Welcome Back to Part 2.
[Here's the Link](https://steemit.com/anarchy/@movingman/the-renovation-of-our-squat-oslo-norway-living-free) to the first part of project.
Its a renovation of a cabin that we don't own nor pay rent for , nor have we even spoke with the owners. I didn't pay rent for many years and if you can see there is no real reason to pay for a place to sleep, this which means you can leave that "security" bubble of society - and it is just a bubble believe me! If you are paying out to live from working at a job, and that money is then exchanged for a place to sleep and food to eat, then you are a Slave. There are many people that have decided to live differently, maybe go buy a campervan and go drive around and then park in several locations over time or the most common one I guess is to go travel many places in a year, rushing around on planes and then going back because you spent all your money and feel un-secure without the bubble, so willing to get back to being a slave again. Learn something that people need then you have your own income. I for instance first was working as a cook, everyone needs to eat food and all over the world you see resturants. Then after some years I went to carpentry school, everybody needs houses, and houses are also all over the world. If somehow I managed to be able to live in a box (house), travel in a box to work(car or buses etc), and then sit all day in another box (office job), this would become "it." I would rely on that job to keep my shitty existance going in the society, and the office block is there in the same place for 100 years maybe, Fuck That, I had Better Ideas!
Oh yeh! There was a building project happening, right!
Got another window! lets fit it!
You see Below that we had only just got the ceiling done for insulation, but left it til last minute because of the dust from it (glass fibres) we did have masks but whats the point in working in really bad conditions?
A photo from the outside Below
Now was time to work out a different idea from the start because the first plan didn't work out!
In the beginning we thought to have our bedroom doors next to each other in the lounge as that was just the easiest to do, but then there wasn't enough room for the two doors side by side with a wall between, my room would have in the end been 1.5M2!! His bedroom door would now have to go in on the kitchen wall, that's the kitchen wall in the picture Below. Here Above is the ceiling ready to insulate and plasterboard and he had got a nice triple glazed window from the city and got it back with the bus, very heavy its was indeed, triple glassed bad-boy for the northern wall! (it just happened like that it wasn't planned :) ) Nicely fitted.
We had the wood for the walls ready and the main ceiling was done, just the kitchen one remained and we had started doing the 2nd bedroom for Cronus. I didn't really want to look at the kitchen again because I already had and it was going to be fun with no power tools. The floor was quite unsafe where the back door was, and it was just all due to an overhanging tree and a blocked guttering had caused some structural damage. But with the new plan there was no more putting it off, now was time to do the kitchen.
The kitchen
I took all the old cupboards out and took the old wood burner that sat in the corner outside. There were pots and some other bits and bobs on a corner shelf that we still use now for cooking, but apart from that the kitchen was stripped out. Where there was a huge wall mounted unit was where the door would go, i just cut out a door shape to see it Cronus agreed as it would be his bedroom door after all.
From the lounge..
New ceiling in Cronus' room, and now the cabin was suddenly open plan!
You can see a good cross section of the ceiling Below , and the spot is ready to build a new wall there and a door opening. There wasn't much else to do there until I knew what size the door frames were and I had managed not do the worst part yet of the kitchen!
More Windows?! Yes more bloody windows!
Seriously , I will never forget the missions to get cheap or free windows with no car. Never. This time we were to get the kitchen window and the second window for my room. I remember that I went to meet Cronus at his work, where there are boats in a small harbour and we could use a boat to take a door that he had found there in the trash, some 4x2 and also we had thought that we may aswell take the 2 windows we found online. I went on a tube, then a bus to get the window for the kitchen and back again, and he went somewhere in the city to get the other one. Missions! Windows are heavy! We met up near to where the boats were and then we see the last bus was already finished. So we had to walk with everything down to the boat. Exhausted. The guys that lent us the boat had asked where we were going and had said "Oh yeh 30 mins and your there" so we were well up for it. We loaded it all on with the dogs as well. My dogs haven't been on so many boats and I had promised them that 30 mins we would be on land again. Lovely evening it was, but the we realised how slow we were able to go because we had alot of weight on the boat, and it would just bounce and we would get wet if we went to fast.
It went from daylight to evening, and then we got it that they guys must have been joking about "30 mins and your there!" The dogs were not very happy, after a while everything was wet and it was getting darker and we weren't even half way there!!
And then.... Of course, the engine just stopped and we sat in the water for some time just thinking that we should have taken the bus.
Luckily Earner, thats Cronus' pup from my brown dog, just looked and knew what was wrong, we didnt have a clue and you see how dark it was by now, but luckily she told us that the petrol tank cap was screwed on too tight and there was no air flow.
Dogs are smart!
We did after 3 hours get back to the harbour near the cabin, and it was already late so we just unloaded the cargo and went up to bed to sleep. Cronus took the boat back and then it was time to start hauling it all up to the cabin.
The next day I got busy on the kitchen again, and started on the floor repair. It needed brick work and wood work and I had everything I needed
Bricks were from the chimney and I got some sand and cement with the wood delivery from before. The brickwork you see there is what the new chunk of beam rested on.
The photo above is the repair. Under the thickest beam there I had to run some brickwork for the beam to sit on with a layer of roof felt to stop rising damp. It should have been fixed to the brickwork but I just managed to use cement under it at least, the weight of the structure will hold it in place anyhow. The Joist on the left was rotted away so it was extended with new wood either side of it screwed in with massive screws to make it solid with the old existing beam, like the one on the Right. We had to move that huge concrete step(s) away a bit from the cabin to be able to repair it, that was the thing that the water had splashed off of onto the door causing this damage in the first place! There should be at least 150mm from the ground to the start of a door so water dosn't splash up to it.
Fitting the kitchen out -
I took the blue chipboard panels off and then the next layer. It was then insulated with 50mm recycled insulation from the city trash and then the same panels nailed back on ready to plasterboard.
Look at the nasty ceiling! Here is where the window was smashed since years and there was a lot of mold in the walls so best to just make it new and im not one for scrubbing a ceiling hahaha!
Now I was able to change the door- the front door was perfect, this one wasn't so good. Plus the corner of the cabin needed replacing also as it was rotten also from a blocked guttering.
Here's photos of the outside at this stage
We also ordered enough wood for the outside to do around the windows, I need to replace that plastic i put there as now we have the proper material!
The back door was looking like a piece of art!
Finish off the corner from the inside.. We were also ready to do the new insulated ceiling aswell
It was now ready for plasterboarding, I had done nearly all the perimeter walls of the cabin and in part 3 we shall see how that all went, making the bedrooms and lounge room. The plasterboard would be fun.. there was 700kg in total!
I hope your enjoying an insight to how others are choosing to be spending life, and that there is always a different approach to everything you were ever told to be the only way to do it.
Part 3 will follow soon aswell!