Original subtitles

and along with my wife Angel

and our two children,

we're nearly five years into restoring

this once-abandoned chateau.

There's something quite sort of majestic about it.

Feel like you're in the clouds!

It's been demanding...

..yet truly fulfilling.

It's made me feel a bit mushy,

and, like, a bit emotional.

And, with thousands of chateaus in France,

we're not the only Brits buying into the French fairy tale.

Oh, my goodness, this is amazing!

So Angel and I are once again helping our fellow expats...

This is a big old build!

..as they embark on a brand-new set of chateau adventures.

Oh! Ah!

It'll be a roller-coaster ride...

Whoa!

Oh!

No. No.

..but no matter what...

I'm just going to try not to cry.

..these plucky Brits...

We're doing this with all the technological accomplishment

of the ancient Egyptians.

..are determined to transform once-unloved buildings...

..into the most spectacular homes...

That is amazing.

..and live the dream as custodians of their very own castles.

Today...

..we revisit some familiar faces...

We need to get these big branches out.

This is the biggest bit of branch,

and then we've got an awful lot of logging to do on the other side.

..who have plenty to do to impress their first winter guests.

It's absolutely freezing today and there's snow possible tomorrow,

so I'm feeling a bit anxious, just a tiny bit stressed

that we're not going to get everything done in time.

One couple are looking to reach new heights...

We've got to do some proper construction today, haven't we?

..as they start renovating the last room in their chateau.

We definitely don't want to get a heavy object jammed above our heads.

And new chateau owners get a dose of reality...

Oh, my... Oh.

That is really full.

..as they start work on a massive project.

I don't really know yet what I'm supposed to be jack hammering.

Maybe I should find that out.

I'm Dick Strawbridge, and along with my wife Angel...

Oh! The sewage pipe!

..we're busy all year round running our chateau as a home and business.

LAUGHTER

Autumn and winter are tough - we have to do all the jobs

we can't do when we're hosting guests in the summer.

This is... This is a big moment.

And there's always unexpected challenges to overcome.

I need things to happen in a timely manner,

otherwise I'm going to have a heart attack.

I just really, really, really hope it grows.

Across France, there are lots of Brits in the same boat.

For new chateau owners,

they also have to cope with building up their business.

Like Lincolnshire couple Tim and Rebecca

and their two children, who we first met a year ago...

..after they spent £380,000

on the once-dilapidated Chateau de la Ruche.

I think we've had lots of moments where we've thought,

"What have we done?" Definitely. Yeah.

Not in a kind of, "I don't want to do this," sense.

But in a kind of, "Crikey, have we taken on

"a bit more than we could chew?" kind of sense. Yeah.

Located just 50 miles from us in the Pays de la Loire region...

This is going to be a bathroom. Right.

..last summer, they began renovating two out of the five guest rooms

to start running the place as a B&B.

There's an ever so slight gradient up. Ever so slight?

It proved trickier than they thought.

Hang on, there's quite a lot of water

leaking out of this tap, Tim, right now.

However, all their hard work eventually paid off

as they transformed four derelict rooms

into two beautiful high-end suites...

..and welcomed their first guests.

You're welcome to use this room at any time.

Wow, it's absolutely gorgeous. It's amazing.

Now winter is here, bookings have slowed down.

They haven't had any guests for over three months,

and are financially struggling.

We are into loans from both sets of our parents,

currently, and the credit card.

It's kind of survival mode.

We're kind of eking things out to get us through to next spring.

However, with Christmas fast approaching,

Tim and Rebecca have some good news.

We've got some guests coming this weekend,

so our first winter guests, bless them.

These guys are coming over from the UK for three nights.

It's a really important step for us.

For any business, it's all about reputation.

Tim and Rebecca need the chateau to look its best.

But as their guests arrive tomorrow,

they need to get their skates on.

I can't feel my hands already. I think this is a good thing.

First task is to clear the grounds of recent storm damage.

Right, who's driving?

So they've drafted live-in mate and helper Dale.

Come on.

The worst-hit area is the entrance to the driveway,

which is nearly three quarters of a mile away.

OK. Now you can get out.

We had a freak storm, basically ripped a tree out,

almost out of the ground.

And it crashed through, of all the places, through my gate,

which I wasn't very happy about.

Today we've got to clear away the branches that are in the ditch

and on the drive, and get it kind of back into the woods.

