We have been living in Paraguay for over seven months now and today I would like to write an update on our house construction and also report on how we are doing with the current situation.
In the meantime, the government suspended construction throughout the country for about five weeks, but since May 4, 2020, our house construction has been progressing rapidly. We will still have to wait a few months before we can move in, but we can already see the light at the end of the tunnel.
In my last blog post, I reported that our floor slab had been completed. It’s been a good three months now and, despite the aforementioned construction freeze, a lot has changed in that time.
The structural work is almost complete and the timber for our roof truss was delivered last Thursday. Friday was a public holiday in Paraguay and now it’s weekend. I assume that the roof construction can start on Monday and the roof is usually finished in two to three days.
I took advantage of the good weather on Friday and flew over our construction site with the drone. I wanted to get a few more shots before the roof is installed on our house.
Here is a current photo of our property and below I will show the drone flight. I think the video turned out quite well. It was a bit windy that day but you can see into our house very clearly from above. 😁
Nevertheless, there is still a lot to do on our construction site and we are particularly looking forward to next week, because as soon as the roof is installed I want to be there to see it. The current picture of our house will change completely as soon as the roof is on.
We’re very excited about that, because so far we’ve only seen it on paper. We are also currently planning our entrance with a carport and a solid path made of natural stones around the entire house.
Garden design for our plot
We went back and forth about when we should start planting our property. Actually, it would have made sense to start planting trees as early as possible.
However, we didn’t know exactly where trees might be destroyed when the house was built and we didn’t have any water on the property to begin with. In the meantime, the lake has been finished and water is available, so you could always fetch water from the lake with a watering can.
We grew a few plants from seed at the apartment and planted two pumpkins on our property the day before yesterday. Let’s see what happens to them and whether they will survive on their own.
We’ll start the actual planting when the construction work is finished and we’re living in our house. Then it will be easier for us, we’ll be on site and can take care of everything straight away. We should also have running water by then and two taps have been installed on the outside of our house for the garden.
We will be planting a number of trees, including fast-growing varieties such as bamboo and eucalyptus. So we can all look forward to seeing how our plot will develop over the next few years.
The first vegetables will of course be planted soon, because it would be nice if we could eat more and more from our own garden. We have already grown tomatoes, mango and pumpkin in the apartment as an experiment. An avocado is currently growing and the passion fruit has unfortunately died.
Building our own furniture in Paraguay
In my last blog post I wrote that we would have our furniture built to our specifications in the carpentry workshop. This has now changed fundamentally. We have already received the sideboard we ordered and it is in our apartment.
It turned out very nicely and was planned in such a way that it will also fit into our own house later on. We have now decided to build our furniture ourselves. I’ve ordered some extra tools for this and I think we’ll manage quite well with them.
As soon as our house is ready for us to move in, I will start building our furniture. This will certainly be just as interesting and I will be happy to write about it on my blog and show you the pictures.
We already have plans ready for the first pieces of furniture. As soon as our carport is finished, I want to set up a small workshop in the rear area. For the moment, I’m building our furniture in a room in our house.
The current situation in Paraguay
How are we currently feeling in Paraguay?
In March 2020, the worldwide restrictions began, which we unfortunately also felt in Paraguay. Thankfully, we live on a large estancia of around 16 km虏 and always had enough space to move around without restrictions.
So we were never locked up in our apartment the whole time. I didn’t go out shopping at first. We wanted to wait and see what happened.
At some point, I occasionally went shopping in the next town again and since May 4, 2020, the lockdown restrictions have been eased in various phases. Phase 3 starts next week and we’ll see which restrictions are still relevant.
How are we currently living in our tiny apartment?
I have to admit, it’s getting more and more stressful and the size of the apartment alone doesn’t really matter. Because when I compare it with our motorhome road trip last year, our motorhome was definitely smaller and we were fine most of the time.
Here in the apartments, however, you wouldn’t want to live in them for more than three months and, as I mentioned, we’ve been living in them for over seven months.
We just miss the privacy, that’s basically it. You generally have peace and quiet in the apartment as long as nobody knocks on your door. However, people have come in twice just like that. As soon as we leave the apartment, it usually doesn’t take a few minutes before you’re spoken to again or involved in a conversation.
We have children and they also need our attention. Unfortunately, it’s rarely possible to sit on our terrace in peace, as people often walk across our terrace or garden. It’s not unusual for us to get involved in a conversation again, even when we’re eating, and I don’t think anyone can stand that for long. 😞
We have a very large area for walking and we can usually be alone there. But even here it has happened that people just join us and walk along.
This makes it impossible for us to have conversations as a family. After all, the completion of our house is getting closer and we can see that we will be able to move soon. Until then, we just have to pull ourselves together and get through this time somehow.
This lack of privacy has certainly prompted some people to leave El Paraiso Verde permanently and move somewhere else, especially if you don’t know when you will be able to move into your own property.
The excitement of having our own home
Fortunately, we have been working from the very beginning to ensure that we can move into our property as soon as possible. We have so many things in mind with our planning and what else we want to do on our property. As soon as we get into action, a lot of the weight will fall off our shoulders again and we can continue to work on our goal with fun and happiness. 😍
I will report again as soon as I can write a new blog post on my notebook. I would have loved to take more videos of the apartment, but unfortunately I don’t really enjoy it because of the lack of privacy mentioned above and then it’s best to forget about it.
As soon as we have more peace and quiet and are on our property, I will hopefully be able to make up for it. And now, as promised, here’s my latest drone flight over our house without a roof.
See you soon and best wishes from Paraguay from Sebastian