Old and lazy

I must be getting old and lazy. Had intended to go up to cabin to work there saturday and sunday as Julia was in Athens, and the kids with their other respective parents. But waking up to heavy snowfall saturday morning, with a christmas decorated tree in the living room and tons of leftovers in the fridge I chickened out and ended up satying home not doing much more than reading magazines and renting a movie. Very nice indeed but not much progress is being made that way. Drove up on sunday to empty the car of more cement (avrettingsmasse) and got at least all the materials in the living room area re-stacked (again!!) so most of the floor surface is free to put down the floor boards next time going up.

Taking a week off work from January 8th and will have some company the first weekend. Thats very good because I need to get all the cement I have carried up there on the floors that now has gotten the heating cables installed by the electrician. Hopefully we will get that done and a soldid portion of the floor in the living room done AND a day in the slopes on our snowboards on sunday at Gaustablikk. Kitchen is due to arrive sometime the week I am up there so need to get the floor in the living room done so it can be put on top of that. The following week I will hopefully make some good progress in the living room and the bedrooms that now have first priority to make it has "livable" as possible. I will probably buy and bring the slate tiles for the hallways up to and might spend a day putting those down.

Until later, Happy New Year to everyone!

Two short trips for man, big steps for cabin builders....

Had a short trip up last weekend with my oldest offspring and spent most of the time then cutting the panel that will eventually be used in the living room. By cutting it all I could fit it into one of the bedrooms and free up floor space in the living room area.

Also had a trip up this weekend and the electrician was done with all the concealed installation so during saturday afternoon I managed to panel the second bedroom and both hallways. Fun and gratifying work as progress is fast and the results are so evident! Also primed the floors in the hallways and one of the bathrooms, so the electrician will put down the heating cables there this week. Have a total of 600 kgs of "avrettingsmasse" (cement) up there now to pour on top of it next time going up. Need to find nice slate tiles on sale soon too to finish off the floor in the hallways.

The plumber will do his preparations too before christmas so I can put up plates on the walls in the bathrooms soon.

AND today I put in a large IKEA order for delivery second week of January with kitchen and all the appliances, 4 beds, 8 mattresses, 4 chest of drawers and some interior for one of the bathrooms. Needless to say it was a lot of money running out of the account, but still feel we got good value for money...

Plan now is to put the floor in in the living room so it is ready for the kitchen when it arrives. Will be very nice to get a fridge in to keep the beer cold as minus 15 is a bit too much for both my beer and the milk.

Fulltidsprosjekt...

Jeg tenkte kjekt når vi satte i gang med hytta at fordelen med hytte fremfor bygging av hus er ihvertfall at man tross alt har fri mellom hver gang man er der....noe naivt kanskje...? I går var det ut å kjøpe første lass med avrettingsmasse, omtrent det bilen kunne klare å bære, totalt 300 kg som omtrent er bare 1/3 av det totale behovet. Tar det over flere turer inne i bilen så jeg slipper å kjøre med henger på særdeles glatte veier.

I tillegg ble det innkjøp av mere 23X48mm lekter. Vi har valgt stående villmarkspanel i stua og hvis jeg forstod bruksansvisningern til Familiehytta rett så har de levert materialer til å kubbe ut mellom reisverket for å lage spikerfeste, dette syntes jeg ble noe tungvint samtidig som det er en god løsning med å lekte ut veggen istedenfor. Da bruker elektriker lektene som feste for tomrør og det blir færre gjennomføringer i diffusjonssperren (denne ligger på innsiden av lektene). Uansett, poenget var at jeg brukte opp alle lektene som egentlig skulle brukes til å lekte gulvet for furugolvet.

I tillegg måtte jeg gå til innkjøp av mer 48x73 mm for innvendige vegger. Mulig jeg har brukt litt for mye til stendere, uansett var det ikke nok til alle delevegger.
1000 furugulvskruer ble også kjøpt inn sammen med diverse maling og pensler.

