There is no gym to go to on this island. We get our excercise just existing off grid. Sure property prices are lower than the full service islands with their ferries, power and gas stations. But what we trade for price and privacy is a complete lack of convenience. Every task, job and chore on this island is complicated by our isolation and ultimately labour intensive. At the end of the day, it helps a great deal when you have friends…

We started our day before so much as a cup of coffee. At seven am we were unloading the trailer from yesterday’s barge. 100 – 2×4’s, cement, mortar, 123lb batteries, doors, plywood, drywall, an inverter and solar panels..  none of it light, but at least we could get it off the truck.

We then headed down to the boat ramp for 8:30 to help my sister in law with her barge. Lots of rumpled hair and sleepy eyes arrived to help. We filled four trucks and Tom’s trailer with ISO board and 2×4’s. Muffins and strudel were our reward once it was all loaded into her storage shed. She is ready for her new roofing project.

She and Big Guy then came down to help with our next two jobs. Most of our furniture needed to go. Out, out of the house and up to our neighbours workshop. Thank you Anne for your space. We have to make room for the 198 boxes which will be our Ikea kitchen, and the new doors and the batteries and the inverter and all of the other new arrivals which need to be readily available for the next stage of the reno project.

Once they finished that chore, we loaded our three trucks with garbage from the giant garbage pile so it would be ready to go on the barge coming at 4pm. The pile is still not gone but there appears to be signs of it diminishing. Then, the barge guys called and delayed their trip to Friday. It was 1pm and we had had been working for six hours. To be honest, I wasn’t completely disappointed that my work day was over even though I hadn’t done anywhere near the heavy lifting that E and our friends had done. E finished up the afternoon by tiling the fireplace hearth.

Whew, I’m exhausted just writing about our day. I have 30 percent use of my wrists with plates holding the bones together and a one year old new shoulder… After five years of living here full time, I know I could never live anywhere else. I also know I could not survive without the never ending hours of labour which E puts into our life here.. More importantly I know neither of us could succeed here without the help of our friends…. Thank you

 dear dear friends