So let's start at the bottom.

CHAINSAW BUZZES

This is a good workout! I'm knackered already.

And it's a case of all hands - and paws - to the pump.

Go on. Take it away.

I don't need it left here.

Being outside is nice.

We've been doing a lot of inside work,

so getting outdoors for a bit is good fun.

Can you get this bit off?

Tim seems to be enjoying the challenge, as does Dale.

Ride it! Ride it! Yes.

But there's a lot more clearing up to do

if they want the place ready for their winter guests.

We need to get these big branches out.

This is the biggest bit of branch,

and then we've got an awful lot of logging to do on the other side.

300 miles away, in south-east France,

lies the stunning 13th century Chateau de Rosieres.

It has 20 rooms and is set in an incredible 130 acres of land.

The lucky new owners are Brit Amy and French husband Marc,

who moved in last year.

It was so clear to us when we came to visit here

that this was the right place.

We were looking for history with the land

and the potential to do something...

If I could just translate that,

we had no idea what we were looking for.

We just wanted somewhere that spoke to us and was magical, basically.

So, history and gardens and stuff. Yeah. Yeah. That's what I said.

Located an hour and a half's drive from Lyon,

it's a dream come true for writer Amy and French farmer Marc,

who met by chance seven years ago.

I went on holiday with my mum and I happened to bump into Marc there,

who was running a hydroponic lettuce farm, as you do.

He just kept suggesting activities for us to do together,

and so my mum kept coming along on all of them

and we actually nearly drowned her on one of them.

Yeah. I didn't manage. No!

We got married about a year later.

They now want to start a new life in France,

running a B&B and hosting yoga retreats.

Before they can start work inside the chateau,

they need to replace the old, defunct sewage system.

Oh, my... Oh!

That is really full.

Their plan is to put a brand-new one in themselves

with the help of their own excavator.

But until they replace a damaged caterpillar track,

they can't start digging.

Apparently, I have to clean this.

Not totally sure why.

But I suppose it makes the caterpillar track

come off more easily!

Marc tends to get the technical jobs,

and I get the brute force jobs cos I'm the muscle.

I'm supervising my workforce.

You're very cheeky.

It's a tricky job, so they've brought in friend Manu to help them.

The last time we had to do this,

it took us about two hours to get it off.

To release the track, they have to unscrew the retaining bot.

MANU ASKS A QUESTION IN FRENCH

But the bolt's not moving.

We might have...a 24 of this kind.

While Marc goes in search of more tools...

..Amy has a go.

I'm going to try anyway.

SHE STRAINS

Hey! Oh! It moved!

It's moving, I'm doing it.

Is it working? Yes. Oh, well done.

Just a little bit.

First prize for a digger technology today goes to me!

Nice one, Amy.

All they have to do now is take the old track off...

Yeah!

..and put the new one on.

Is it...? Ah, yeah. Perfect. Yeah.

Bravo. Did it!

Good teamwork, Amy.

SHE LAUGHS

With the excavator up and running, Marc can start digging trenches.

It's just the start of a much bigger plan.

They want to create giant eco-friendly filter beds

at the edge of the forest to purify their waste.

We've been digging two ponds right down at the bottom of the slope,

and the ponds will have gravel and then reeds planted in it,

and the reeds will digest the sewage,

and any clean overflow water will just flow into the forest.

That's how the system works.

The more difficult bit, and the bit we're a bit...

..concerned about getting right

is moving the sewage from all the buildings.

Connecting pipes from the chateau 100 m down a slope to the waste pond

is going to be an epic task.

If we don't do this task, then we can't set up bed and breakfast,

we can't set up a retreat centre, we can't do anything,

because until you've sorted a fundamental like the sewage,

you ain't going anywhere.

Coming up...

Where are we going to have a disco ball?

..more familiar faces return as they begin their next renovation project.

We are working at serious height.

We'll be 13 m off the ground. Yeah.

There can be no room... There can be no room for error.

..Rebecca gets creative to win over her guests...

I just want their whole kind of weekend to be

really treatful and beautiful.

..and Amy and Marc start the next stage of their sewage masterplan.

Marc convinced me to rent this boring machine

to drill holes in the bedrock of the house.

In north-west France lies the beautiful

19th-century 45-room Chateau de la Grande Maison...

..located a stone's throw from the Loire Valley.

