unexpected detour

I said good bye to my hosts last Wednesday, and to Julien and Vivien too.  It is definitely the end of any project together, the three thing was just too difficult, though I would be more than happy if Julien were to end up with a plot of land next to mine.  One of my most enjoyable and eye opening visits of my journey so far.  So many things achieved, so many things possible, with an open heart and a sense of sharing and participation for everyone who visits, what a great place.  I am sad to leave.

Though on what an adventure.  My brother has been hankering for me to visit him since he moved earlier this summer, though I have declined, believing that his new life is his project and he should decide what route he needs to take.  He had a dramatic journey by car from the Midlands to his new home, with break-downs causing his journey to take over two  weeks rather than the 48 hours originally planned, though that is another story.  

He moved to Portugal earlier this year, to a large plot of land in which stands a ruin and the remnants of some very productive horticultural land.  I am aching to visit to see what he has bought with his partner MIchael and am already desparately telling myself not to get too involved.  I know that they have a list a million questions long for me and I can’t wait to hear their stories, see the land and stay with them in their tiny caravan and help out for the next three weeks.  There is no phone, no WIFI, no electricity or running water, it’s back to basics and from all accounts, so far, they are loving every moment of their new life.  Watch this space for what I discover, as I shall update you when I return to the modern world.

donkey stables

I am less than 24 hours from being out of computer contact for three weeks and have too much to tell you.

This is what Vivien, Julien and I managed to build in two weeks, on helpX hours, with a little guidance from Jean Francoise.  His advice changed like the wind as he adapted the design as he went, adding or altering specifications and requirements as the project evolved.  An interesting way of working and with a well equipped woodworking workshop at our disposal, little alterations didn’t need to take for ever to complete.  Our competence with hand tools and big machines increased dramatically during this project and the result was satisfying for everyone. 

as close as I got to a before photo

not sure of the correct technical term in english but the french call 

them "jambes de force" (legs of strength)  which works for me.

not tongue and groove but good enough to be a weather proof stable

roof detail

waiting patiently

beauregard

During the last few years I have discussed countless projects and possibilities with people, all of whom have done a few of these things.  Whether it be pizza and bread making, cultivating fruit, keeping bees, building with local materials, renovating old buildings, making a bread oven, drying fruit and vegetables, keeping poultry and sheep, working wood, mending mechanical things such as rotavators, bicycles, food processors and motorbikes, recycling and re-utilising discarded objects, conserving fruit and vegetables, making juices, having solar heated water, dry toilets, composting, living in yurts and caravans, storing rain water, gardening organically on a large scale with traction animals, there have been many discussions, I have gleaned many ideas for the future and made countless notes on what to and not to do in many situations.

Now I find myself at a location that has or does all of these things, it is truly amazing. The amount of time and effort that has gone into these projects over the last twenty or so years has been incredible and the fruits of this labour are a joy to behold.

Up on a hill above the ancient town of Montbrun Bocage with a view that stretches as far as the Black Mountains in one direction and the high peaks of the pyrenees in the other, there is an ancient farmhouse called “Beauregard’ and it is there that I am staying and discovering all these things.

It is the last location on our list for the summer that was decided back in June when Julian Vivien and I decided our summer route.  It hadn’t been one of my favourite choices but it  would allow us to spend some time in a new area to see if it would be a suitable place to look for land.  Jean-Francoise had written back saying that he had decided on a project that would keep us busy for a couple of weeks if we were interested and we would be welcome.  He proposed that we build a shelter for his donkeys and that was about it. So we added it to the list and arrived a week or so ago.

The family of four plus another four grown up children who come and go from time to time, plus another WWOOFer, Cecile are all really lovely people, welcoming, kind and of generous spirit in time, energy and soul.  Day to day life is full of tasks, planned or otherwise and things move along at speed.  With ten or so folk to feed there is always something needing harvested or chopped or peeled.  Hens, ducks, sheep and donkeys to be fed and watered.  Gardens to be tended to, crops to be harvested either for immediate consomation  or to be preserved for future enjoyment. Bread to be made and of course our predetermined tasks in hand.  

As a team we are progressing well with the framework for the stables, there isn’t a fully worked out plan so we consult every morning and discuss what the next steps are to be.  So far we have made more mistakes that I care to mention, although, happily recoverable from and we haven’t had to waste any wood just yet.  The errors come from miscommunication of ideas, changes of mind and further reflections that result in modifications for the future.  All are taken in good humour and with an attitude of learning, discovery and the fact that we are only, in fact, building a shelter for some beasts, not a work of art.  That said, we are paying attention to detail, trying to perfect techniques and do things to the best of our abilities, fully aware that in the not to distant future it may well be our houses that we are working on. (Well, I am anyway).

