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| • Building renovation | • Sanitation | |
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Basic facilities
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We now have our basic accommodation in place.
The next priorities are to establish basic sanitation, washing and cooking facilities.
Accommodation
We purchased a 5.8m Mongolian yurt which arrived in the UK at the end of January 2009 and was delivered to Portugal by our intrepid (and recommended) man-with-a-van at the end of April. While buying a yurt from Mongolia might be considered extravagant, particularly with the embodied energy in its transportation from Ulaanbaatar to the UK and then to Portugal, it feels important to acknowldge a major source of this most excellent design of living space and give something back to a culture and way of life that's dying out under economic duress created by the ubiquitous spread of western values. (See Byambasuren Davaa's lovely film Cave of the Yellow Dog.) Ulaantaij, the company manufacturing the yurts, have a sound ethical basis, source their wood from sustainable forests, and support Mongolian social programmes.
They also make really beautiful yurts in traditional style.
Before erecting the yurt, we built a wooden platfom to keep it off the ground. This makes a huge difference to the longevity of a yurt in the much damper European climate. The challenge with the platform is to construct a solid raised area for the yurt to sit securely on while allowing easy drainage of rainwater runoff. Wooden platforms that extend beyond the circumference of the yurt itself can allow water to pool and lead to damp and mould problems, so we cut the platform to the size of the yurt after it was erected.
This proved to be a wise decision given the enormous amount of rain which fell in Portugal in the winter months of late 2009 - early 2010. Even with waterproofing on the canvas outer cover and no chance for runoff to pool, the sheer amount of rain meant that water eventually soaked through. The only solution in such situations is to make sure the yurt is constantly inhabited and a stove kept running to dry it out as fast as it gets wet. We also had problems with the door and door frames swelling to different extents. By mid January 2010, neither outer nor inner doors would close any more.
Cooking
Initially we're using a camping stove and the heating stove in the yurt, but need a better solution for accommodating volunteers and visitors and for more varied meals. The idea at the moment is to construct a kitchen area and bread oven along with the other facilities close to the yurt. We'll be experimenting with solar cookers too.
Washing
We're aiming to have a solar-heated shower and washing area up and running as soon as practicable. For winter we've got a wood-burning German Badeofen. More details once I've thought through the construction and the plumbing.
Sanitation
See the Sanitation project page for more details. We'll be constructing simple collecting toilets (basically a 20-litre plastic bucket in a wooden box with a toilet seat on top) and a couple of compost bins for the processing.
Traduzir esta páginaEspero para fornecer uma versão Português deste site, quando ele é mais completo, e quando eu puder escrever melhor Português. Por agora, o link acima irá dar-lhe uma traduçâo do Google.