Up in the air :-)

I ‘clocked off’ at 21:00 again tonight, just as the sun started disappearing behind the Storr. It’s late enough, I’d been at it since 7:00 and at last feel like I’m getting somewhere. This concrete polishing is turning into a bit of an epic, the discs are £120 each and I’m on my 5th!!!!!! Hopefully I’ll not need five more, but I won’t be far off and that doesn’t include the special 100mm ones for getting in the corner.

I did an hour this morning before breakfast, having finally started on the living area last night I wanted to press on.

I also made the switch from a medium disc to a fine disc, though subsequent research has led me to believe that I need even finer discs to finish off. Anyway I spoke to a helpful chap today at http://www.atsdiamondtools.co.uk/home and some finer ones are on the way, and with a bit of luck they’ll be here on Saturday.

The only way to see Raasay

Anyway, I’m getting a little ahead of myself here, for yesterday I ‘cashed in’ my birthday present from  the ‘post lady’,

    

a ‘taster’ in Mike Westman’s  http://www.skyemicrolighttraining.co.uk/pleasure.html Ikarus C42. Both wifey and son have been out with Mike before and I really cannot think of a better way to see Skye or Raasay.

 

Here’s Scalpay, where I lived for four years prior to moving to Arnish 25 years ago, I never realized the lochs were so big, or that there were so many ruins.

 

Fearns on the south east of Raasay.

 

 

The Dun Caan lochs and Dun Caan itself.

 

Screapadale, Brochel then the hard rock of the Arnish ‘common grazing’ with Loch Arnish, Torran and Fladda on the west side.

 

Truth was I only flew over to check on the builders

It was all over far too soon and I bade Mike farewell

until my 60th birthday Seriously though, you can have a shot at flying for a lot less than you think and I can thoroughly recommend the experience.

Back to the grind

After my exciting trip I headed back sedately in the ‘Old Girl’ and caught the 11:25 ferry

 

arriving back at Sonas to a ‘hive of activity’.

 

Thursday

Lachie, Donald and Angus had made great progress and I continued with my friend ‘Mr Werbel’

but at last seemed to be making progress

   

and that will be the best part of 100kg of concrete dust removed today.

Also managed a quick 66,000 mile service o Phoebe

Lots of dust :-)

Well this is going to be extremely short, it’s almost 23:00 and I’ve not long finished me chores. A spell of concrete grinding until 21:00 then a shower and lots of messing about on the internet. I came in looking like the abominable snowman and wifey looked very fetching in her oversize Cal Mac overalls

This concrete polishing is turning into a bit of an epic, and whilst Lachie and I are heaving 40kg of polisher around for hours on end I’m sure we’re both regretting the decision to do it. However, I’m sure it will look just amazing when it’s finished, and even now with no heating on it’s almost 4 degrees warmer than the floor in the barn.

We’ve been taking it in turns to do a couple of hours each on the grinder then go and collect stones for Norman who is busy with the gable end.

 

I’ve been going up to North Arnish collecting corner stones from around the ruins there. I just can’t bear to remove any stones from the actual ruins but there are plenty lying on the ground, the only problem is lifting them onto the quad.

I just can’t help thinking how lucky I am to Skye’s best tradesmen working on my house, just look at that wall, awesome  

 

As the mobile phone reception is pish in the caravan I moved the Land Rover to the top of a hill and now use it as my ‘office’. The phone works from there and I can use a pen and paper without getting soaked

It took me two hours to get two stones for Norman, it took Lachie about half an hour to get a pallet load and trim them to size

Anyway, that’s it ‘I’m off’, I’ve got a plane to catch tomorrow