“You can’t cross the sea merely by standing and staring at the water.” – Rabindranath Tagore
When I visited the land in November 2018 to be present while they drilled the borehole, I vowed that there will be no more visits to the land in winter. It was just too cold and rainy, not to mention living arrangements that were too rough for the conditions. I managed to keep my promise to myself throughout 2019. However, when we got a surprise email from our electrician/plumber showing a house with a completed floor, and lights that work at the flick of a switch, I knew the next trip had to be planned, winter or not.
The next step for us to get a habitation licence is to install a kitchen, and with IKEA’s kitchen designing app on their website, it was only a matter of a few clicks to design it. Easy and simple. Well, that is what I thought. And so, with my vacation dates for the year confirmed at work, a click or two booked my ticket to Madrid.
It turned out designing an IKEA kitchen is slightly more involved and time consuming, but I got it done, and visited our local branch to check if I’ve got everything listed, and to check the weight. It was clear a rental car would not suffice. I had no choice but to rent a van.
Thank goodness Jolandi’s sister, who has lived in Spain for twenty years, came for a quick visit at the same time when we were planning the kitchen and trip. A bout of good luck for us, as it turned out that the different IKEA websites aren’t linked, and not only did I have to redesign the kitchen on the Spanish website’s kitchen design app, I had to do it all in Spanish, as there was no English language option and Google could not translate it. And so my sister-in-law and I spent an entire evening in front of my computer screen.
What we thought would be a straight forward process of then converting the design into a pre-order for me to pick-up in Madrid turned out to be a logistical nightmare, again with my poor sister-in-law having to make various phone calls to the IKEA call centre in Spain. The only blessing was that the lady who helped her added items to the list I overlooked, and generated a more complete list of items with their relevant codes.
In the end we decided that pre-ordering was not an option, and that I would simply try my luck at the store the morning I arrived. My Beautiful wife, who is extremely organised, took it upon herself to check the availability of each item on our list in the Alcorcon branch. She also checked the Portuguese website, as friends of ours in Portugal alerted us to the fact that IKEA recently opened a collection point in Castelo Branco, our nearest city about 45km away.
Not only did we find that many of the items (doors and drawer fronts) were much cheaper in Portugal, but splitting the order in two meant that I would not have to spend hours in Madrid waiting for my order, as it is a four hour drive from Madrid to our land. With our order placed and paid in Portugal for collection on the Monday after I arrived on the Friday, I was ready to pack my thick winter jacket and beanie, and arrange for a pick-up service in English to take me to the van rental pick-up address. We have found that Madrid in stark contrast with rural Portugal is not a place where English gets you very far, and I was bent on making my day as easy as possible, especially after limited sleep on a flight that departs Abu Dhabi at 2am and arrives in Madrid at 7.30am.
I collected the van and got to Ikea without any problem. Armed with a list of codes printed on a piece of paper (did I mentioned how organized my wife is?), I found a sales lady who, despite not speaking a word of English, helped me. In no time I was given two lists from her, one to collect in store and one to collect at the kitchen cupboard section. I raced through the store collecting what I could, paid, handed the other list to the kitchen cupboard section, got told to come back in half an hour, and went for breakfast.
When I eventually arrived on the Quinta late in the afternoon, the first thing I did was to get the gas heater connected and lit, before collecting the mattresses and bedding from the barn to make my bed. By the time I managed to unload the van and get all the pieces into the house it was dark, but for the first time ever it was not a problem, as I could simply flick a switch for the house to be ablaze in light. After I got the boxes organized and the tools I would need ready for the next morning I could finally fall into bed, exhausted.
As expected I was awake at 4am the next morning, as my body clock said it was already 8am. This set the stage for the next couple of days of work. Early to rise and early to bed, when my body simply wouldn’t co-operate anymore.
The kitchen cupboard carcasses were almost all built over the weekend. I collected the door and drawers fronts and tops on the Monday from Castelo Branco, which gave me enough time to get the railings mounted onto the wall so that some friends of ours could help me lift the top cupboards onto the wall on Tuesday. They were also able to help me move the long counter top in and out of the house in order for me to trim it to the funny shape of the house’s back wall. A task I would definitely not have been able to manage on my own.
On Wednesday I could plumb in the sink and connect the cold water tap, so we now have running cold water in the house. Running hot water in the house is still an elusive luxury, as the geyser (or water heater as it seems everyone else except South Africans call it) doesn’t fit in the ceiling space above the bathroom. The Electrician will install it outside, which is perhaps much better anyway, as if in the event it bursts, the mess will be outside instead of damaging the house.
The seemingly endless job of packing and tidying up at the end of each trip always takes longer than we think, so this time I started on Wednesday afternoon with this much hated task, and still had to rush on Thursday morning to get everything done and reach my hotel in Madrid before nightfall.
I would have liked to finish the kitchen during this trip, but as there are a couple of problems I encountered along the way that I couldn’t immediately deal with, it simply has to wait for the next trip.
