Today I finished installing the margelles, or edging stones for the pool. It has taken me four days of hard slog – I had to do it on my own because I am known as Bonnie Tiler here and so everyone thought they’d leave it to the expert – ha! It was hard because each stone weighs about 10kg and they have to be millimetre accurate because the slabs for the rest of the terrasse are the same colour and width (but not the same depth) so these edging stones will be the starting point of the rest of the 154m2 – the joints and the height all need to line up. I have used 150 kg of tile cement to put them down because they need to be solid – people will pull themselves out of the pool by the edges.

I ache everywhere, back, arms, shoulders, elbows and knees ….

P.S. The water will be cleaner than this when the pool is put in service!!!

It has been quiet here for a while, but that does not mean that we haven’t been working. It has taken several days with lots of headscratching and shovelling to get the terrasse ready for concreting.

The problem was that we needed a slope o…n each side of 1cm for each metre to enable the water to run off freely – easily said, but with each of the four sides sloping in different directions and not easy to take levels over such a large area, it took a bit of time.

We have used a system of rails, the top of which represent the finished level of concrete, and we needed to bring in the right level of stones to reach the required depth of 10cm over the area of 154 metres squared.

The concrete arrived in two lorries and it was off loaded and levelled into place by me standing on the top of a long plank and three butch french men pulling the plank to level off the concrete (sorry no photo – lots of balancing required!)

After this the rails were lifted and we filled in their holes and finished with a petrol vibrating concrete ruler to get a smooth finish.

The only thing left for me to do was a four-course meal for 8 people, phew!

Because the ground where the pool has been built was sloping, the pool was not fully sunk in to ground level. This left us with a problem of how to secure the patio area so that it would not subside. The solution was found by installing 5 former concrete and metal electricity poles (don’t ask where they came from – does everyone still have power?!) This should ensure that there is no landslide in future years!

The ground work for the patio area is now finished – we are now ready for 15 tonnes of cement and 600 paving slabs, phew!

There are various pipes around the outside of the swimming pool to take the water to the sand filtration unit, which is compulsory for a “public” pool, which is what this is considered to be. The pump then takes the water through the heat pump and brings it back to the pool – it will circulate the entire volume of water (70m3) in one hour. There is also an additional tube, which will feed the waterfall feature. These have to be covered in fine sand to protect them, before we can infill with gravel.

The same day, we excavated a couple of trenches. One to take a drain from around the pool in case the ground gets waterlogged and disturbs the pool structure. The other trench was to feel electricity to the pump house. These were quickly back filled (before I had a chance to get the camera out) and you would almost never know there were there!

All of this work was washed down with a beer for the boys, whilst I did the school run!

Yesterday we finished putting in the metal reinforcements for the concrete and connecting the pipes which will suck the liner into place.

The pool walls need a level, solid base to stand on, here are Jeff, Yves and Hugh putting this in place

The lorry arrived with all the pieces of the swimming pool, very exciting and very big – the lorry couldn’t turn around in the courtyard, it was so big!

After waiting for three stressful days, the digger man finally arrived – and we now have a hole. The deep end of the pool slopes downward from the shallow end (furthest away).

Now awaiting delivery of the pool kit on Thursday…