Monday 20 January 2020

Camp Renovation

Winter has returned again to the Great White North, so it is time for new blog postings from me. This one will describe the work we did at the cottage beginning about 12 years ago to bring it from the dark ages into the present times. Below, you see it as it was for over 50 years -- a hunting camp, but in good shape. Historically (for the first 35 years) we used outdoor toilets, water from the lake, no electricity, etc., but the camp became too small for children, spouses and grandchildren all at the same time. Thus, it was time to change.


As it remained unchanged for so long, our old friend John Wilcox, who with his family has visited us at camp for decades, one year carved a salmon and inscription for us to recognize the unchanging fact that the cabin was a veritable museum.  Thus 'upgrading' was definitely due.



And so the work began. First the back door was removed from the original camp's kitchen and its solid cement porch, seen above, was dug out. This involved a sizable backhoe and a neighbor, Arnie Jones, with the help of friends seen below. Note one of the new footing pads for the new addition is positioned next to us.



More of the concrete footing pads in the picture below were distributed according to our addition drawings.  Between the pads we began digging up the ground for the plumbing lines and laid the ground piping heading to the septic system.  Except for the digging (by a backhoe), we installed the entire plumbing system, learning about drainage, flexible Pex lines, shut-off manifolds, and how to use it all to our advantage.



The septic system followed, finding a home in our small 'back yard'. Note the roots that owned the yard.



Next, it was time to drill for water and install the pump system. Since the camp was only 20 feet above the lake, I assumed the well water would be soon accessed -- and it was at 30 feet. But the water wasn't clean, so the boys kept drill -- through solid granite!! The next vein of water was at 170 feet. They capped the well at 200 feet and I installed the pump. This had the happy ending seen below.



Now the floor for the new addition. The side door and its porch roof on the old cabin also disappeared subsequently.



Knowing that we were going to begin this project in 2008, we began harvesting wood from the property the year before that would be used in much of the finishing work. This procurement was documented in the next few pictures. First we downed aspens, seen below, for the ceiling and some walls. Then we harvested a pine for the beams and posts.  Finally, black cherry and yellow birch for stairs and railings.



At that point, my sawyer, André Seiffert arrived with his portable saw mill and turned the logs into the required boards and beams (like he did later for our house in my previously posting). This was during June black fly season! Horrific!!



Then all of the various forms of wood were stacked, stickered and covered for a year before going to the planer man (same fellow we used in a few years for the house wood in my posting from last year). Aspen boards and pine 8x8's were stacked up in the wood yard where the logs had previously been collected.


White pine beams  ...


And black cherry and yellow birch for the stairs ....



The 5x10" black cherry boards for the stairs I worked on over the winter in our old basement until they were to my liking.



We hired someone to frame the extension and put up the walls and windows. Now the new addition was closed and roofed, so the six of us could begin the finishing jobs both inside and out (Dan, Jamie, Tobi, Peter, Tracey and Nancy). First we got all of the new boards moved inside with the indispensable help of my old buddy Ormond Churchill (who is sadly no longer with us). His team also installed the roof singles, skylights, soffits and gutters.



The inside ceiling went in first. This involved working off of 3 tiers of scaffolding, which the grandkids (Siobhan here) played on when I wasn't dangling at the top.


Scaffolding without me on it.


Here I am working in one of the 5 skylights.


The aspen worked great for this purpose.




When I was finishing the apex of the ceiling, I was on top of a step ladder tied to the top of the 3-level scaffolding. This is no place for a guy who responds poorly to heights!! But I survived without doing a two-and-a-half gainer.



Now that the ceiling was finished, here is a view of the great outside from the finished loft, showing also the rarely used second bed positioned at the loft railing.



On other weekends, we moved to installing the stairs, starting from the loft, which became our bedroom, to the down stairs. Jamie and I struggling with some fairly heavy 5x10" stairs rungs at the loft.


and then moved down from on high.




The next step (no pun intended) was working on the upstairs bathroom. A functioning shower minus the walls. Peter made the border around the shower from little stones on our property - lots of them!



Downstairs kitchen minus the ceiling, the island, and floor covering.



Designed by Nancy...



More recently, we attacked the old fireplace. Now we removed the brick, pulled out the old firebox and replaced it with a free standing unit set inside the fireplace hole. The system is now much safer than the old one -- see below. Here is the old steel fire box after removal of the bricks.  Note also the new downstairs bathroom, in the right of the picture, which we made from a previous bedroom.



While doing the work, I looking up the old flue and saw that there was no liner in it -- just bricks. Yikes... Man were we lucky to never have had a serious chimney fire, since the previous owner used to burn coal in this puppy!!



The new stainless steel piping and cap exit from the chimney was now complete with mouse and mosquito proofing thanks to Jamie!



The new stove system inside the camp with insulated liner from bottom to top, all to code.



Adding to this heat source is my brother David's old enamel pellet stove, which now sits at the junction between the old and new additions, so we have acquired a very thermally comfortable cabin for the fall and spring, at least.


Here is the pellet stove's position in the new addition.



In the old cabin we had gas and kerosene lights, but now we have electricity. Because we are about 4  miles from the commercial power, we installed a solar system, as you can see below ... one little unit on the old cabin and 4 panels on the new addition above the sky lights.



For times when the sun doesn't shine, we have a 6K generator in the in-ground box, which also contains the well head and pressure tank. Son Jamie is working on the generator and is allowed out of the box a few time per day. 😀



As the place is now complete, here are a few pictures of the end product. Below is the backdoor entrance with screened porches before painting on the upper porch was finished.


And from the front or lake side ...



And a view of the lake from the finished two tiered porch deck ...



On the inside, a view of the living room/kitchen/loft in the service of John and Karen Wilcox (reading and a puzzle) with Nancy in the kitchen..


And the downstairs bathroom for family and guests.


Now we can accommodate many more people than before, and comfortable so. Two indoor wash rooms with running water and electricity. What more could you want? Don't ask ... Just watch for the next posting 😊.

3 comments:

  1. What a tremendous amount of work! But it was a good dry run for your house, the next construction project.

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  2. Wow - I realize I have never seen these photos! I bet you all kept them from me so that I would not freak out. No one was more prepared to see the 'museum' into the next century than me! I realized how much I miss the old place (so many memories!), but also how much I love the new place...

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