We work in the mornings, starting early, and then have the afternoons free to do whatever we wish to do.  Explore the area, read or write, go for a walk, do nothing or else participate in whatever else is going on at the time.  Cecile has different tasks and often works the afternoons, Jean-Francoise always has several additional tasks on the go, so there is always something new to get involved with and learn.  For the evening meal there is a voluntary helping out with tasks which means that meals get prepared fast, eaten at a leisurely pace, often on the terrace overlooking the valley and tidied away without fuss or bother.  It all works wonderfully and I am quietly content that I can now follow the gist of a good number of the conversations that go on during mealtimes.

the caravan where I sleep at night

solar food drier

the smartest duck shelter I have ever seen, we're going to

waterproof the roof next week with old hessian sacks and chalk render.

the dreaded asian hornet.  the sting is intensely painful ( I know)

home constructed bread oven.  made bread, pizzas for 20 people, cooked

meringues and dried figs and tomatoes from the garden

bakers tools

preparing to press apples on a grand scale

almost industrial

the big press in front of the honey and juice workshop!!

vines protected from the hornets and birds

another composting toilet

patiently waiting for their new quarters to be finished

the Sunday market at Montbrun Brocage

apple juice

Apple juice is something that I have wondered about for ages, how is it made, what do you have to do to the apples before they are pressed and how much do you get for your harvest?  I expect that commercial presses are much more high tech, but for home use what we did here was superb.  Three decent baskets of windfalls, none too bruised, the wasp and bird eaten ones are fine so long as it remains fairly clean.  A fairly robust mincer a small multipurpose press and some sterilized bottles.

We shredded the apples

Tipped them into the press

Added the top of the press with additional blocks of wood to help maintain pressure

turned the screw threaded head until the juice started to flow

continued till winding until it was too difficult and there was no more juice to flow filling bottles as we went

Opened the press, chucked the pressed apple ‘cake’ onto the compost, hosed everything down and left it to dry in the sunshine.

Easy.

artists

Claude and Susan were great hosts, they are artists, often performing as ‘Un kilo de Cirque’ and between events lead a calm and pressure free lifestyle.  No animals to look after, save a couple of horses and a cat, so no daily feeding routines and rushing around, no work schedules and times to keep, it made a great change from other more hectic hosts.  That said, they practice their routines and learn new sketches frequently, fabricate their own costumes and have just finished renovating the old barn into a community events venue, their plan is to host local events and loan the space to societies and associations as there are few local resources like that available on a regular basis.  It’d be great to be there for a dance or musical event as the building is beautiful and the sprung dancefloor just waiting for the movement of feet and music.  The opening event is next month but unfortunately I won’t be there.  Julien and Vivien are helping out for the two day event as ushers/parking attendants/general help and I shall be in portugal visiting my brother in his new home.......

Susan started life in London and has lived in france since the eighties.  It was great to spend time with someone who has spent so long here and has settled almost completely.  Many of our conversations were in french, especially if the others were involved, but often alone, her french with a definite west london accent made me smile.  She prepared us great meals and, much to the amusement of my french friends, kept us well supplied with tea at all the appropriate times and with cake or biscuits in the afternoon.  How civilised.  Proper pot with cosie, I wish I’d taken a photo now, PG Tips, though in tea bag form as they were easier to get hold of.  

Our accommodation was wonderfully comfortable and definitely different to the usual room , Julien had a wonderful gipsy caravan and I, a white van.  We were going to swap halfway through our stay but as we were both comfortable in our beds decided not to change in case it wasn’t for the better.  Vivien stayed home in his camper van as usual.

We put down new stones on the floor of the winter horses shelter to help keep their feet dry, spent a couple of good mornings clearing brush and scrub in one of the higher pastures, no bonfires as it was far too dry, but plenty of fun for whoever is there in the winter.  Collected several truck loads of heating wood and stacked it ready for the winter, I can imagine that the hall takes a fair amount of heating even if everyone brings their log contribution that is requested of them.  Put up the framework for a tack room, I guess you can call it that, somewhere to keep saddles and straps and all the paraphanalia that goes with horses.  Someone else will get the pleasure of boarding the sides and kitting the inside out when the  wood arrives.

les jardins de sortilège

Denis’ parents are an inspiration too.  His mother has created a series of demonstration gardens on the steep slopes of their land, they are open to look round and for guided tours  throughout the summer. Les Jardins de Sortilège. Each area is themed with explanations by storyboard, an illustrated booklet and if you take a tour with a guide, in-depth explanations, edible plant tastings and discussions with a friendly guide along the way.  There were medieval, medicinal, culinary and ornamental areas, collections of mints, plants for dyeing fabrics and producing fabric.  Areas that represented old curates gardens, herbalist gardens and a garden for lovers, a scented leaf geranium collection, several vegetable gardens containing rare and heirloom varieties and most surprising of all, at around 800m altitude in the mountains, a twenty five year old lemon tree, full of fruit, that survives outside with a minimum of protection throughout the year.  It gets a plastic corrugated roof in winter and is a picture of health, there must be an amazing microclimate in this tiny corner of the valley.  Denis' father is a writer, his subject matter is herbal plants, comestible, wild and useful plants and how to use them, the shop at the gardens is packed with his publications and I could easily have bought a copy of just about all of them.

