Oh delivery, that’s another story. No delivery direct to the island so I’ve asked the company to meet me in the Tayinloan ferry car-park. The delivery address, Big Jessies Tearoom, I kid you not.

So I will meet the wagon bearing the two packages in the bottom right of the diagram for onward carriage to the Island on the ferry sometime in Delivery Week: #24 (Jun 14, 2021 – Jun 20, 2021). Again I refer to the instruction sheet I mentioned earlier and I am now trying to work out what I can get in the back of the Hilux versus the cost of hire of a larger transit. Undoubtedly, I am going to have to break down the cargo to be able to carry it into whichever vehicle I choose, and likely I will be looking for volunteers to accompany me!

You already know the story that after driving the tractor/mower into the back of the Hilux I had no room for the grass box? I don’t think I’ve admitted to that here…..