I’ve still not unpacked and the barn is littered with cardboard boxes.  There are books in a lot of the boxes so we’ve just collected the most enormous bookcase from very close by. I think there will be 10mm clearance to the ceiling to allow us to stand the bookcase up in the study.

Unfortunately we found there is not enough clearance through the doors from the barn so we’ve invited some big strong lads over to dinner who will hopefully help take it the longer route through the front door.  The photo is an artist impression of how it might have looked had we collected the bookcase on the roof of a Renault.

I thought there would be 10mm clearance to the roof. The bookcase just brushed the ceiling when we stood it up.

We had the heating on full with some windows open to try to dry the building out. That worked well, but then a couple of days later we came home to find a burst pipe and a flood downstairs. The VAX carpet cleaner we bought for the beer smell sucked up the water and we removed the underlay. There’s not too much damage and the place should be dry in a week.

The shuttering came off today. It’s freezing in there as the heating won’t work until the weekend. I can’t have running water in this weather until I have heating. I am spending a lot of time at Kae’s house.

The heating was recommissioned on 27th and I moved in on 28th January.

I bought the place with shuttering on and have never seen it without. It looks so much better without the shuttering.

The Salutation closed in December 2011 and has been boarded up for a year. I’m Malcolm. I’m an engineer and have bought the Salutation to make into a home. I don’t want to run it as a pub myself but I’m keen to make sure I don’t do anything to stop it from being a pub again in the future (apart from not buying the car park – it has planning permission for a house which makes the land too expensive).

I plan to move into the upstairs in January 2013 (timing might be weather dependant) and will take the shuttering off and tidy up the outside a little. I can’t do a lot more until I have planning permission which should come in April or May 2013. I bought some of the car park to the side of the building and that will eventually become my driveway. The remainder of the car park is still for sale with planning permission to build a house.

The restoration will be sympathetic to the building. I’m keeping the bar and as many interior features as I can. The exterior will be freshened up but the style will remain the same.

The Salutation has a long history as a pub and still smells of beer. Colin’s Blunham Pubs webpage has some History of the Salutation

I’ll update this page with plans for the conversion when I have them.