I kveld må jeg sammenfatte endelig bestilling til IKEA så jeg forhåpentligvis kan få det levert den uken jeg planlegger å ta fri i Januar... Til helgen blir det en kort tur opp sammen med ungene for å prime gulvet i gangen og på badet så elektriker kan legge varmekabler.... Har jeg glemt noe da? Hm...

Now we are talking!

Except for the lame attempt, being-over-tired-after-saturday-night-party-still-trying-to-go-to-cabin-sunday, 2 weeks ago it has been 4 weeks since the last visit, luckily there won't be that long before the next trip up.

Luckily because now things are really starting to move. After this 3 day effort all the inner walls (frames) are completed, one bedroom is almost complete (The better half came on a surprise visit on saturday, so we even got the walls stained), and the other bedroom got the floor finished. Electrician is finishing off the hidden installation next week, so when I go back up 14 days from now I will be able to put panel up on all the walls! That is a very fun, fairly fast and rewarding task. Then we really see the layout of the cabin. It will be very nice to get the bedrooms done too, so we can put in a proper bed and sleep in an almost saw dust free atmosphere...

I was a bit anxious as to how it would be to put the floor on the concrete but it proved to be fast to fasten the "lekter" to the floor with expanding nails you just hammer into pre-drilled holes. I see that some recommend having cc 100 cm between the nails but to be safe from squeking floors I used cc 60 cm... better safe than sorry I guess...

Learned  a lesson this time too:
Always have candles and/or a flashlight within reach. A power failure first night turnes out to be a rather dark experience, and eventually I just tucked in as there was nothing to do in the darkness. Luckily power came back on during the night.

We are really excited about the progress now, and I will take a week off in January to work on the cabin, and with that and the upcoming weekends the winter break might be in reach after all... At least 70% :-)

Super optimist...

Annual grouse dinner with hunting friends and spouses on saturday night....and still being optimistic about going to cabin on sunday to put in some work is nothing more but naive... Home 4 a.m. in the morning lead to not getting up there before 2 p.m. and returning only a few hours later. Not much more than a few details here and there, some remaining insulation, a nap and a few nice pictures driving up there is the result...

Decorating

Ok, it is a bit premature to use decorating as a heading as most walls are just showing the insulation. There is one advantage about building a cabin; you don't have access to do work whenever you can and will avoid exhaustion. The downside of building a cabin is that you don't have access to work whenever you can... So the days in between needs to be filled with some other activity. Like thinking about the decorating... Thinking some nice pics from the surrounding nature will be nice on the walls, I have started picking out appropriate pictures...like the one below. This picture was taken in April, skiing on the last remaining snow above the tree level. A perfect day with a clear blue sky. Unfortunatly a perfect day with a clear blue sky makes somewhat dull pictures, so a little bit of Photoshoping might be needed....

A new sky was needed...and that was found on a picture taken at a vinyard in New Zealand last winter...so now the pictures will remind me of two, very different, but great trips the last year:) To test the quality provided I have ordered the picture on canvas in size 90X60 cm and if succesfull more pictures will be prepared for decorating the walls inside the cabin sometime in 2010.

Blackcock, throne and aching muscles…

I took Friday off and had another 3 day session at the cabin, this time fully stocked with beer. But this time I actually forgot to drink the stuff with the exception of 2 the first night. What an amateur! Don’t know if it was the abstinence or not but felt I got quite a lot done this weekend (too). After just 4 weekends the attic is completed, the entire ceiling downstairs is panelled and most of the framework for the inner walls are completed. If I just had one more day I could have called the electrician and asked him to finish off the hidden installation…
After spending all Friday and half of Saturday putting up the remaining panel in the ceiling I hereby make an oath; I solemnly swear never to put up ceilings alone in any kind of construction ever again! At least not with a masseur on watch and ready at my convenience!! Muscles I didn’t realize I have in possession is now screaming for peace. Worst thing is that I have earlier booked an appointment with a personal trainer at Elixia tonight, just to make things even worse. What was I thinking??