The chateau is run as a luxury guesthouse,

and is home to musicians Ben and Billie.

We really do have regular moments of going,

"Wow, this is incredible, isn't it?" And we do pinch ourselves.

You know, we might take a cup of coffee up onto the balcony

and sit in the sun and look out at the land and the river...

That is really special. ..and just say, "This is incredible."

Last time we followed them, they transformed the chateau's

south wing, with a bit of help from yours truly.

That is a talking piece. Yeah.

They created an events venue...

..and dining area...

Thank you, everyone, for coming.

..which proved to be a great success.

Now that it's winter and quieter,

they want to renovate the chateau's final untouched room...

..the old library, where they're planning to start hosting

book club events in three months.

The problem is, it's been used as a dumping ground

ever since they moved in.

Getting into that room at the moment is a bit like mountaineering,

I think. If there is something you need,

you would have to climb over a hell of a lot of boxes and junk.

And what is all that stuff in there? I've no idea.

Before they can do anything, they need to clear the room out.

When are we going to have a disco? THEY LAUGH

There's some quite interesting cupboards,

which are original to the house.

I actually haven't seen that before.

That's, erm...

What is that?

Is that that? Is that moving, Billie?

Yeah, there's a metal arm up there.

This is the mechanism for opening and closing the window.

It will be possible to maybe get that working again,

just to open the internal window.

It's a nice find.

The skylight is two-tiered,

and is the only source of natural light,

as the room has no other windows.

Several weeks later, with the old library cleared

and walls plastered...

..Ben now needs to replace the top window with

a heavy-duty 100 kg piece of glass he picked up for £250.

It weighs an absolute ton, doesn't it?

As it's going to sit on the roof,

the only way to get it up there is through the skylight itself.

So they've brought in some friends to help out.

We've got to do some proper construction today, haven't we?

Me and Ben have been planning this for about three weeks,

how we're going to do it. We're working at a serious height.

We'll be 13 metres off the ground... Yeah.

We're going to be five metres from the roof to this floor.

There can be no room for error.

It's dizzying heights, however,

all of Ben's mates are experienced tradesmen, so he's in safe hands.

The boys are constructing a frame to hoist up the heavy glass,

using an electric winch.

They've secured the glass with ropes.

It's crucial the weight is evenly spread to avoid the risk

of it falling out.

OK, there, there will do.

All right, keep going up.

Having got it up safely, they now have to fit the glass in place.

Just try and keep it around the outside.

OK, towards me, then.

It's got to come this way a bit.

Whoa.

OK, hold it there, everyone. OK, I'm good here.

Great job.

The whole plan has worked seamlessly.

With only the frame of the window to seal in,

it's mission accomplished.

Wow, the light's literally glowing out of this room.

It is so much lighter in here, isn't it? Oh, yes. Fantastic.

Yay, fantastic! That's really good, really happy with that.

Stage one complete.

They now need to get the interior window working,

which could prove a lot trickier.

Over at Chateau de la Ruche,

Tim is still tidying up the driveway,

ahead of their first winter guests' arrival tomorrow.

Rebecca has an idea to make the chateau look extra special.

I'm going to go foraging for some bits and bobs

for some kind of festive, floral archway over the front door.

We have got paying guests coming,

and I want it to look amazing when they rock up.

I love decorating the house for Christmas,

it's one of my favourite things, so, yeah, really looking forward to it.

Foraging is one of Angel's favourite pastimes.

OK, brilliant.

Throughout the year, she collects a host of things from our garden

to help bring our chateau to life.

That's good, we are getting somewhere.

And there's no time more special than winter.

It is just such a lovely, easy, cost-effective way

to make your house into a bit of a winter wonderland.

Rebecca obviously shares Angel's passion.

What am I doing? Am I up a tree?

And there's one festive plant she's on the lookout for.

Mistletoe.

We've got loads of mistletoe, actually, and this is

a really good tree for it. But there's quite a lot everywhere.

Right, I might see how far I get with that lot, and then...

..I can always come back and get some more.

Hello, my love. Hello, do you want a kiss?

I can't stop. SHE LAUGHS

Do you want me to stop? Oh, OK.

Here you go.

Ugh, you've got a wet beard.

At Chateau de la Ruche, Rebecca can finally get cracking.

I have no idea if this is going to work.

Last year, I made an absolutely beautiful wreath,

and it was huge, and it was lovely.

