Thank you, thank you, thank you
When we posted a message on LinkedIn about the Florago project we received many generous donations and we are very grateful for it. We really feel supported and want to thank everybody to make it possible to transform Florago into a sustainable and divers food forest....
Behind the scenes
Still a couple of weeks to go and then we will be heading for Florago again. From experience we know the evenings can be a bit chilly and we did not really had a comfortable place to sit, so we decided that the van is the perfect place for it. We designed and...
Inspiring book
A very inspiring book I recently read is: Restoration Agriculture: Real World Permaculture for Farmers of Mark Shepard. (ISBN 9781601730350) It is about planting trees instead of chopping them down for one year crops. The book is a mix of the writers own experience,...
Kitchen 2.0
Since the kitchen 1.0 was a bit small, unstable when there was wind and not very comfortable, we are preparing already in the Netherlands a little upgrade. Good preparing makes living on the land so much easier. We only have to install things in Portugal and we have...
Our Soil Test Results
Take care of the soil and the soil will take care of you. This is one of the basics of regenerative and organic farming. To find out what the characteristics of the soil on Florago is, we took some samples and had them tested. See the results in the table (in Dutch...
Keylines permaculture
Keyline design is a landscaping technique of maximizing the beneficial use of the water resources of a tract of land. The "keyline" is a specific topographic feature related to the natural flow of water on the tract. When looking at a YouTube of Andrew Millison about...
Connecting Floresta and Lago together to Florago
At the borders of each land a lot of brambles and broom are dividing the 2 pieces of land that we bought. We are connecting them again.
Banho Termal
In the area there are several thermal bathes. This because there is a lot of healthy clean water in the area from the mountains and it contains a lot of silicium. So after weeks of hard work on the land, it was a treat to have a relaxing afternoon bubbling in fresh...
Storm
Amazing view and also a bit scary in the open field if you see a sky like the picture entering. The tent we sleep in was not a problem, but our sunshade kitchen tent had a hard time and was not ready for this storm, so next time there will be a 2.0 version of it.
Serra da Estrella
Since we can see the snow white mountains of the Serra da Estrela from the land, we wanted to experience the snow in person. It was amazing to be in the snow in May and to find a wooden chalet restaurant that looked like we were in the Swiss Alps.
Before and after
In the autumn it is time to pick the olives, but some of the olive trees are completely overgrown by brambles so that we cannot even reach them. Now the olive trees get a lot of tender loving care by liberating them of the brambles. And sometimes discoveries are done,...
Camper van, traffic jam
So nice when friends come over. And it also makes us want to take a look at the surroundings. There are so many nice idyllic places in the area. And because we are close to the Spanish border, there are also many old forts.
Handcart
What equipment to buy for practical reasons? One that we use a lot on the land is the handcart. We use it to transport tools from one place to the other, displace water containers and to collect stones from the land. One of the lessons learned: do not walk downhill in...
Solar power working
After a week we had the solar power in place. Our lives changed to a new level. We could have the camping fridge working and we could load our laptops and phones. Still off grid living, but with luxury as well.
Lago
What a blessing that we have such a beautiful lake on the land. According to calculations the lake will provide us with 600.000 liters of water and it will be the source for our drinking water, for watering the plants and of course to take a dive into it on a hot...
Wild camping
Wild camping on the land is amazing. We live in a sea of wildflowers and no sounds other than crickets, frogs and birds. The first week we did not even have electricity because the solar system was not in place yet and no water yet from the lake for the same reason....
Stuck
Although we took the road with the tiny bridge to enter the land, we thought it would also be possible to take the road crossing the little river because it was already May. Not a good idea, because we got completely stuck, even before we reached the little river!!!...
Entering ‘our’ land
After months of preparation and thinking about what to take to the land and what could fit in our van, we entered the land on a bright sunny day in May. Because we only had seen the land on a cloudy day in winter time, we were surprised by the stunning view on the...
Preparing for solar system
Already in The Netherlands we prepared for the solar system. It was really a jigsaw puzzle. And how glad we were that we finished it, because one wire was missing. That would have been problematic if we would have noticed it in Portugal!
Nursery
Because we need lots and lots of plants and trees we are already starting a nursery in our garden in The Netherlands where we will grow the fast growing species. It also saves a lot of money if we can grow a part of it ourselves. We even have some sunny seeds in the...
Looking for land with an estate agent
When we entered this piece of land a fox did show itself and left. We were in awe. Not only about the fox, but also about the vastness of the land. The next day we went back to have a look again. This time walking from the village and crossing a little river. Mmm, do...