Knocking down an Outbuilding

I feel that there comes a time in all men's lives when it is necessary to do something manly with a crowbar, sledge hammer, heavy duty power tools and so on.  And at the end of the day, one hopes for a large pile of rubble to show the results of the day.

Today we started on demolishing one of the "petits touts" to open up the garden.  An hour or two is spent on the removal of the tiles and wooden chevrons from the roof.  This reveals that actually, the walls are really thick.  Moreover, one end is covered in an extremely hard render which is very difficult to break through.

Undeterred by such minor set backs, a few hours later it is clear that the petits touts is on the way down.

And by the end of demolition day one, there is something of the view we eventually hope to have of the opened up garden.

Day two sees some serious sledge hammering and the render gradually succumbs. 

There are few more manly sights that a man with his sledge hammer and the large pile of rubble he has created from the sweat of his brow - it is like Corbett posing with tigers in India, or Hemingway with a large tuna.

So the outbuilding is more or less down by the end of day two and now we have the issue of disposal of the debris.  This is scheduled for five or six weeks time and the current plan is to hire a tipper lorry that we can move several tonnes in at once - even so, it is possibly one day's work and three trips to the dump to move it all.  And then we still have to knock down the last sections and dig out the concrete foundations.

It does look more open though!