But I'd forgotten that the door was a double door, so I made it all,

and then said to Tim, "Can you put this on the front door?"

And we came out here and then realised that we had

a double door, so, we put it on and basically,

the door was completely unusable, and the only way you could

get out of the house was by ducking down

and crawling underneath the wreath.

Which is fine if you're us,

not so fine if you've got paying guests coming in.

Rebecca's going to make sure there's no repeat with her archway.

There's going to be a lot of cable ties, initially,

to get the initial structure.

And then, hopefully, I'll be able to weave a few sticks through.

I need it to be strong, because I need it to withstand weather.

OK.

That's a start.

I feel like it's slightly...

When the guests arrive, I just want them to be, kind of, wowed.

And for it to be really festive-looking and special.

And it's kind of their first impression of the chateau,

really, and I just want their whole weekend to be really treatful

and beautiful, so, hopefully,

this will, kind of, set the tone for it.

Fingers crossed, Rebecca.

Over at Chateau de Rosieres...

..new owners Amy and Marc are putting in a new

eco-friendly sewage system.

While Marc continues to dig trenches outside,

inside, plumbers have started laying new waste pipes that will

connect to a central one in the entrance hall,

which presents its own raft of problems.

We need to be able to get the pipe through the house

and out of the building.

And Marc convinced me that the only way to do this was to rent

this boring machine to drill holes in the bedrock of the house.

To operate the machine, experts have been employed,

as they need to drill down over a metre through the wall.

Going to go just through the corner of the floor,

and you see, where he's pointing it, it's going through

actual bedrock, rather than the stones of the house.

It's a nice piece of kit.

It's designed to extract a core of material in its cylinder.

What's that made of? Is that the actual rock?

We have the first layer of concrete here, which will be the edge

of the wall, and here, we are hitting the rock, yeah. Oh.

It's going to be a long, BORING job.

Oh, my God.

Boring? Great pun, Marc.

Although it's no laughing matter...

..as their experts don't appear to realise the drill

isn't long enough to go through the wall and out the other side.

So far, they have managed to drill

1m20 with the bore.

But the wall is probably about 1m80 thick,

so we are going to have to finish breaking the wall

with the jackhammer.

So now, they have to try and meet the internal hole from the outside.

Actually, I don't really know, yet,

what I'm supposed to be jackhammering.

Maybe I should find that out.

Yeni?

I actually have absolutely no idea where anything's coming out,

so I'm just randomly drilling holes in the wall at the moment.

SHE GROANS

I'm very determined not to be defeated by this.

It seems Amy is not the only one who doesn't know where the hole is.

Basically, they dug it at a much steeper angle than I expected,

and so I think they've gone too low under the bedrock.

I rarely understand much of what's going on, so...

..I'm just rolling with it.

Using a collection of drills,

they try to see how much further down the hole is.

I think I can hear the sound of his drill bit going through

the borehole, so we might be very near to joining the holes.

Yeah, yeah!

It worked! Woohoo!

We found the hole!

So, he felt the drill bit on this side from the other side,

so we have managed to connect.

What we are going to do now is put another borer from the other side,

and do another borehole from the outside.

While the machine does the rest,

Amy and Marc breathe a huge sigh of relief.

You can see light through the hole.

At the end of the tunnel.

THEY LAUGH

Coming up...

You forget that the room's -3, so is the radiator, innit?

Tim and Rebecca's guests risk being left in the cold.

Feeling a bit anxious, just, and a tiny bit stressed

that we're not going to get everything done in time.

I catch up with Ben and Billie...

Show me how much it moves the bar.

Oh, yeah!

..to help them with the next part of the skylight.

Aw, that's cool.

Can you imagine going and trying buying one of these?

And Amy and Marc's new challenge could get very messy.

It's really important that we glue it well, or we get leaks.

Erm... We don't really want sewage leaks

in the walls of the house.

At Chateau la Grande Maison...

..Ben and Billie are restoring their old library

to host book club events.

They've put in the first part of their two-tiered skylight.

Now they need to get the interior window working...

..so I'm checking in to see how they're getting on.

Hi, Dick. Hey, Dick. How you doing?

Oh, good, thank you. Good, thanks, yeah. Nice to see you.

Progressing well. First things first, where are you?

We're in the library.

Done loads already. We had great fun putting, er...

That's over 100kg, that window. We had great fun putting that in.

