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Winter and going slow...

I miss the farm but there is not much for me to do there. It is cold up in the mountains at this time and I do not have any workers up there right now.

Winter is a great time to build because there is no rain at this time of year, but our design is on hold and we need to get some more money together in order to start the excavation of the hill. The approach road is really rough and needs a bit of TLC before we get the big machines up there.

So we wait in anticipation...

Going nowhere slowly...

Everything is at a standstill right now. Winter is upon us in the mountains and we are at a standstill where the building is concerned. Our little cabin cottage has a new kitchen lean-to but now we need to start on the bottle wall and we need sand and cement. The road is so bad that I am not sure we could get a delivery truck there! I shall be going there on Monday on my way through to Pretoria and I shall inspect the problems and look for solutions. In the meantime I continue designing a new "inside the hill" cottage. We have decided to go for something much smaller than our farm house is planned to be, and use it for guests or rental when we have finished our own Hill House. This way we will learn from any mistakes we might make - and of course we are hoping not to make any at all! It is frustrating to go so slowly but then patience was never one of my virtues. Got to learn to chill and go with the flow, even if it is at snail's pace:)

Farm a bit burnt...but still beautiful:)

It was a wonderful weekend in the mountains, lazy and chilled. We went to look at the damage done by the fire. Not too bad and it may even help a bit. Johannes got a bit over zealous and the fire he was tending jumped the dirt road and licked at our fields and some of the trees. We sat under the new roof of Chestnut Cottage and gazed out at the fields through the chestnut trees, the leaves lime green in the sunlight. How peaceful and serene. Not much to do but just sit and enjoy the Now. And breathe... The winter approaches and there is huge clearing to be done. My heart longs for a brushcutter. The horses are still two farms away, but the plan for the water trough is on the go. If I look at what needs to be done, it looks like a mountain, but if I see only the Now, I can smile and enjoy. To sleep...to dream of the beauty of nature.

Fire in the Valley...

There was a fire in the farm valley but fortunately it did not reach our little haven or do damage to anyone's property.

The roof is up between the two little wooden cabins and now it is on to constructing the kitchen lean-to, just waiting for the quote. The lean-to actually has a wall on the south side and a door that leads down to the long-drop loo, which is surrounded by a pineapple sage. I thought it would look pretty and smell nice but the bees liked it so much they made a nest in the loo! We had to throw down burning rubber to get them out...don't think they will come back now:)

The shower will be built into the kitchen extension - the lean-to. The "donkey" - in which we light a fire for heating the water, will be built outside the south wall and will have extensions to both the shower and the kitchen. There is so much to learn and I am so grateful that I know like-minded people who already know some of this stuff!... (and that I have a lot of good reference and instruction books and the Internet:))

It is really difficult to find a team of brush cutters up in the mountain. The municipality seem to have them all trimming the sides of the roads. I need a team on the farm to clear all the long grass. The horses are not on our land yet, so the grass is still very high. All we need is a ball valve to refill the water troughs which have not been placed yet. It is hard to get things done, living nearly two hours away.

I am keen to start my cage/bottle walls to connect the cabins and make our Chestnut Cottage more protected from the east winds, mist and rain. the weather can be most inclement in winter, and the rain in summer can become a deluge.

The ceilings need insulation, and I would like to try cardboard and egg-boxes in panels...but how to keep the mice out?!! I wonder if there is a herbal repellent I could make up? Perhaps one could make panels made of papier mache and vermiculite?...I am going to experiment by making up a paper pulp with vermiculite mixed into it. One can only try. It could be fun!

We are going to make this camping cottage as user-friendly as possible so that we can be here on site while we build our earth shelter. It will be a simple house...two large bedroom suites, one for each of us. Both suites will have its own bed and bathroom and both will have their own space for whatever is required by the occupant...be it space for an office/crafts/meditation/yoga/etc.

Both of us love books, so we will need to be very creative when it comes to shelf-space. Next week we are going to do a book decluttering session. That will be fascinating as I have inherited a load from mum as well and we ourselves have a mountain of the printed word. Whatever we do not keep will go to the second-hand book shop in the mountain village.

Off to dream of farming and horses, eco-building and fresh vegetables... isn't chocolate a vegetable?

Planning the site...

We are off to the farm for one night and a day. We are going to see the cabins and the roof that has just been built, combining the 2 Wendy houses and giving us a shelter to hide from the rain. Unfortunately it will not protect us from the mist and rain coming in from the east. So I have a plan.

There is a huge heap of bottles waiting to be used to build a wall with a door and two windows. A cage of two fences filled with bottles and slurry and plastered. I have waited about four years to put this plan into action and I am looking forward to finally starting.

The kitchen lean-to is yet to be built, and we will use the same bottle and fence technique there as well. I will take measurements today and work out what will be needed to finish this construction camp - Camp Chestnut. It is a beautiful site surrounded by chestnut trees that bear an inordinate amount of fruit. Conkers! I remember conkers in England when I was little. Bashing someone else's chestnut on a string called a conker.

Chestnuts are also called Famine Food. Apparently they are filled with nutrition, so if the world's food supplies start dwindling, we will be picking up and bottling these little brown powerhouses!

Have a great weekend all. Love and light.

Found an Engineer!...

This is exciting. Fredl spoke to a structural engineer buddy and he has recently completed an earth house...and we are going to see it. About half an hour from here. What a find! I thought no-one here knew about this kind of architecture. Right on our doorstep! Is this the Law of Attraction at work I wonder:)

The earth house is built into a hill on a golfing estate not far from here. It is a beautiful area and it gets mighty hot in the summer and not too much cooler in the winter. The owner was very sensible to build into the earth. At about six feet under, depending on the latitude, the temperatures range from 45 degrees to 75 degrees Fahrenheit. That is about 7 degrees to 23 degrees Celsius.

Of those to whom I have shown the photos of Peter Vetsch's earth sheltered houses...so sculptural and clean...most want one too. My across the valley neighbour and soul sister Louise is in love with them, my husband and daughter are so in favour and my good friends all want to come and visit when it is done. It has created quite a stir.

I'll get my spade...will you bring yours too?

Fredl has long wanted to master a TLB...you know, those thingys that dig up the earth and deposit it elsewhere? Tractor, Loader, Backhoe...TLB. Very useful. We will need one of those to take away the terraces and make a nice flat space for us to build our earth shelter. All the services need to be put in place before the earth gets loaded back over the structure and the TLB will be back to do just that. Then we will get on to planting the local indigenous grasses and field flowers on the earth roof.

But hang on! No land has been touched yet. The most important task still to be done is to drill into the earth and find out where the water table is. We don't want to build too low. So that will have to be handled before we start excavating land. My first challenge.

Now to find an expert.