Autumn officially started a couple of days ago and rain is now in the forecast.
In contrast, last week there were almost 200 wildfires burning in the northern region of the country.
The fires were the worst for a few years and sadly seven people died including 3 firefighters, many others were injured. It was a worrying time, even though our area was not affected.
Thankfully, there were very few fires in this region even though we had experienced many weeks of temperatures in the high 30's each day.
Now the risk of fires is much reduced with the approaching rain and thoughts turn to keeping warm during the upcoming Winter season.
Over the past 3 years we have been cutting up and burning the old timbers from the house renovation and had not needed to buy any wood. But now that supply is almost exhausted. Time to get some wood delivered.
I had seen that our neighbours had already received a delivery early last week, so on Saturday I asked him where to buy locally, he kindly called up his supplier and ordered a truckload for us.
The delivery arrived this morning, a lot of wood !!
Although the back of the truck could fit through the workshop door it was not possible to raise the tipping bed so it left half inside the workshop and half outside.
I paid the bill and it was then time to start stacking the load - I suspect a long day.
I began working inside and had built almost one and a half stacks when I realised it had started raining. Seeing no point in buying dry wood and letting it get soaked outside I worked on chucking the remainder into the workshop. That task still took most of an hour.
With the door now closed and the wet weather outside the stacking continued.
A few working hours (and a lunch hour) later, we now have three large, neat piles of wood to burn. Probably for at least two Winters.
The remainder of the wood from the house renovation may last until the New Year but there is no chance of running out after that.
All that remains is to clear up the scraps from the delivery and pack these into a bag to use as kindling.