Contractor Selected

We finally have selected the contractor to perform the more difficult jobs in our house!

We met Kurihara-san the Carpenter of Arisaka village, together with his son. Kurihara-san was introduced to me by the friend mentioned in my previous post. He has essentially repaired most of the houses in the neighbourhood, and by the looks of them has done a good job. He is also an active member of the community, and helps to prepare the floats for the famous shinto festival that is held here every January around the 14th (I missed it this year because I was waiting for my son to be born).

Together we went through the house this weekend, and checked the works that need to be done based on Tomo's drawings. One of the major tasks will be the replacement of one structural post and about three beams that hold up the roof. They have been affected by past ant infestation and therefore neither look good, nor are they very strong. Kurihara-san, already measured me up (176cm) so that he can place the new centre beam a few cm higher, and therefore allow me to cross the room without bowing my head (or hitting it).

I think it will be quite spectacular, as the roof must be supported by temporary beams, and jacked up to allow the replacement. I hope to be able to film or photograph this work. He will also insulate and add (pair glass) windows to the northern bedrooms, and prepare them for plastering, then continue by insulating the kitchen and prepare the extended concrete Doma.

To create a nice natural feeling, we have opted for big wooden flooring, that he will install to replace tatami mats.

On our side, there are still many things to do. We have decided to fill the wall separating bedrooms and main living space by ourself, using mud wall mixture. So we need to fill out the frames that Kurihara-san will install. Because this will be a labour intensive job, I think we will need a few volunteers to help us out.

We also have opted to do all finishes - that means plastering walls, and staining the flooring and other wooden parts. Again, volunteers should apply to me - they will be needed!

Even though we are awaiting the final schedule from Kurihara-san, soon, we are aiming at completing the House by May this year.

Skiing in Inaka

This weekend we tried out the skiing in Inaka. There are various Ski resorts in the area, but we tried the closest one, called "Blache Takayama"(Official resort homepage, Snow-Japan information in English .

We got there after a 25 minute drive up the 152 just after lunch time. It was snowing continuously, so that by the end of the day, our car was covered by 10 cm of snow.

Thomas hired his skis, boots and poles at station two (higher up), while I brought my own skis.



Station 2 is equiped with a fast 4 people chair lift, that allows skiing without too much delay. Station 1 is further down, and is mainly for beginners, and children. So you would need to take a long lift up to station 2 first, before serious skiing can commence.

The resort is not big, but not small either. It makes for a nice weekend of skiing with a variety of slope types. There are no difficult slopes, the maximum could perhaps be graded as red (European scale). I found they have one special area called "Mogul & Air Park", which included special practice moguls, and two large ramps for jumping (looked fun). The upper slopes were enjoyable given the good snow conditions, without posing any major difficulty. Off-piste does not seem possible.

We skied on firmly prepared slopes, with a nice layer of soft fresh snow, so that even despite the snowing we greatly enjoyed the feeling of the powder.



I was particular impressed by the children area. They have a tiny standing lift (looks like a conveyor belt) so that even tiny humans can go up, and use the sledges to go down. They also had a truck tire slope, that looked incredibly fun. Of course there is a ski-park for the small ones too, as well as an indoor care centre, if parents want to go off on their own. According to the rental guy, they have skis and boots for rent, fitting children starting from age 3.

On sunday the weather was improved, so that we also had a nice view of the mountain panorama, and we could see the other ski resorts around us.



Next time we will try one of the other resorts nearby, it will be fun to explore them one by one.

What you can work in Winter

Did I post something about there is little work that can be done in Winter? I think I must correct myself. In fact I popped round with my friend Thomas on Sunday, and conscripted him to help for a few hours.

When we arrived at the house, we found our parking space occupied by a little snowman, probably build by the neighbours grand child. I tried to move it carefully out of the way, but unfortunately the snow broke. To compensate the little girl we made our best effort in restoring it. In my opinion it actually looks better than before.



Today's job was to remove Tatami from the two main rooms. Please see the picture before:



This is a few liters of sweat and buckets of dust later:



Now all tatami mats from the main building are removed.

Lazy New Year?

Happy New Year! Maybe you worry about the break in reporting on this blog - don't worry! We are still here!

Fact is however, that Winter is a lousy time to do any kind of construction work. Cement cracks, and so does mortar. There are only a few jobs that can be done during this season.

We do not rest however, instead we do less glamorous jobs: Sending drawings to contractors, checking out legal details, getting quotes and meeting other companies and peoples that are interested in co-operating with us. We are now at a crucial stage in deciding contractors, and finalising our plans, and hope that the heavy work can finally start in March.

Unfortunately, interior works must wait until we have replaced a bunch of beams and posts. This job can of course only be done by an expert carpenter, and definitely requires some time: The entire house must be stabilised with temporary poles first, and is than jacked up to allow replacement of individual beams. Following that we can envisage doing flooring, insulation and internal walls. When it gets warmer in Ueda again, work on the roof will start. And of course, we need to care for permits, license and other matters before opening up.

With all this work, we would like to utilise only ecological materials as much as possible, and try to source the building expertise and carpentry from the local community. Inaka Home will only succeed if the community is involved.

Another reason for the temporary lull in blog posts is that my family has been boosted by one fresh arrival. A little baby boy was born, wo can enjoy natural life in our house soon!