About 1100 meters of panel have now found its place where it belongs, appx. 4500 nails have been shot into the wall (the nail gun is starting to lose its entertainment value…), still the pile of remaining materials seems quite big…and I spent the second half of Saturday reorganising all the remaining materials to make room for the inner walls. Since I needed to turn the pile 90 degrees where it was situated I had to move the lot twice as it was kind of hard to do in one operation. That and getting the last pile outside safely inside did not help on my muscles either…

A more positive contribution to wellbeing is the newly installed throne! The cabin is as of now classified as high standard with electricity, heating, water and a toilet!! From the picture you can see the ingenious flushing device (red bucket, and water hose right next to it). A lot more sturdy construction than what you will find in any normal home. And you can’t really find the same view either from toilets in any other houses or cabins. Spectacular! A downside is that the view from the road to the throne is also spectacular so the daily visit demands some careful scouting and planning or a kind of exhibitionist mentality. For this reason I guess I better build some walls around it. Also note the strategically placed beer…

It was unusually quiet up there this weekend and the majority of the other cabins seemed desolated. Maybe the wildlife felt it too, Sunday morning I woke up at sunrise and noticed I had company of a blackcock (orrhane) that was lurking around the cabin. He was more of a poser than an anxious bird so when I silently opened the window and started shooting (pictures this time) he found the perfect podium and posed willingly. Unfortunately fog/snow and scarce daylight didn’t provide the optimal conditions for photographing. To show my gratitude for letting me photograph him I waited a while before I let my Gordon Setter out, at least to give him a good head start…

Unfortunately there will a full 4 weeks before I can go back up, but then I hope my better half can tag along so she can see the progress being made. Really think Norway should implement the 6th week of paid vacation now!!

Lessons learned....

1: It is a lot easier to stop a bleeding tumb with toilet paper, than to stop a leaking nail gun hose.
2: Never, and I repeat never, underestimate the need for beer. Always stock up!
3: Size matters! Putting up ceiling panel having that last centimeter of height makes all the difference when working alone.
4: The professional can be wrong, and the bathroom window was supposed to be further to the left. And the professional will also admit the error with a smile and fix it right away (keeping the customer smiling too...)
5: An insulation knife double nicely as a bread knife.

Just when finishing off the attic I got a nail in my tumb which started bleeding quite bad, so to avoid too much spill on the floor I stressed down the ladder, and in the heat of the moment I dropped the hose for the nail gun on the working lamp. Bad idea!! Now I had two leaks to deal with, the tumb was easy enough, the hose was a different matter. And the gas stations never sell hoses for nail guns on a sunday anymore..... BUT they do sell repair kits for bicycle tyres and tape - plenty of tape! And after using about all of it, and then some, I finally was back in business and the hose happily dealt with 8 bar of air pushing through...

The rest of the story is less exciting (not that the first part is really that exciting either...), but the attic is finished. Half of the ceiling downstairs is done. I have, after pulling a 90 meter long heating cable through the outside water pipe (I now understand why the plumber was so eager to do it together with me....) gotten a water tap inside. The heating cable is inside the water pipe and can be turned on in case the water freezes up, just as a security measure really. Nice to not have to bring canisters with water up every time. I have one oven on, and directed on the tap however to avoid a disaster when the real cold weather sets in..... The plumber has also promised me to put a toilet in one of these days and I made a nice little elevated floor around the toilet outlet that will support it. Of course it will need to be flushed using a bucket of water, but I will feel like a king sitting there and looking out on 86 sqm of building site;)

The electrician also turned up on monday and completed everything that needed to be put in the ceiling area, and it was nice to have some company for a few hours! And the guy who put the cabin up came by to look at a window that seemed to be about 50 centimeters too far to the right and would make it hard to fit the sauna. He admitted a little measuring error and would fix it before I will get back up there (and I really didn't expect anything else either as he has been very nice and professional all the way).

No cabin building next weekend, but weekend after that I will have 3 days and hope to complete all the panels on the ceiling and get most of the inner walls up! Then we are talking cabin!!!

PS: And next time I will remember to bring enough beer!!

The tide of noon is upon the hills.

