Had to get out the number 8 wire.

There has been lots of bad flu around this year, and I think I have had a touch of it, not badly, but enough for a few days rest. Headaches and sore throat was as bad as it got fortunately, and this house sit has a lemon tree, so lemon and honey drinks are always good when you feel a bit blah like this.

We, well Peter really, had to get out his number 8 wire. This house sit has a lovely pool. Pools always take a bit of your time every day, keeping them clean etc, and lately we have had quite a bit of wind and with all the trees on this block we get quite a few leaves in the pool when there are high winds.  But our main problem was a leak.  Its been slowly leaking for quite a while, I think I mentioned it to the owners before they left. Its wasn't a lot, but there was constant puddling at the wall at the base of the pool. After consulting with the owners, who asked us to see what we could do, Peter made a start.

The pool has a wooden deck around it, at the filter end, so half of the deck had to be lifted up first.  The it was a matter of breaking away some of the concrete around the skimmer box, which is where the leak seemed to be coming from. After digging up the soil around the base of the skimmer box, and exposing the pipes, sure enough, there was the leak. It wasn't pouring out, but a solid heaving drip, certainly enough to warrant some repairs.

One of our sons is a builder and knows lots about repairing pipes etc, so after a little consultation session with him, Peter bought some fibreglass boggy stuff, that is supposed to dry in a few minutes, be completely waterproof and fix anything to do with pipes. He partly emptied the pool, getting the water level down so that the skimmer box would dry out properly.

He spent quite a bit of time over the last few days working out there, making sure the pipes were ok, fixing it, leaving it to dry, and double checking everything. He knows about motors and pumps and stuff, it is all completely out of my league, but we have had pools in our homes in New Zealand, so he knows how these things work.

Satisfied that the leak was fixed, he put some flour underneath the pipes, and left it overnight. His theory was that any leak would show up in the flour the next morning. Not a drop to be seen!

The motor for the filter had been switched off for a couple of days, so when he went to turn it back on, the switch, which I think must be have been installed when the pool was built some time ago, fell apart in his hands. After another trip to Bunnings, which opened not long ago down the road, and has already extracted a few dollars from our purses, he tried to replace the switch. But something was not right, so we had to get a qualified electrician in. He came the other day, fixed it all up beautifuly, and the pool is now full again, sparkling clean and all the pooling from the leak at the base of the pool has gone. All nice and dry.

So today he is off for a couple more lengths of wood to replace a couple of old bits from the deck and make the deck supports a bit stronger underneath and he can put his number 8 wire away for a while.

Now all we want is some nice warm weather to enjoy the pool.