Openreach, a break for our joiners, and paving

The dividing of Openreach from BT may have helped people who want to have their telecoms provided by other than BT, but it hasn't helped us. We had BT broadband in our rental property, enjoying a download speed some 8 times faster than we had been able to achieve at Coed y Mynydd Isaf -and that had necessitated a microwave system beamed from Halkyn mountain and largely paid for by a Welsh Government subsidy. We should have been more suspicious when Elizabeth made her first call to BT to ask them to provide service here in Gellifor. In spite of the fact that she explained that the house is a new-build and had no physical connection to their network, she was assured that her contract would continue and that service would be transferred the day after we moved in. Fat chance. The day came and went, and no engineers attended. Further long telephone calls established that we had been wrongly advised. It would be necessary to cancel our contract, arrange for Openreach engineers to install a line (with a wait of three weeks for an appointment), wait further to see what speed of service the new line would support, then open a new contract.

As then promised, yesterday brought Thomas, Openreach engineer number one, in a van. He looked at the job and announced that he would have to send for a colleague with a larger van fitted with a hoist, or cherry-picker. He didn't know how long this would take. He made a telephone call and assured us his colleague wouldn't be long. We gave him tea. Surprisingly quickly his colleague soon arrived and leapt into action, erasing other doubts Thomas had expressed. Our electrician had fitted cable connections high on the front of the house for both data and a TV aerial (more of the latter in a future post - we don't seem to be able to persuade an aerial fitter to attend) with a view to making it unnecessary for unsightly cable runs on the outside of the house. Thomas hadn't thought this feasible as line of sight to the telegraph pole connection across the road went through one of our beech trees - perhaps, he mused, we would have to terminate today's appointment, engage a tree surgeon and make another appointment (with a three weeks delay again). Engineer number 2 looked, and extracted a bow saw from his (larger) van, whizzed himself up on his lifting platform, trimmed the tree, attached the cable as desired and routed it through our grounds and across the road. Only then did we, as Thomas put it, fall at the last hurdle. The telegraph pole connection box had no free lines, so a further job has had to be raised for engineer number 3 (and maybe 4) to come in hopefully less than three weeks' time to run a new connection 350 metres through the village from telecoms cabinet to the pole. We remain dependent on mobile phone data for the time being.

Thomas' small Openreach van

engineer 2's cherry picker allowing him to work at roof level

leaving a neat connection with the aerial cable tucked temporarily (we hope) up above it

before working away in the beech tree

and then attacking the vertical garden which is the telegraph pole across the road


A cladding update: after a couple of weeks of uninterrupted work on the cladding at the back of the house (all done) and then the porch, the outside of the porch at least is finished, bar for the hopper and downpipe. Ian and Dewi have gone off, perhaps to another job, perhaps to therapy. Pat tells us that Ian wants to have one of the drainage gullies moved so that there does not have to be a bend in the downpipe: he may not win that one. But perhaps he won't come back unless he does?

the result of more clever arithmetic in balancing and cutting the lengths of larch

and the entrance porch is suddenly more presentable

And then, earlier in the day than we expected, today brought action which we at first observed from inside. The first of the paving stones which will provide sitting areas and paths round the house arrived .....

..... handballed round from the front of the house ......

..... where they were being craned from a local builder's merchant's lorry

for the record, calibrated light grey Indian sandstone (and there will be grey granite setts for edgings

it's not quick work - this was close of play, without Elizabeth .....

..... and with her

we can now begin to imagine rather better how it will look when all the crushed stone is covered



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