Amid leagues of purple heather, of pale amethyst ling, stand isled great yellow-lichened granite boulders, fringed with tawny bracken.

In the vast dome of blue there is nought visible save a speck of white, a gannet that drifts above the invisible sea. And through the hot tide of noon goes a breath as of the heart of flame.

Far off, far off, I know dim hills of dream, and there my heart suspends as a white bird longing for home: and there, oh there, is a heart of flame, and the breath of it is as the tide of noon upon these hills of dream.

Fiona Macleod

Winter dream

Finally I was back in business after a couple of weeks off the building process. Didn't end up getting quite as much time as I was planning on but still feel some nice progress was made. Main objective now is really to try to decimate the amount of materials that are blocking the first floor area, and that means getting it up on walls and ceilings. Got all the remaining insulation in, and in high time... It was minus 8 degrees celsius outside the first night and not much above zero inside... But as soon as everything was covered the temperature rose to around 15 degrees (Have to small 2 kw heaters) The electrician wasn't quite done with the ceiling on the main floor yet so started up on the attic. Let me tell you; I pity the fool who doesn't have a nail gun! Why on earth didn't I buy one earlier when I built the houses and garages..... Not only is it fun, but work is at least 3 times faster! Did get about 75% done on the upstairs area and quite a lot of materials out of the way from the main floor. Next weekend will be to finish the upstairs and to cover ceiling downstairs with panel. Hopefully this will reduce the pile of materials sufficiently so I can build up some motivation to move it around and make some desperatly needed room for the inner walls. Seeing the attic take shape as it does is really motivating too....actually starting to look like an area you would want to lounge and sleep in:)

Kitchen

As most other cabin bloggers out there, we too have chosen IKEA for the kitchen. I know that there are other competitive suppliers out there now, but as long as we found what we wanted at IKEA we didn't really bother looking around at the other "low cost" options available. I am pretty sure that we will add quite a lot of other stuff to the IKEA list too before we put in the final order and have it all delivered at the cabin...
Either way, it will still take quite some time before the cabin is ready for the kitchen, but the electrician naturally needed to know how it would be before starting his work.

Ny runde

Snart er det klart for en ny runde, grunnet høstferie m.m. ble det noen uker opphold men til helgen er det bare å brette opp ermene igjen. Skal legge inn siste rest av isolasjon. Elektrikeren skal opp dit i løpet av denne uken og legge inn tomrør for lamper og spoter i taket slik at jeg kan legge på diffusjonssperren og legge panelet i taket. Må få unna så mye som mulig av materialer da det ligger en 2 meter høy stabel på langs i hele hytta nå, men legger jeg panelet i himlingen i første etasje og på hemsen så får jeg vel nesten halvert haugen så det blir noe lettere å flytte rundt.

Snekkeren var imponert over byggesettet fra Familiehytta (sett mot prisen) men et par småting har det vært. Det var 4 meter for mye med takrenne...men manglet ca en meter med beslag. Vindsperre var det også noe snaut med, men snekkeren hadde en rest liggende så det løste seg. Jeg kommer også til å kjøpe inn mer vindsperre og legge på utsiden av kneveggen da det ikke er beregnet med i byggesettet. Kommer nok også til å legge 50 mm til med isolasjon i den delen av himlingen som ligger utenfor kneveggen på hemsen (kun 150 mm som følger med til dette). Furugulvet hadde litt varierende kvalitet (av det jeg har åpnet så langt) men ikke verre enn at det aller meste kunne brukes. Utover det var det både rikelig og riktig med materialer. Og servicen har vært veldig god, så alt i alt er vi godt fornøyd med Familiehytta.

Så langt har også rørlegger, snekker, og elektriker bare vært en fornøyelse også og til helgen skal rørlegger og undertegnende strekke en 80 meter lang varmekabel i vannrøret da han var litt bekymret for om det ble liggende dypt nok grunnet mye fjell der de gravde ned.

Rapport etter kommende helgs fremskritt kommer:)

Painting....