Working in remote areas of the mountains is all very well, but is doing little to forward our search for land.  We chat to folk and spread the word, but as with anywhere out in the countryside, things change slowly and it’ll be by chance that we stumble upon the quantity of land that we need using these methods.  That said, the week at Denis was an emergency stopgap after fleeing the previous host in disgust, it turned out to be inspirational, educational and with the work we did, very good exercise too.

the view from my bedroom window

following the garden path

it looks dangerous but does't sting at all, just a plant that used 

to be used for dieing fabric. 

good gourd

mountain lemons

our work in progress.

above Lourdes

view from our new location.  

I climbed one of those distant peaks a couple of years ago.

 I have moved on again.  I have no idea when I will get to post this, as I am at nearly 1000m altitude, high up in the mountains above Lourdes.  The view is breathtaking, the weather good so far. but absolutely no chance of internet access and only a tiny, occasional phone signal.  It’s worth every penny.

In fact, we only found this host a week ago.  The original proposition cancelled and suggested some friends that needed help.  We contacted them and started to make arrangements but things didn’t go smoothly,  easier to abandon a host before arriving than to arrive and find things in complete disarray.. So Vivien quickly did some research and found our present location on a “Chantier Parcipatif’(a building site that welcomes others to learn and help out at the same time) website and there was a positive response within an hour of us asking if we would be welcome.

Our hosts are renovating a fabulous old barn situated several miles from the last village of the valley, way up high, accessed by a dirt track that becomes practically inaccessible in winter.  They, husband, wife and daughter live here part time in the summer, flying in from their current home in Martinique.  This summer they have friend staying with them for the season. Running water is from the nearby stream and for the moment there is electricity when the generator is running.  It is used whilst there is a need for power tools and produces enough extra to chill the fridges, charge lights, mobile phones and run a dilapidated old washing machine.

summer kitchen, shelter and shower room OR car port in winter

the encampment with restored barn in al its glory

Several days later........

We should have been a bit more wary about the mega fast response requesting us to come and help, also the fact that there were no other willing hands about.  It’s not that the place was chaotic, far from it, it was one of the neatest well thought out building sites I have been on so far.  The difficulty that we stumbled upon was one of communication.  Our host was 60% or more deaf and not attuned to building sites or giving directions, his friend was more than willing to dispense advice, whether asked for or not and took every opportunity to direct us, even when we had already been given tasks to complete.  With the generator running almost constantly, plus power tools, chain saws and hammering it was difficult for anyone to have a decent conversation, let alone an in-depth discussion on the finer points of construction detail.  In addition for me, the second language and two new and interesting accents to contend with made even light going a challenge.  So you can imagine how smoothly things went.

Suffice to say, after three exceedingly frustrating days of miscommunications, along with the heated discussions between our two ‘bosses’ as to who was in control, the fact that we could have decided ourselves how to do several of the tasks easier, cheaper and with a more robust result, we decided to leave.  A week early.

Our hosts were surprised and individually both strangely sympathetic to our plight and apologetic for the behaviour and attitude of the other.  Neither really got the gist that it was of their making and will probably continue in the same vein in the future.  An interesting week that did little to forward our cause in finding land, but a great deal in learning about communication skills, taking control and team guidance.  Duly noted as we move on for an unexpected long weekend of recreation.

ferme du moulin - photos

excited hens chasing their breakfast delivery

trying to feed 200 hungry hens is a feat of patience as they crowd round, leaving no

room to walk, move your feet or even see their feed containers.

Farmer Bea with Adrien and Tim at the night market in Esparros, feeding

customers stir fry chicken or duck with rice and vegetables.  Delicious.

the goats were supposed to be clearing brambles and scrub, but used to jump the fence

and feast on the duck food almost every day.  They're not stupid.

lovely old ramshackle farmhouse, complete with obligatory breeze block repairs

and additions.  very french.

poultry yurts, not like the ones I enjoyed at my previous hosts.

very smart pallet garden shed, veg cleaning station and bar

from yurt to yurt

My life is now calm, ordered and a lot more french than it has been for quite a while.  As usual the transition back to the french language is proving a challenge, though I do think that I am demanding more and more of myself each time.  Conversations are getting easier but in different circumstances my vocabulary lets me down.  Imagine being at a table chatting when the subject changes from edible wild plants to the rise and fall Cathars and the influence of religion on european life and bread eating during the last centuries.  Not to mention trying to explain what is wrong with my brothers car and how the garage is fleecing him.  I need to learn more.

