New roof

The 'new roof' project was the first project I photographed at the sanctuary. For two weeks, Nicolette's brother - Dominic - came over to renew the roof above some of the storage rooms and guest rooms. It was really great to see and document all the progress that was made in such a short time.

Dominic Audy is a carpenter from Alberta, Canada. He previously did some more work for the sanctuary as well. It was a real pleasure to meet him and document him doing his work (even though he didn't like my camera very much xD).

As you can see in some of the photos, the roof really needed renewal. Some of the wooden planks underneath the roof plates were rotten, rainwater was leaking into the cabins and the tin roof plates were old and grey.

 Dominic's first step was to stabilise the cabin. He poured gravel underneath the cabin and he made the building leveled by putting pillars underneath the cabin.

A small week after Dominic started his project, he finished the work underneath the cabin and could start on the top of the cabin. We went out to Telegraph Cove to load all the new roof plates onto a boat. That boat belongs to Jim Borrowman. A good friend of the sanctuary. He was so kind to help us with the transportation of the long roof plates from Telegraph Cove to the sanctuary. The next day, they arrived at the sanctuary with the boat full of bright red tin roof plates. Later that day, after unloading everything, the sanctuary team moved the plates from the dock to the beach.

Once everything was ashore, Dominic could start on tearing down the old plates. Which was a struggle, since the old plates were attached to the solar panels. Therefore, he "split" the roof in two halfs, so that he first renewed the first half of the roof and after that was done, the second half. He did this, so that the heavy solar panels wouldn't slip of the roof and still be attached to the other half. After the old plates were removed, Dominic located old and rotten pieces of wood from the roof, tore those out and replaced them with new wooden planks. Once the roof itself was stable, Dominic layed out insulation rolls and installed the new roof plates. Which again was a struggle, since the heavy solar panels also needed to be attached to the new plates.

Dominic really did a great job on renewing the roof and I am sure that the sanctuary will benefit from his work for a very long time!