1: I hate to paint. Nothing is more boring in the whole wide world. Maybe peeling potatoes.
2: The limited time I have available I want to spend inside and get that done.

But the cabin needs to be painted.... Asked a local painter if he could put on one coat before winter sets in (yes it has started snowing in some parts of the mountains) but he wanted 120 kr per sqm....a total of 21.000,- including tax (yes, some do the tax thing....). 21 k for one coat was a bit too much so now I either have to get my xxxx together or just leave it untill spring comes... ugh!

Still another week and a half before I get a chance to go back up there, can't wait!

Sleepover!

The project was put on halt for a little bit due to sickness but when the last bit of fever had been chased away a car with trailer full of tools, materials, matress, and more headed for the mountan with an excited cabin builder behind the wheel. The week was intended for the annual hunting trip but some last minute change of plans freed up 3 days to spend at the cabin before loading the shotgun...

First night was a rather chilly experience but the next two improved dramatically as the walls and most of the ceiling area got insulated. Two 2kw heaters did the job when the insulation was more or less done. Although the dog never got quite satisfied and desperatly fought for her right to get a corner of the comforter.

Plan was insulating and putting down the pinewood floor on the upstairs area, but the later took more time than estimated as many boards where a bit crooked and twisted, but the floor did get done and only some insulation remains. In total there is 345 sqm of insulation to put in on all the right places...

It will be a couple of weeks before the next trip but will have a total of 6 days then and hope to complete panelling both the ceiling downstairs and upstairs. The electrician is coming this week to do everything he needs to do in the ceiling. Decided to put up the panel on the entire ceiling area before putting up the inner walls for 2 reasons; easier to put inner walls up, and even more importantly get as much material as possible off from the floor and out of the way....bet shoulders and arms will be quite stiff after 6 days of panelling ceiling area....

Verktøy

Godt verktøy er halve jobben sies det. I så fall bør hytta være halveis ferdig nå... I går listet jeg meg ut etter mørkets frembrudd for å starte innkjøp av planlagte nye verktøy. På Bauhaus fant jeg kapp/gjæresagen Bosch GCM8s til en grei pris med tilhørende bord (den gamle slarkete billigvarianten blir sendt til feriekoloni i Gudbrandsdalen) og en Mikita batteridrill. Bosch sagen fikk god score i en test (http://www.klikk.no/bolig/hus/article468894.ece) og siden jeg ikke hadde noen andre referansepunkter satser jeg på at det blir bra... Og drillen? Vel det er en Mikita... Alltid morsomt å kjøpe bursdagsgaver til seg selv:)
Nå er jeg på jakt etter kompressor og spikerpistol og en billig bordsag så burde vel det meste være på plass når jeg blåser støv av alt i furteboden her hjemme også...

Comments

Got some comments through e-mail that it was hard to make comments on this blog. No wonder..apparently it was, by default, set to only accept comments from registred users... but not any more, so feel free:)

Topping-up ceremony/Kranselag

In Norway it is (was) an old tradition to throw a party for familiy and all involved in the building process when the roof was completed. I know they have the same thing in England too at least (topping up/topping out cermony). If the builders where happy with the party they would fasten a bush or a wreath on top of the roof (derav Kranselag), if they were not happy they would mount a "filledukke" up there (a nasty scarecrow'ish thing) to show the world you are a cheap bas.... really. Also meant bad luck not to throw the party. Today it is not so common, but to at least contribute some in keeping an old tradtion (and not get a cabin with bad vibes...) we left the builders a bottle of cognac today. Don't have high hopes of seeing a wreath there next weekend, but at least I feel somewhat insured it won't be a filledukke there either... (and I hope they wait with opening the bottle untill their work is done...)

Cabin!

Now it is there, no doubt, the cabin is indeed standing there!! We drove up full of anticipation, and was not let down. As the pictures show it still has a sort of airy feel, and we didn't put all the furniture in just yet... But its enough to get a feeling of size and room arrangements. And even more importantly our view from the living room area. A glass of wine, contemplating life, and looking out on the snowcapped mountain ridge. Yup, got some pretty solid mental images of that in my head!




