"It is the trouble that never comes that causes the loss of sleep" ~ Chas. Austin Bates

You may not have gathered from my posts but whilst I have a very strong feeling I am meant to be where I am...there are always nervous worryings, particularly financial ones.  I have taken an enormous risk, particularly with my financial security...I sold my home in Australia and with all of the  funds from this sale have financed this adventure.  I have been here nearly 2 years and as time has moved on and things have taken longer than initially planned I have had quite a few sleepless nights fraught with worry, wondering if this venture would be financially possible and viable.  However, even this late in the summer season, I have been pleasantly surprised by the bookings and enquiries I have received to date, my nerves have been calmed and I feel quietly confidant about it all.

Fortuitously, Lonely Planet were also in town recently doing the rounds of accommodation and seemed suitably impressed with what I had to offer and so fingers crossed Gamla Pósthúsið makes it into the 2013 Lonely Planet Iceland Travel Book.

So all is moving forward nicely the apartments are complete and I am pleased with the way they have turned out.  As I already have posted pics of apartment 1, today's are of apartment 2.

The next stage of development will be the retail space which is a blank canvas at the moment just waiting for me to make a mark...still not sure how this will work except that it will be art related...I am sure inspiration will hit me soon.

 The white metal railings are to the spiral staircase that leads down to my studio

 Front door opening onto the street.

 There are lots of windows, good lighting but not so much wall space.

 The space beyond the main area

 Door leading to storage area and small kitchen, the other is to the parcel lift which goes between this floor and the basement

  I left in part of the original staff kitchen...I am sure it will be useful.

“Nothing is impossible, the word itself says 'I'm possible'!” ~ Audrey Hepburn

Apologies for being a bit absent from the blog but life has been a tad hectic, I now have a blog, a website, and a facebook page to maintain and update on a regular basis plus have also been creating pages on several holiday booking websites to get the ball rolling with bookings.

This time last year I went through a period where I really wondered if it was possible for me to see my ideas come to fruition.  It was a big project and scary attempting on my own...I had never done anything like this before. At one stage when doubt was knocking loudly I even toyed with the idea of just leasing the middle floor to others for businesses...but it just did not feel right and so that spurred me on to stick with my initial gut feeling I had when I first walked through Gamla Pósthúsið. 

And so a year on the apartments and retail/gallery space are now finished...just wireless internet to be installed in the building ....then it is all done.  I have been madly moving everything in to the apartments, cleaning, washing all the new stuff before use, hanging block out blinds etc.  I am not that fast anymore, once I could have worked non stop all day until late at night but I find my body just can't do that anymore...so I have to pace myself...can be particularly frustrating!

Apartment one is now completely set up and my first guests arrive tomorrow, non paying but my good friend Judith visiting from Australia with her nephew George will be the first holidayers in the apartment.  I worked with Judith for 6 great years at Edith Cowan University, the other member of our Art Education team Gill, visited me last year.   It will be lovely to take a few days break from everything and do a bit of socialising with them...really looking forward to that.

Apartment 1 is now completely set up, if you have been on to my facebook site you will have seen these photos but I know many of you aren't on FB so here they are.  

There was a bit of trouble with the floors but the builder happily re did them and they now look great.  

I have been very impressed with the quality and thoroughness of the workmanship here, I have no reason to complain about anything...everyone has been great to work with and I highly recommend Skúli and his team at Trésmiðjan Borg they have done a fantastic job!

 This kitchen is better than the one I have upstairs.

 The young tiler did a great job.

The empty space in the bathroom will be filled eventually with a washer/dryer.

The exterior of the building needs a paint job and possibly new roof but that will have to wait until next year, just can't afford to do everything in one go
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I will post photos of apartment 2 sometime next week, although it will look much the same just a slightly different layout and a tad smaller.  Once I have the apartments all sorted I will perhaps have a little more brain power to work on the retail/gallery space and try to visualise how that will unfold.

End of week 15

Well, it has been a hectic and frustrating time, finally got my computer back after two weeks, still dealing with a few issues as they uploaded a slightly newer operating system which meant that I lost the programs iphoto, imovie and garage band...have never used garage band but I did use iphoto and imovie a lot, I was informed that I had to pay about $15 to upgrade each program, so I thought ok but the problem is when I went to do that Apple state that I need a higher operating system, which of course costs more $...so feeling a little duped at the moment and I am still coming to terms with the fact I lost 16,000 photos! I did have some on an external hard drive...which sort of consoled me...however that drive is now not opening...so not having much luck with techno devices at the moment.

Since getting the computer back I have spent the last few days finishing off the website so that it would be good enough to go live, there is still a fair bit of tweaking to do but it is basically all there and I finally was able to add in a booking and payment system...I certainly have been on a big learning curve with this. So the website address is www.ausis.is which is my company name although the apartments are to be known as Gamla Pósthúsið (The Old Post House) you can view via the link above or by the new tab on the navigation bar titled Holiday Apartments.  

I have also set up a Facebook page for the business and if you feel so inclined please 'like' or subscribe to it.

So back to the end of Week 15 start of week 16, we are very close to the end of the renovations, the final coat and seal to the floors will happen sometime this week and over the weekend....I will not be able to walk on it for a few days until it has cured...and then there are just a few finishing touches by the builder before I can start moving everything in.  The gallery side will take an extra couple of weeks to complete...but I am in no hurry for that.