I wrote that last week and things are a lot easier now.  My head has found its french area and is well and truly wired for use.  There are still plenty of opportunities to get completely lost in conversations, especially when there are plenty of people, though it is a lot easier.

I am WWOOFing (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms) with Vivien on a small organic poultry farm in the south west of france.  It is quiet and relaxed compared to my last location, yet I am still learning loads.  The biggest learn here, so far, is that I know that poultry farming is NOT for me.  The feeding, watering and care of hundreds of birds/animals is endless, there are frequent mortalities, especially with the smaller birds, plus a constant need to slaughter, clean and prepare carcasses for several markets each week.  Dealing with life and death at close proximity day after day takes a certain type of person and I am finding the whole episode quite tiring.

Differences between french and english view on animal welfare don’t sit well either and I find some of the “approved” methods and practices less than attractive even here.  I can only imagine what may happen on large scale agricultural premises, that would be enough to turn me completely vegetarian.  I shall be choosier about my meat consumption and its origins in the future.  It is a life, after all.

Vivien is one of the team that I am part of.  We have joined forces to search for land to start farming projects and build homes to live in.  Economies of scale on a tiny scale.  The plan is to find a large(ish) plot of land to buy that we can divide up and live on independently, supporting each other in neighbourly ways and sharing the expense of certain tools and machines.  Julien is the third team member, he is yet to join us this summer and should be here by the end of the week.

Our host here is an inspiration.  A single mother of six children, she left regular work just over a year ago, rented an old farmhouse with seven hectares of land and started her organic poultry business.  Four of the children are grown up and self supporting, one of which stays on the farm with her boyfriend for the summer to help out and the youngest two come and go between various family members and holiday opportunities whilst they are not at school.  The amount of work that needs to be done here, for one person is incredible, I can imagine that it never ends. Starting with hosting helpers must be like being on holiday for a while, though that does depend on the helper......

We are out in the country in a wide valley with a river and woods to one side and fields and  the church spire of a local village in the distance, to the other.  Down valley, to the south, are the mountains.  Today is the first clear day and they look amazing in the summer sunshine, their peaks still clinging to the remains of their winter snow.  When we drive out to the local towns, to the markets and to visit folk, it’s great to recognise some of the names on road sign posts.  It is good to be back near the mountains.  It almost feels like home.

There are seven flocks of hens here, all of different ages, they arrive at a day old and pass through various pens and enclosures until they are large enough to be kept in check by the movable fencing.  Thereafter they have la large area of grassy field to roam in throughout the day and a smart tin yurt to shelter in at night and when the weather is inclement.  Hardly the yurts I experienced at my last host, but yurts none the less.  There are four yurts out in the green sunny field each with its own flock.  The birds  then spend a while growing and plumping themselves up on a delicious blend of milled organic grains until they are sufficiently large to go to market.    The ducks and geese get a different area with a small stream passing through, so they always have fresh flowing water to paddle about in, though it doesn’t stay clean for long.

the roundwood house is getting there

NW bale wall finishing.  We discussed endless possibilities for finishing the end of the bale walls.  Due to the nature of the building and the fragile nature of straw, when it comes to moisture and rot, there were not a huge number of feasable options.  The straw had to be covered and kept dry whilst the earth needed to fall and look fairly natural down the side of the building.  Here, the waterproof layers continue to encapsulate the straw behind the willow horizontals and are secured with the large vertical trunk.  The tyres hold the willow in place at the other end without damaging the layers behind.

SE side, needed a different solution of finishing and retaining, so we used oak planks to hold the soil back and finish the straw wall.  The shower tray is still visible as the final wall isn't in place yet.

Interior straw walls clipped neatly ready for rendering.  The cloth protects the plumbing for the kitchen sink.  For the moment the tyres will remain visible.  They protect the bales from the damp floor/ground and are filled with large stones.

Adam working the first layer of lime mortar well into the bales.  The further into the bales this layer goes the better supported the final wall will be.  Not particularly strenuous work but hard on the fingers with constant forcing of mix into the straw.  3 parts sharp sand, 1 part lime and enough water to form a slurry.

Cordwood wall sections under construction.  They rest on horizontal beams of cleaved chestnut wrapped in polythene to keep them off the ground.  The two sides of the wall are mortared and the central area is filled with wood chippings, this reduces the amount of mortar used and in enclosed buildings provided an added layer of insulation.  

Second layer of lime mortar in position, scratched to take the final finish coat once dry.

Evening sunshine on a portion of finished cordwood wall.  It's starting to look good.