So what our plan is now, with the window,

is to leave the top window fixed and get the inner window working.

And you're going to put a mechanism in that so it opens?

There is a centre mech... The centre window.

Oh, that's the only bit that opens? Only the middle part of it? Yeah.

It lifts upwards, correct?

So you're looking at the top side, there?

Yeah, we're looking at the top. Good. So that opens like that.

Ah, couldn't get easier than that, could it? I don't know,

can we get the mechanism working that's in the cupboard? Yeah.

Yeah, shall I show you this mechanism? This is the fun bit.

Because it looks great. If it worked, that would be even better.

And so we showed you earlier, um...the bar.

So that bar moves up and down.

And it's controlled by this mechanism in the cupboard.

Oh, you have to love it.

It's a lovely thing, isn't it?

When you turn it, how much does it move?

Make it go up and down.

OK, I'm just lifting off the catch.

OK, here we go.

Now I've hit the cupboard with the handle, so what do I do?

Lock that on, and then reposition that?

It's a little bit tricky at the moment

because the cupboard is in the way

for the handle to go all the way around. It's kind of...

What you have to do there, mate, get a ratchet one that goes on there.

Oh, yeah, yes, that's a good idea.

An old car ratchet, you'll find one on the Internet or somewhere,

cheap as chips for that size.

By putting the ratchet over the top of that, you can go chug-chug-chug,

which means it can be permanently in place. Yeah, I understand.

If you have something that you have to remove,

it gets lost, it doesn't get used.

Can you show me how much it moves the bar?

Oh, yeah! We've got bar movement.

I'm jealous.

Do you know what's really interesting?

I've actually got a mechanism a bit like that

I bought at a vide grenier.

I didn't know what it was, so, down in my workshop at the minute,

I've got something that looks a bit like that.

Hold. Don't go away. Don't go away.

Hold the line a second, hold on. Yeah, no problem.

I'm always buying stuff that could come in useful.

As, when you own a chateau, you just never know.

The handle idea was really good for the mechanism. Yes. Yeah.

It could be a ratchet. Yeah.

If we can't find a ratchet, we could always make an extension.

Hello!

Hi.

Look what I've got!

Oh, wow. Very similar.

Oh, that's cool. Great.

I bought it for two euros in a vide grenier,

and I bought it because it had "JM"

and a mate of mine is called Jim Milner. That's great.

So you bought it without knowing what it was?

You just thought, "Well, that looks interesting"?

I wasn't quite sure what it was, I thought it was for lifting things.

But the mechanism makes sense now that I've seen yours.

Yeah, great, brilliant. So we've solved a mystery as well.

That's brilliant.

But be very aware about getting rid of anything,

because one day - one day - you will need it.

Yeah. Have to got and try...

Can you imagine going and trying buying one of these?

Yeah. Yeah! THEY LAUGH

They don't make them like that any more.

So your window now, and all of that side of life, that looks brilliant.

Thank you very much. Listen, lovely to talk to you, you take care.

Speak to you soon, be good.

Take care, bye. Cheers, bye, Dick. Bye.

Cheers.

I tell you what, it's really nice to find someone else

as excited about our mechanism.

Got someone to talk to about my mechanism now.

Over at Chateau de la Ruche, the temperatures have plummeted,

and Tim and Rebecca's first winter guests are due tomorrow.

Ready for heavy lifting? Whoa!

The old oil-fired boiler that heats up the guest wing

hasn't been started in months, so the rooms are freezing.

That's cold, innit? Oh! THEY LAUGH

It's really...

You forget that the room's minus three, so's the radiator, innit?

Before they can turn the boiler on,

Tim's brought in mate Dale to help connect up the radiators.

The heating is very important,

which is why I wanted to get it done this morning,

so we've got plenty of time to heat it up,

because it's absolutely freezing today.

I'm feeling a bit anxious and a tiny bit stressed

that we're not going to get everything done in time.

Oh, my God! HE LAUGHS

Ugh...

The original cast-iron radiators weigh a tonne,

and they need to be plumbed in carefully.

With all the radiators in and sealed,

it's down to the boiler room to start pumping water though them.

Dale? Yeah?

Do you want to run upstairs quick and keep an eye on those three rads?

Yes.

Here's hoping for no leaks.

So the...the noise has just changed.

Which means...

I don't know what it means.

But when the noise changes, it means the system's started to fill up.