Firstly I thought I would take you on a little tour to the basement...this is literally the bowels of the post house....I warn you there is nothing pretty down here.

Once downstairs this corridor runs the breadth of the building, there are 8 rooms, 4 on each side of this passageway.  The door at the very end leads to my studio.  At the moment the basement is filthy and full of dust as just about each room as had plumbing and wiring installed to cater for the rooms above.

This is the plumbing and heating room and controls the water throughout the building, I have no idea what all this means and the plumbers too have had a bit of an issue understanding it all as there were no plumbing plans for the original build in the 50's.   Fortunately now after working on her for all these weeks they pretty much know how she is put together, although they still think she has a few more secrets to share.

The electricians have even been in my studio and wiring is everywhere at the moment, all my things/furniture has been shoved in to the middle of the room away from the walls...so needless to say I have not spent much time in here.

This is looking from my studio door to the opposite end of the passage which leads to the stairwell and 2 other extra storage spaces....so much storage room!!!

Upstairs though looks completely different and I am very pleased with the way it is all working out.

 This is how you paint doors...line them up and spray

The kitchens are basically in except for the doors.

The bathrooms are all tiled and most fixtures are in

The white paint work looks amazing, so fresh and the light that comes into these rooms is heavenly.

Just to let you know

I am out of blog action for a few days as I dropped my laptop and killed the hard drive...of course I had not backed anything up for ages...at least the last 12 months...so many pics lost...at least I have the pics I have posted previously on the blog albeit they are now of low resolution. So sorry no pics this post!  It has been a week now and I am still waiting to hear from the repairers...I am secretly hoping that they have been able to retrieve some data for me but they had said it did not look promising as I dropped it while it was on.  Fortunately insurance will cover the replacement hard drive but alas not my stupidity...this is the second hard drive I have killed in just over 2 years...you think I would have learned...I promise you I have now!   So if you haven't backed things up recently...take a lesson from me and do it now!  

The renovations are moving along nicely but there has been a major issue with the plumbing (old building) but that is slowly getting sorted as there are a team of plumbers here working on it from 8am-6pm each day.   I am now getting to the pointy end of the renovations and it is so close to completion...the tiles are being laid in the bathroom, the kitchens and light fittings are being installed plus the painting is nearly complete...should all be finished in about 3 weeks.  My basement has been completely taken over by plumbers and electricians, they are even in the studio...so no work happening there for me...I am feeling a little guilty about the BAO project but my head at the moment is not in the right space...I don't think I will have the time to get back into it until I have the apartments all set up and ready to book.

Olga and I travelled to Akureyri to purchase furniture, linen, kitchen utensils etc for the apartments...Ross was on a holiday from work and so Henry stayed home with his dad whilst Olga and I shopped....still did not get everything I need but we are close. 

In other news we are in a bit of a heatwave, the weather is sooo pleasant I have turned the heating off in the apartment and am very comfortable walking outside without jacket, gloves scarf etc....it feels quite summery. The weather though is so unpredictable here...only last week we had a major blizzard and it was snowing fiercely. We are now well into + double digits...one of the plumbers told me he was having trouble working in such hot conditions...Hah!  Today it is forecast for 18°, tomorrow 16° and Friday again 18° with lows overnight of a sweltering 9°...might be a few more plumbers complaining before the week is out!  I hope it stays this way for a while....Iceland is very beautiful on warm sunny days. 

Hopefully I get my computer back in the next day or so and can finish the website for the rental apartments and post some pics of the renovations...I am very gratefully using my son's old laptop to check emails etc but it is very slow.  Thanks for stopping by and enjoy your week!  

End of week 12!

 Firstly I just want to send love and a special birthday wish to my youngest son in Australia, Jesse who turns 25 today.  I Hope to catch you on skype sometime over the weekend darling, miss you heaps, enjoy your day.

 

Where does the time go.... it has been 5 weeks since I last gave you an update on Gamla Pósthúsið renovations.  However during this time it has been mainly hidden work and not a lot of external changes to show until this week, although men have been here every working day...doing stuff!

In the last few weeks it seemed to be mainly electrical and plumbing that has taken up most of the hours in each day.

a lot of electric cables were going into walls

 and ceilings. 

 

Plumbing outlets installed in the walls, bathrooms and kitchens

and an air tunnel for the fan installed from the bathroom to outside.

 

Once all the cables were in the walls the painter came along 

filling and sanding in readiness for painting.

 Parts of the ceiling where the beams are

 were prepared 

 for boxing in.

In between all this the painter has been here everyday (even on public holidays, it is now 8am Sat and he is here now) sanding, priming and undercoating...

The framework for the ceiling was added whilst waiting on the electricians

Once the electricians were finished the ceilings could be put in place.

 

 View from apartment 1 entry

View from bedroom of apartment 1 through to the bathroom.

View from main entry to apartment 2

View from apartment 2 to the main entry

View towards entry door from apartment 1

Kitchen area of apartment 2

Lounge dining area of apartment 2

Each bathroom has space to eventually house a washer/dryer

the shower recesses has been waterproofed

The bathroom tiles have been delivered in readiness for tiling next week.

The end to the renovations I sense are not too far away...it is exciting but scary at the same time...so much to do and prepare for.  I am pretty sure there will be plenty to reveal next week.

So until then enjoy your weekend!