Solar: Two Years On

Two years on we are still generating solar power, and the 'trees planted' are mounting up (although they appear to have changed the method of calculation at some point during the year so the numbers here have leapt up!):

Our best performing day for solar generation was 14th May 2020 when we generated 26.13 Kilowatt Hours (kW-h), with the month of May remaining the highest month for overall solar generation. Below are the Top 10 and Bottom 10 dates for solar generation throughout the year.  May dominates the top 10, and as last year most of the bottom 10 dates are near the shortest day of the year.

Date	Watt Hours		Date	Watt Hours
14/05/2020	26,133		12/12/2019	263
01/06/2020	25,268		12/11/2019	338
05/05/2020	25,254		11/01/2020	339
11/07/2020	25,129		18/12/2019	357
20/07/2020	25,125		07/01/2019	379
31/05/2020	24,931		26/12/2019	426
25/05/2020	24,881		28/02/2020	473
30/05/2020	24,835		13/12/2019	479
20/05/2020	24,701		02/01/2020	549
29/05/2020	24,675		14/01/2020	617

This is how the years compare.   In the summer months, the trimming of the Yew Tree may have helped to boost solar generation earlier in the day, but it isn't really possible to make direct comparisons from one year to the next as generation is of course hugely dependent on the weather.

Month	2018/19 Generated kW-h	2019/20 Generated kW-h
October	206.419	179.489
November	87.261	79.224
December	32.87	48.374
January	62.46	62.145
February	175.996	124.181
March	283.345	354.99
April	393.949	491.76
May	489.449	622.559
June	401.437	417.704
July	445.908	426.441
August	404.56	354.619
September	337.506	368.342
Total	3321.16	3529.828

And here is the required graph!

A Good Day

With our holiday weeks drawing to an end - and after a busy few days cleaning, tidying, gardening, cutting hedges etc. - decided on another trip 'out' - this time a (pre-booked) day trip to Powis Castle.

We've been really lucky with the weather so far, and today did not disappoint, with another day of glorious sunshine, so the gardens were looking their very best (no access to the Castle itself still):

Also took the opportunity to pop in to the nearby Coed-y-Dinas store / garden centre on our way home for a browse round.

Must say I'm not sure why anyone would want a gorilla in their garden, but it was good to see that he was wearing his mask!

Back home again, and as it was still dry, sunny, and relatively calm decided to light the bonfire (which had built up again with garden waste, hedge clippings and various bits of rotten shed panelling / old leylandii).  

We'd scattered the hedge debris around the fire pit to help it all dry out a bit - but it still looked like far too much for one bonfire:

It did turn into a longer job than we'd planned, but it was a nice evening so we stuck with it - ate our dinner by the fire, had a drink, and watched the stars come out.

By 9pm we were down to the dying embers, and had actually managed to burn the lot - time to shower off the smoke, and pour a glass of wine!

Out and About

September holidays - and with some sense that normal service is resuming, decided we would take a break and actually go 'away'!

Booked ourselves a Travelodge in Portishead on the Bristol Channel, and headed off for three days of sun, sea and sightseeing. 

 
Stopped off at Clifton on the way, walked round Portishead taking in the views (and the graffiti) and fitted in a return trip to Tyntesfield (which had to be pre-booked, and was all very one-way and socially distanced):

Also had a day trip to Clevedon - with its pier, and marine pool (really missing the opportunity to go swimming back home, but unfortunately hadn't brought my bathing gear).

All in all it was a nice few days - we mostly ate / drank in beer gardens (kind of regretted the one trip to a too-busy Wetherspoons) so it all felt safe enough - and the weather was remarkably kind.

At the same time we were glad to be going home again.

Stopped off for a final (pre-booked) visit to Duffryn Gardens - then back to the safety of our little bit of Wales.

DIY Pizza Oven

As part of the #kitchencourtyardredesign we had been considering options for a barbecue installation - then, somewhere online, we saw a DIY pizza oven that someone had made by piling up old bricks, so decided to combine the two . . .

And here we have it - lots of clay bricks, the grills from a defunct barbecue, and a roof of more bricks sitting on some spare aluminium greenhouse struts, topped off with a couple of spare concrete roof tiles.

All built on top of a 'table' structure made from breeze blocks and a paving slab.  Almost everything was stuff we already had - although did pay a few quid for the (reclaimed) bricks.

So, it was:
a) cheap
b) almost entirely recycled
c) easy to construct, dismantle and move
d) somewhere to use up twiggy bits of wood that are a bit small for the log burner . . .

. . . and it made great pizza!

Storm Francis

And on top of everything else - the storms are back . . .  Francis has done its worst, which was mainly to bring down part of the ornamental 'palm' in the back garden (itself a reincarnation of one we lost to our last really snowy winter back in 2010).

On the whole we escaped the worst of it, and as you can see there is still a healthy offshoot, so the palm isn't done for yet.  We also avoided a scheduled 'switch off' for network maintenance as electricity crews were too busy dealing with the fall out of the storm.

Here's hoping for a quieter end to the year weather-wise!

DIY Fire Pit

Ended up dismantling this as part of our '#kitchencourtyardredesign' - which revealed an old and very rusty domed cauldron, with a small hole in the base.

It rolled around the courtyard for a bit while we considered what else we might plant in it, then we had that 'eureka' moment - what about a fire pit?

Cleaned off the worst of the rust, and propped it up on some bricks (with its handy air hole at the bottom).

Then - serendipitously - found that an old rusty metal parasol base, that was also knocking round the garden, fitted exactly on the top as a lid for a rainy day!

Time for a test firing . . .

. . . and looking good!

#kitchencourtyardredesign

Still working on it, but the kitchen courtyard is looking a lot tidier - some flower planting, pots with herbs, and even a water feature.  A much nicer place to sit out and enjoy the evening sunshine!