But it is a long way yet... The guys setting up the exterior part of the cabin will probably be done within the next 10 days or so, meaning that weekend 4-5 september will probably first big working weekend for me. And after that I guess it will be any available moment - from here to eternity.




Will ask the carpenters if they can do the dormers (underligger, picking up on english construction terminology:), next project will be a hunting cabin in the Scottish highlands...) of the outside panel so I can paint those the next weekend before they do the linters/girders (??? dictionary not giving me much help on this one..."overliggere").
Also need to talk to them to make sure they remember to move entrance door as far as possible to the left to make room for a slightly less steep stairs with a 90 degree bend at the bottom. The one provided by Familiehytta is not very kid friendly...

5 hour cabin trip

Julia hadn't been at the cabin plot for quite some time so the friday night ended in yet another 5 hour cabin trip; 2 hours of driving up there, linger around for an hour, and then 2 hours back. But with a brand new car it doesn't really feel that much of an hassle.




Anyway, even though we still feel it is surreal we better wake up very soon and realize that yes, we are just about to get a cabin!! The concrete work was finished the same day as Familihytta delivered first load (actually 4 days ahead of schedule...) and the carpenter will start assembling on monday, next thursday the roof will arrive and soon after the cabin will stand proudly up there waiting for some love and attention from its owners. Exciting indeed. So much has happened in our lives the last 3-4 months that I think neither of us really understand that the dream is actually coming through... The expected downpour of invoices the next couple of weeks will, however, probably take us back to earth and reality will sink in:)

Familiehytta had forgotten to send assembly instructions, but when made aware of this they quickly delivered it to my office the same day. I am really pleased with the service they deliver, and hope for others that they will realize how little it takes to be good.... Before we made our final choice we had sort of decided on another cabin from another vendor, but even though they got 2 e-mails and one phone call more or less saying: hey, we are ready to buy a cabin from you....they never came back to us... Beats me that they can afford running business like that. Credit to Familiehytta!

We are also struggling to find the color we want on the walls, think we will end up with something like the picture of another cabin (but with white window frames) We drove around looking at other cabin and colors, and also knocked on some doors to ask name of color they had chosen. Think they all just thought it was fun to help and get compliments about their own choice of colors:)Unfortunatly no one was present at the pictured cabin so any ideas on what color it might be are welcomed!!




Anyway, we had a nice evening trip up there, catched the sunset at Vegglifjell and made it home just in time for the bed:) Soon I can finally start doing something!! YAY!

Being in love

Building a cabin is like being in love - it makes you do things you in under other circumstances even wouldn't think of. Like driving 2 hours to take 10 pictures before driving 2 hours again to get home... But when the plumber calls you on a friday and tell you he has started work you get curious, barely manage to resist temptation on saturday but lose the battle of interests on sunday - sensible thinking telling you to stay home and get the house organized after Julia and kids moving in, curiosity and feelings directing you into car with a camera in your hand.... So today I had my shortest cabin trip ever, 5 hours all togehther of which 4 was driving. This cabin will leave a huge environmemtal imprint at this rate... sorry, generations to come...

BUT, It was super fun to see that things actually are moving!! The cabin has up to now been just "something that we will do later" and we have been so busy moving in togehter and travelling to apartement in Spain that it was an almost unreal feeling standing there and seeing that "hey, they are building a cabin for us here!!"

In the car on my way up there today I was thinking it was a shame that I couldn't fill the car with stuff to bring up there as long as I was taking the trip anyway. When I got up there I was thinking it was a shame that there were nothing for me to do up there and my fingers started to itch. Ask me 6 months from now if I feel the same... First delivery of cabin due August 17th so guessing that from mid september it will be ready for me and some solid amounts of elbow grease and DIY. FUN!!!

PS: Hope they get the Bob Cat out of there again btw, not sure it will fit in the finished living room...

A date!

And not the romantic kind, thats just for Julia, but a delivery date! First load of cabin will be delivered 17th of august if all goes according to plan! Yay! But now I can't write anymore, have to get back to the moving business, Julia moving in tomorrow! Doing everything at once? Yes that is our trademark....