HISSING

I am just releasing the pressure in the radiator,

so all the air can get out.

Is he still up here? Tim? Yeah?

Are you still getting air out of yours?

With all the air out, the system is now filled with water.

Let's hope there's no puddles.

I'm down in the Honey Suite. Oh, OK.

With three separate floors to negotiate, there's lots to check.

Did you get water out of the one in the Garden Room bathroom or not?

I forget the names. I've only been here a year.

HISSING

I'm now hearing water running into the rad.

The old switcheroo.

This room is the Garden Room,

so this is where we've got guests this weekend.

So this rad really needs to work.

Are they all done up here now, Dale?

Ooh! It's got water!

Oh, nice.

It's looking good.

Water is being pumped into the radiators.

The challenge now is getting the boiler working to heat them up.

The boiler's old.

They're very simple and all it does is blast diesel into it

and set it on fire, as long as the old beast fires up.

After sitting idle for almost a year, it's crunch time.

If it doesn't work, they may end up losing their imminent booking.

BOILER HUMS

BOILER RUMBLES Wahey!

That's two noises - again, I don't know what they mean.

One noise, it starts, then the next noise is proper growling.

You can hear that now.

It's so good that you can actually see the flames of the boiler.

Yeah, you can see that that's burning away.

Is there heat?

Well, feel the pipe, it's not cold.

It's lukewarm. All right, come in here.

Come and get hold of this pipe.

That pipe is just slightly more than lukewarm.

Yes, that's definitely better. Yeah? OK, good.

Good work, Tim. It's a big relief all round,

and one less thing to worry about before their guests arrive.

Over at Chateau les Rosieres, Amy and Marc have finally managed

to put a sewage pipe through the outside wall.

Now they have to finish laying them inside.

This is my.... This is what's left of my office.

It's a very messy job,

as the pipes are being fitted inside the entrance hall,

and underneath floorboards on the first floor.

Thankfully, they have Stefan the plumber

to do most of the hard graft.

This is the junction.

This room is eventually going to be another bathroom,

and so it's Stefan's idea that we put the junctions in now,

even though it's going to be maybe another year

until we do the renovations here,

to save us having to rip up the floor again.

Stefan's our best friend.

It's a smart move, but now Amy and Marc need to get involved,

to help connect the pipes between floors.

We might need you to lift it when we fit it in. Yeah.

And then we'll tell you to push.

OK. OK, thank you.

Because it's going between the two floors,

it needs three of us to push the pipe together to glue it.

It's really important that we glue it well, or we get leaks.

Um, and we really don't want sewage leaks in the walls of the house.

Marc and Stefan line up the pipes from below...

..while Amy prepares to push from the first floor.

Ooh-ooh!

To make these joints work,

Stefan's not being shy with the glue.

There's no...

No way back now.

Now?

IN FRENCH:

Now?

I'm leaning. OK, it's all good.

Sorry? All good.

OK.

Well, it all seems to fit together.

Now we need to wait for it to dry completely during the night.

Um...

And hopefully we'll see if it's completely watertight.

It's quite a work of art, that.

Non. Oui.

SHE CHUCKLES

After leaving the glue overnight, it's the moment of truth.

Amy and Marc gather outside...

Vas-y.

..while Stefan pours water through the pipes.

AMY LAUGHS

Wahey-hey-hey!

Ah...

My God, that's such a relief.

Just think of all the poo that's going to come running down there.

We are one step closer to being eco-friendly.

It's a great start, but with more trenches to dig, pipes to lay,

and sewage ponds to build, this huge project has only just got going.

Coming up...

Get the chains back up, we're ready to test it out.

..it's the moment of truth for Ben and Billie...

Does it open? Does it work?

I haven't tried it yet.

..and Tim and Rebecca face a race against time

before their guests arrive.

Slightly-y-y-y...stressed.

Just feels like there's quite a lot to do right now.

At Chateau la Grande Maison...

How are you getting on? Looking good.

..Ben and Billie are preparing to put the internal part

of the skylight back up in the library.

Rest them on here, lift it up

and then just lift it into the slot on the way up.

The 19th-century frame needs new glass panels,

but first Ben has to get it in place.

I'm really very worried about getting it stuck on the way up,

cos when we got it down it was incredibly tight. I measured it

earlier today and there's literally 1-2mm of clearance.

