Cottage opening weekend
Clearing months of closed-up air out of a seasonal property in a day.
The first thing you notice walking into a cottage in May is the smell, and it tells you something before you have looked at anything. Closed-up air is normal after a winter. Closed-up air with a damp edge to it is a message.
So the order of operations matters. Open everything first — every window, every door, the crawlspace hatch if you have one — and let it move for an hour before you decide anything. Then go looking for water: under sinks, behind the toilet, around window frames, the crawlspace, the underside of mattresses. A smell that comes back after you have aired the place out is a moisture problem, and no pouch fixes a moisture problem.
Once you are satisfied it is just winter air, work through the closed spaces. Strip and wash the linens. Stand the mattresses on edge for the day. Empty the pantry of anything that overwintered and wipe the shelves. Open the cupboards, the wardrobes and the bunk storage and leave them open while you work.
Then place pouches in the spaces that stay closed once you leave: one per bedroom closet, one in the pantry, one in each bunk storage bay, and two in a basement or crawlspace at floor level. That is where the air sits still between visits.
The more useful habit is at the other end of the season. Fresh pouches in those same spots on the weekend you lock up in the fall, with the cupboards left ajar, is what makes next May’s arrival a better one.