A man and his chainsaw

This time we actually have some real progress to report, and photos to document it thanks to Julia. I suspect her eagerness to take photos was somewhat motivated by getting off "clearing branches duty", but I was holding a warm chainsaw in my hands, with the combined scent of sawdust and oil so no complaints:)

We went up to the land yesterday to meet our man Lurås and agree on placement of cabin on the plot. Unfortunatly I didn't have any red paint at home to color the stakes, but why settle for red when we can use gold paint spray! Impossible to see on the pictures, but 4 gold painted stakes are now marking the corners of the cabin, let's hope the guy digging have an eye for gold.... Speaking of, according to Lurås the guy doing the digging just had an heart attack, but is appearantly back in the saddle, so hopefully they will start the digging soon...

We also got the area where cabin will be placed cleared for trees, and wood for a couple of months at least secured. The good thing about wood, is that it really gets you warm....many times....phew. Even though her master feels nothing but joy with a chainsaw in his hands, Hera didn't really share the same excitement, and spent most of the time hiding behind Julia or posing for photographs.

The land owner has actually sold 6 plots since Easter so no sign of the financial crisis there. One other Familiehytta cabin is also on order for the same area so that will be nice.

Well, now making ready for Julia and kids moving in awaits...all these properties :-)

"Lies, damned lies and statistics" (M. Twain)

Contract with Familiehytta in the mailbox today, phone call from the coordinator of the building process last night, confirming that things are moving forward:)

While we wait I found some interesting facts about norwegians and their habit of having a second home:
- There are 418.000 cabins in Norway
- 55% of all Norwegians have access to a second home
- 6000 cabins are built a year (prob a little less now.....)
- Average use is 36 days a year
And finally average price/value is 1.4 mill NOK. Which is pretty much our budget so I guess we'll end up with a average cabin:) Although I guess all the palaces and castles that have been built around the major ski resorts the last 10-15 years ruin the statistics somewhat...

It would be interesting to know what the main motivation for having a cabin is. Pretty sure the majority buy one to get away, and closer to nature, but pretty sure many do it because "every one else got one". But few would probably confess that...

Anyway, soon there will be 418.001 cabins in Norway and I hope we will be able to keep the average number of days usage up!!

Things are moving....

Waiting for contract in the mail from Familiehytta. Lurås who owns the area will be coordinating all the work are working on the application to the local authorities. We still hope that work will start mid July, beginning of August.
Had a day trip up there last saturday to keep the dream alive and go for a last cross country skiing trip in the great spring weather. Had to take skiis off at some points due to lack of snow, but once on top and well above tree level it was truly magnificent!!

Party guests...

There are some people you just don’t want to invite to your party...like the people working at www.dinside.no ... On their economy pages you can find a calculator that estimates how much the cabin costs you every day you use it (http://www.dinside.no/13110/hva-koster-hytta-deg) Curious as a cat I had to punch in the numbers and get the verdict. Value of cabin, running expenses and such, divided by number of days you actually use it. I put in 35 days of use annually and that might be on the ambitious side even though it doesn’t sound much. Anyway, according to their killjoy calculator, each day of use will cost us 3000,- kr! Now why would I want to know that?? Hello people!
For those 3000,- multiplied with 35 days we could, with all 4 kids and maybe even the dog, have 20 days in a 5 star hotel in Thailand, including the flights, every year!! Umbrella drinks, snorkeling, lazy day on the beach and cheap massages. But on the other hand:
• skiing conditions there are terrible
• the fishing is a matter of catching the fish before the fish eats you
• I have yet to see a grouse or even moose down there
And:
• We wouldn’t have the pleasure of on more place to shovel snow at in winter
• We wouldn’t get the pleasure of worrying about how the cabin copes through that awful snowstorm
• And shouldn’t the cabin really be painted one more stroke before the fall?
• And when are we ever going to get time for using that sauna?

You can’t put a price on those things! You have to do a whole lot better to discourage us DinSide!! Party killers…

Essential planning...