Written by: Michael
January 2020 visit
All this planning sounds incredibly complicated, but I’m glad you were able to make such good progress. The kitchen looks great so far. I hope you will be able to finish it without many more problems.
Best wishes,
Tanja
It sometimes feels way to complicated to me, Tanja. Thank goodness Michael has done work like this before, but literally everything is new to me. I’ve never known how much work goes into building a house! We are busy plotting our next visit, and this time I will be able to go with to give him a hand, as I’ve just renewed my residence visa in the UAE, which means I am good to apply for a Schengen visa. – Jolandi
Well done you two, its coming together slowly but surely. Never give up on your dream.
Thank you, Monty. We appreciate your encouragement. – Jolandi
Impressive as always! I was squinting hard at the photos to determine if you really had chosen bright blue cabinets (it seemed like a good fit in Portugal!) even though I was pretty sure that was a protective film. 🙂 I can’t believe this is the rough-hewn building you started with; it is starting to look like the cozy residence you had the vision to imagine. It’s so much fun for me to follow as I always have dreams of doing something like this. (But my husband is not quite as handy … Michael, you are amazing!)
Hahaha! I guess there is nothing wrong with bright blue, although it is definitely not a colour I would choose. Because the house is so small I want the main colour scheme to be white in a desperate attempt to make the space look a tad bigger, although I certainly do not want it to look too clinical. I even chose drawer and door fronts with molded handles for a more seemless look. But I do harbour thoughts of using traditional (or modern) azulejo tiles for the backsplash in the kitchen for a bit of colour if we can afford it. Keep dreaming, Lex. One never knows in life! And yes, I also think Michael is amazing. 😉 – Jolandi
Wow looks amazing. I actually like the blue colour. Looking forward to seeing the finished product and the luxury guest suite 😉.
Thanks, Mike. That luxury guest suite will have to wait for when you have enough leave to come help us build it. 🙂
Hi Mike and Jolandi
Joe and I think it is a great project you are having and wishing you well on it. .
Michael you & Yolandi are truly amazing. For are reject wifi builder you are so lucky to have such a smart wife. We wish you well with your project & look forward to future updates. Joe
🙂 Thanks, Joe. We are so lucky to have found one another, as we think our skills complement one another very well. Although we must confess that we the project hasn’t been completely plain sailing, as we have sometimes disagreed rather strongly with one another, but so far this it has taught us to work together better. Once this is done, we will need to get some guest accommodation built. We would love for you and Inge to visit us.
Looks like you’re making good progress, despite the hassles of unexpected (or should I say, expected) setbacks. Seeing things come together like this is very encouraging. Running water and electricity – so much closer to moving in I expect.
Hahaha! You are quite right with the “expected hassles”. Thank goodness we’ve realised from the beginning that things won’t always go as we would like them to, or plan for them. That really helped a lot to keep or sanity intact. 🙂 We almost have a complete house. Yay! I’ve never been as grateful for running water and electricity as I am these days. – Jolandi
Such a lot of work involved in this but the kitchen is looking so good already! Well done, both of you!
Thank you, Clare. In two weeks’ time we will be back on the land to finish the kitchen and other odd jobs. Hopefully the last of what we can do for us to get the habitation licence.
Hello Jolandi and Michael,
Apologies for the belated visit to your lovely site – I have been off/on the internet these past few weeks.
As always, it is a real pleasure to follow along on this wild ride, and I am so happy you were able to make progress despite the many challenges. The kitchen looks beautiful, Congratulations to both of you!
All best,
Takami
Thank you, Takami. I understand completely. I’ve actually decided to spend less time on the Internet, and am much more selective these days about how much screen time I have. We are grateful for your continued support. It means so much to us. – Jolandi
I, too, bought an IKEA kitchen for our flat in Milan.
Had to go down there three weekends to build it, stick in the appliances, put the overhanging bits on the walls… and still something wasn’t quite the way it was meant to be. Holes not aligned, bad screws, the lot.
Having done all that I did what no one ever should: checked the costs (the kitchen, the van, the travel) and compared with a kitchen builder my dad recommended. A bespoke kitchen, including installation, was 150 euro cheaper.
I tried to numb myself with G&T’s on the flight back but it wasn’t enough. Love how this farm is shaping up to be!
Oh, Fabrizio, both Michael and I had a good laugh at your story.
Yes, you broke rule number 1 – never, ever calculate the actual cost. 🙂
For the money we’ve already spent on our teeny 32 square metre renovation, we could have built a bigger brand new house. So we understand your pain. We made the worst novice mistake by purchasing the land before knowing what the local building restrictions are. Turns out that you can’t build a new house less than 50 metres from a boundary fence, so with the odd shape of the land, the only place that we could use was right next to a seasonal stream. Not an option, so we turned to the little ruin, and here we are today. As I love stories, this makes for a more interesting story, so I’m glad it turned out the way it did, despite the fact that it was far more challenging. And I adore our land. I feel a deep peace when I am there, so I know we’ve done the right thing by purchasing it. – Jolandi