keep on pourin'...

we've been busy pouring concrete floors the last few days!
we now have two steps by the bbq, the floor for the northern seating area, the center walkway between the kitchen and the main restaurant floor, and the storage/reception bay between the booths and the kitchen.
we hopefully will pour the floor for the booths later today and then next week we'll finish the main restaurant floor slabs.
a very dramatic difference to the eye this week after taking such a long break to work on boats!

seating area floor

pouring the seating area floor has made a big difference in the look of the place!

layin' pipe...

spent the morning laying the drainage pipe underneath the booths.
now onto pouring more floor....

step 1

we've poured the first step! first the guys laid the rebar supports. then they formed the lip of the step so that we may put lights underneath, hidden from view, but glowing in all the right places. then they poured and screeded, and voila!

back to it!

we're getting focused on the island again! after the cyclone hit us at the end of the first week of february, we've been busy repairing every boat and dinghy we own as they all hit the beach... rudders, keels, fiberglass and more.

we also moved our two containers into the same yard and built a storage room between them and then we moved a very large pile of rocks out to the island so that we may build a mini retaining wall to fix the beach that was completely washed away during the storm, undermining the trees at the waterline. we've piled the rocks on the reef and will form up a small wall and back-fill with more sand.

all this is behind us and we're finally working on the island again after almost two months. the boat projects aren't completely finished yet, but it sure feels good to be back!

a sad day for the tree-huggers...

well, in an effort to protect the building from eventually falling trees, we've gone ahead and cut two down. Tu'i agrees, they had to go, but it's a sad day for us tree-huggers. just one of the pitfalls of living in cyclone-area paradise... but, we'll use every last bit of the trees. we drank the young sweet green coconuts, lisa is weaving pola, they'll be cut into logs and made into stools with cedar seats, and as part of the facade for the bar. Una climbed up to tie the rope. then ben used the chainsaw to cut it down, while Soa, Tevita, Una, and Tu'i pulled the very heavy tree down onto the island, in the opposite direction from it's natural tendency to fall. there's nothing quite like the sound of a big heavy tree coming down... at least we'll use it all!

did you know that coconut trees are actually a grass?

sand bar

can you envision where the pola roofed (woven palm fronds) bar will be? it's where the big pile of white sand currently is... with a beautiful beach and sea view!