I asked my dad the other day if he wanted to come along and help out when we get that far. Told him I would buy a case of beer in hope to boost his motivation. His reply was very positive but then he added; "But I suggest you buy more than a case of beer as I guess we will be working more than one day..." Even though this was a joke from him it raised an essential question... After building 2 houses and a garage I feel safe I can pinpoint the building budget fairly accurate (and I still have fresh in memory that everything always gets more expencive than what I plan...) But I have left out this one very important thing: The Beer!!

After building my current house I, just for fun, tried to calculate how many hours I had put into it (I knew I lost 10 kg, that was easy to measure). I think I calculated close to 2000 hours, now the cabin is a lot smaller and I really have no idea how many hours it will take, but let's just say 1000 as it is a nice a number as any other. If not nicer (depending on context of course). And how much beer do I, and any so called volunteer workers need. 4 for every 8 hours of work? 6? More than that might result in too creative solutions and we do not want a cabin that could be displayed at World Expo or anything. Better say 4. 1000 hours divided by 8 = 125 times 4 = 500
Thats more than 20 cases of beer and I really don't have any idea what a case of beer costs these days? Anyone? 400?

Ok, out with the fire place and in with 8000 NOK worth of beer in the budget...
99 bottles of beer on the wall...

Choice of cabin

As everyone else, we have been looking around for the right cabin. As we both have two kids, size matters! But so does the price... All in all with dog and cat we'll be a familiy of 8 (would have been 9 but "Doffen har daua":) and we hope to be able to invite friends and familiy too so we need a lot of beds... We first looked at cabins that would accomodate all needs, but have decided to rather build something smaller and cheaper now, and leave room for an anneks later. So as several other cabin builders blogging these days (www.vibyggerhytte.no) we have ended up with Familiehytta. Although they don't know it yet, so we are probably losing the upper hand now that the news is out there... Anyway, we are going for their model called Rondane with some adjustments here and there. We plan to get the guy who sold us the land to arrange everything with putting it up, plumbers, electrician etc. All of the interior I will do myself. As my mum said; "yes it is only 2 years since you worked your a** off to build your house, so it is about time you start building something again." Truth is I enjoy doing it. Building something is very satisfying, use my hands (and head), and the results are very visible and lasting. Therapy for a guy that is normally stuck in an office...
So this is what we will end up with (but don't tell the people at Familiehytta before we have signed the contract :-)

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More pictures of the area

Language

As already mentioned my girlfriend is american. Now, her norwegian is perfect, and being a teacher and all probably better than mine. When it comes to grammatics anyway. But with familiy in the U.S and New Zealand and a list of friends, that makes the phone book seem like a small leaflet, all over the world this blog will be written in english.

However, I do claim the the right to swap to Norwegian when I get stuck. It is hard enough to know all the Norwegian terms and I am not bothering to try and find the translations for knevegg, møne, tilfarere and whatever might come up.

So to all you english speaking; if you don't understand me, I am probably just writing about some boring technical stuff anyway that I probably will have a hard time to fully understand myself...

I hate to admit it but it took an american girl to show me the dream place to build a cabin. As it turns out she had been spotting this place long before we met, dreaming of one day having a cabin there. I had been dreaming of a cabin for years too, but I had trouble knowing where I wanted it as I couldn't seem to find a spot that was close enough to home while still providing the genuine feeling of being up in the mountains far away from the overcrowded areas with 250 sqm palaces and double heated garages. And anyway it was just a dream for both of us, as our accounts were still waiting for that much wanted transfer from the Lottery.

Well, short story kept short, we met, fell in love, drove up there, looked at each other and said; oh yes!

Only after that did we actually calculate whether we could afford it or not when we moved together. Luckiliy we can (Lottery money still welcome though....). So this summer we will start living togehter and start building our dream cabin:-) Sweet!

So where is this place? Well don't tell too many as it will ruin the great tranquility, but it is in Austbygde, Tinn kommune, Telemark. Just below the tree line and with great access to Hardangervidda.