We definitely don't want to get a heavy object

jammed above our heads 3.5m off the ground.

To help get the frame up there, he's brought in his mate,

also called Ben... OK. It's definitely the right way round.

..and built a scaffold to ensure it's easier to lift into place.

Wear it like a pair of trousers.

Logic has it that if it came out...

Yes, yes, yes. That's a very good start.

..it has to be able to fit back in.

Fantastic. I've got it. Oh...

It's gone in? Yeah.

OK? Yeah.

It's looking promising.

Although having screwed in one part of the frame,

they now realise it's not level.

Maybe we do need a mallet.

If in doubt, bring out a hammer.

OK. Brilliant, Ben. Brilliant.

That's superb.

There's been so much work in this area of the room,

it's been incredible.

He's not quite finished yet, as he needs to add a ventilation

system as the glass on the roof is fixed.

That will fit perfectly, you may need to fit

the hose from the other side but that's going to be great.

But it will all be for nothing

if once all the glass is in he can't get the mechanism working.

Get the chains back up and ready to test it out.

After working tirelessly to transform their old crumbling

skylight, it's the moment of truth for Ben and Billie.

Oh! Oh, gosh!

It's really nice, isn't it? Lovely!

I love it. Does it open?

Does it work? I haven't tried it yet.

Do you want to try it?

All right. OK. Are you going to lift it?

Ahhh!

Up she goes!

I think that's about the highest, I think.

It's so much lighter than it used to be, it's really good.

Really, really good. I love it.

So much work in that little square, 1.5 metre square.

It's a positive start, but there's a lot of hard work

ahead before this room is ready to host a book club.

At Chateau de la Ruche, Tim and Rebecca's first paying winter guests

are due in a couple of hours.

I want to lay up the table for dinner,

so that's all done before they arrive. OK.

With word-of-mouth so vital to any new chateau business,

every detail of their guests' stay has to be perfect.

Sorry for walking on your stairs!

Now it's a race against time to get the guest wing spick-and-span.

Just looking and thinking, what do I need to do?

Slightly...stressed.

It just feels like there's quite a lot to do right now.

Getting a sweat on. The heating's on and the house is actually warm,

this is how real people live.

Real people with heating and money.

Is there time for a mistletoe kiss?

At least your beard's not sweaty today.

I do the making pretty, Tim doesn't do making pretty.

He doesn't get it. He can clean while I make pretty.

He may not do pretty, but at least he does hoovering!

Right. Job done.

Just as well, as here are the guests.

We could do with music in here. Yeah.

KNOCK ON DOOR

Hiya, how you doing?

You can chill now. Yeah. Good.

Come on up.

This is your room. Gosh, thank you.

You're very welcome. Oh, my God, it's beautiful.

Thank you. We're not leaving! THEY LAUGH

It's kind of up your street, isn't it? Yeah, literally.

Oh, my gosh, the taps! I never thought I'd love taps.

THEY LAUGH

Good. So, if you want to just get settled in and then pop downstairs

to the salon, you can have a little drink and something to eat

and chill. OK. Thank you.

LAUGHTER

After the travel that we've had...

To get here. Sitting here in front of the fire...

It has all been worth it.

It's stunning, everything is immaculate,

everything's been so thought-out. Yeah.

It's going to be an amazing three days. We're going to be coming back!

SHE LAUGHS Definitely going to come back.

I don't think you can get any more complementary than that.

Rebecca's extra special touches, both inside and out,

have proved to be a big hit.

I was really pleased with their reaction when they arrived.

That's the thing I love most, seeing people's faces

when they arrive and them kind of getting it. It's another step

towards where we need to be. It feels like all the hard work

we've done is worthwhile.

It's just amazing. Really amazing.

It's good. Good job. Yeah, good job.

Good job, well done. Well done.

Hear, hear!

Fingers crossed more winter guests start coming soon.

Next time... Billie?

..Ben and Billie make an amazing discovery...

Almost perfect. Oh, my gosh!

No! That's perfect!

..and call on Angela to lend a hand.

Like an old face coming back for tea with a trailer!

Mind the chandeliers.

Tim and Rebecca start their next renovation...

There's definitely worse jobs.

..but don't always see eye-to-eye.

Do you not like it? No.

What don't you like about it? Well, everything.

And Amy and Mark continue work on their monster project.

We have a digger.

How hard can it be?

Subtitles by Red Bee Media