Went to take the camper out for a run today to stop it seizing up when not is use. Turned on the leisure battery and lots of water started squirting out of the water heater (luckily the sink is underneath). A joint in one of the pipes had gone due to the freezing weather (next year we’ll drain it down like we should have done this year).
Only got a chef’s blow torch for making creme brulee which didn’t have enough ooomph so down to B&Q to get a blowtorch and some solder and a short while later the pipe was fixed. When I turned the water on again though the pressure caused a leak in another joint which can’t be soldered so tomorrow it’s off to Maplin to get some rubber grommits and a small bolt.
What am I going to do in Lewis? No PC World, no B&Q, no Maplin. Should I change my mind?
When we were in (on?) Lewis in June 2005 we took a look at some of the houses that were for sale and one we particularly liked the look of was this one at Skigersta (typical Hebridean weather!).
It was on the market at the time for offers over £75,000 and sold four months later for £80,000. Now, a fraction over 3 years later, it’s back on the market at an astonishing ‘offers over £135,000′!
If we accept what’s being fed to us that house prices have dropped by 15% in the past year that means that the asking price of this particular house doubled in just two years. It’s not as though it was a wreck that has been done up because it was in ‘walk in’ condition when we saw it in 2005. That’s simply ridiculous and does nobody on Lewis any good except, maybe, the person who bought it. Even then, if they were local they will hardly benefit because they are going to have to pay a ridiculously inflated price for whatever they move into. On the other hand if it was bought by someone off-island as a speculative investment they have, indeed, made a healthy profit (assuming it sells). They probably don’t give a stuff about making it impossible for native islanders to buy a house of their own. It’s just money, money, money!
A few months earlier we were staying in a self-catering cottage in Cnip (actually one half of a house). The lady who owned it (who had lived there since she was married and whose husband’s family had farmed the croft since the 1850’s) was bemoaning the fact that another house in the township (of which there are only 15 houses) had recently been sold for £115,000, a sum that had most local people amazed and saddened. She felt (rightly) that such figures would drive away the youth of the area who could never afford a house at that price. In the event the sale fell through but the house was sold a few months later for £138,000! Within six weeks it had been given a lick of white paint and was put back on the market at £200,000. That’s disgraceful. I am sure that it must have been bought by an off-island speculator who knew nothing and cared nothing about the local people. Luckily it seems that it did not sell and whoever bought it still owns it. They were probably hanging on waiting for the next house price explosion. Serves them right! I hope they lose money.
In my opinion houses should be bought and sold for someone to live in, not as investments or money-grabbing opportunities. That’s part of the reason why so many folk are in dire straits now. I don’t feel at all sorry for those who have lost out in their attempts to make money but I do care about young people and locals who will now probably never be able to buy a house of their own.
If you want to check how the prices have risen in your area a good site for Scotland and the Islands is nethouseprices. You just need to enter a postcode and you will get (actual) local sales prices for the past couple of years.
So we have a couple of days off (I have to work Sunday) and decided to take the camper for a bit of a run and stop overnight somewhere. We decided on Chester, nice place and not too far. It was very white this morning, a really heavy frost and quite cold although the sun was trying to come out. Pumped the tyres up and off up the motorway then par in the Park & Ride and spend the day looking round. We did stop off at a Farm Shop (really good) and bought some food for tonight then to another place (a fruit farm) and had coffee. We were going to get some apples but they were quite expensive.
The weather stayed bright all day, bought a couple of little things for the kitchen but nothing else, quite a surprise considering all the shops we went in. I nearly had a new bra, very posh, but very expensive. We are now parked up for the night and the soup and pasty are nearly ready. We are not sure what we are doing tomorrow, it will depend on the weather.
Bit of a jump and a bit of a story. Thursday we got up, it was raining off and on, and we decided to go to Craster. It took a bit of effort to get off the campsite but off we went. Craster was a bit disappointing so we had a coffee and went for a drive to see if we could find somewhere to stay that night as it was pouring again and there was no way we would get back onto the camp site.
We eventually sorted out a car park just before the causeway to Holy Island that would be fine as we planned to go over the next day. Driving back to the campsite to pay for the previous few days we heard a big bang, ground to a halt, and discovered that the fresh water tank had fallen off. The previous owner had fitted a new, larger, one just before we bought the van and obviously hadn’t checked the strength of the supports. The nut holding the support on one side had sheared off and the tank was just held on one side with the other on the ground with a big hole in it where it had dragged along the road. No choice what we would be doing now - we would be going home.
For the next hour Les was lying in the road in the poring rain trying to get the tank off. To say he was wet was an understatement! Even with me holding the umbrella over him he was soaked and so was I, it was raining that hard. Les got it off eventually then we drove back to the campsite, settled up, and started for home. A lousy finish to a not very successful week. Les had also got a really nice day arranged for the Saturday (his birthday) driving over to Hadrian’s Wall and then to the Lakes to camp in Wasdale and have a meal in the Wasdale Head Inn to celebrate his birthday. Instead we would be back in boring Stafford after a drive of almost six hours.
Not done much Friday and Saturday but have decided to re-do the seats in the camper. so as well as ordering a new tank we have ordered foam and we have been out today and bought some new material. We are going to have them two colours, terracotta and cream. Les has bought himself a new hard drive and a machine to convert tapes to CD’s with his birthday money. We have also decided we are going back to Northumberland next year in June and that Sean can come with us. The area is beautiful. Also we are having another week off in September, going to Sean’s first, taking him away for the weekend, then down to Mum’s to take her out for the day. Then we can go off to Norfolk for the rest of the week. You never know the weather may even be on our side.
It continued to rain all evening and all night. We woke up quite late (9 am) and it was still pouring. A couple of people thought they would leave the site, that was fun having to go out through a different exit and getting stuck, ploughing up the grass and mud more than it already was. We decided to stay and not try and get out, which would have been difficult and we would have never got back up on the chocks. In the end three people left and about six arrived.
One of our fuses went last night so we caught the bus to the outdoor shop and bought a supply and some hose for the waste water. It is now 5.50 pm and we have a little bit of sunshine peeping through, hopefully it will stay dry until tomorrow and we can go out and also get back in. The weather forecast for the next couple of days isn’t that good. We have decided to go to Holy Island on Friday as the weather sounds better than tomorrow. We shall see.
