Green green vegetables

My mission the next 6 months was to focus on the vegetable production on the farm. Old chapel farm has 12 acres of land but only 2 acres were for vegetable growing, the rest of the land were dedicated to woodlands and grazing. The hills of mid Wales was one of crazy and unpredictable weather, which at times can be so harsh that only grazing of animals and potatoes stood a chance. Frost when the ground freezes over can happen as late as the 10^th of June. Vegetable growing thus is not an easy one to crack, the growing season was thus a short one and having to be always aware and in tuned with the weather. There was only so much planning that we could do, but in the end our fate was determined by mother nature.

The glass-house was my garden, a place of great importance but also one with much responsibility. Spring was a time where frantic sowing of seeds took place. I spent most parts of my days sowing the mighty brassica family, members of the solanace family bird eye chilies (hundreds of them) tomatoes, Aubergine, sweet peppers in pots,  peas in toilets rolls, lettuce in succession, calendulas in modules and dwarf French, broad, runner beans. It was a mad house, but mine to enjoy, BBC radio 2 in company I’m sure Ken Bruce added to the vitality of my little seedlings with his ever so monotonous selection of music and his boring banter with the weather and traffic girl Penelope fudge. Damn turn that radio off!!!!!   

Crooked End Farm

Now this is what I call organic farming.

We've been here, at the crooked end farm, their blog: http://www.crookedend.co.uk/ and our hosts Brenda and Bruce have made us feel right at home.

They have 14 acre of land, a bunch of pigs (yum yum, their organic bacon is reeeeally good, the best I've tasted in my whole life), Lots of laying hens, sheep, and lots of organic vegetables (duh)!


In the last couple of days, we planted leeks, picked salad leaves for the shop, fed the hens, collected their eggs (at least 2 times a day), fed and moved the pigs, cleaaned the chicken houses (yuck), weeded, watered, transplanted tomatoes and .... ate good food. There's so much to do, there's never enough time. And I guess this is what it really means to do this for a living. Brenda and Bruce are constantly working! Of course, the two gorgeous kids, Lottie (2 and a half) & James (6 months) are quite a handful as well. Which other 2 and a half year old can remember my name within the first hour of meeting me, and recalls it clearly? She's better than most people I've met!


Anyway, here are some snap shots of us this week! Will be here for 3 weeks.


Wwoofing is the life. Work for 5 hours a day, 5 days a week, food to eat, place to sleep, meeting wonderful (and some strange) people, and of course, the bloody gorgeous countryside.





The cosy little caravan we are living in.

Percy the horse & two other fellow wwoofers - Erin (left) and Callie (right) both from America.

Feeding Mabel, the pregnant Gloucestershire Old Spot sow with bolted lettuce.

Real twittering

This week, on June 15, right in the middle of 2009, we began our United Kingdom wwoof journey.

Falling in love with the English countryside is no fault of anybody but the beautiful countryside itself.

Its not just the visual beauty of the quiet whispers of the sunsets, the big vivid blue skies. But its also the very sweet little things like instead of going to a florist and buying expensive cut flowers,

I can wander the land from March all the way to November and find seasonal gorgeous wild flowers to celebrate the time of the year. Oh, and experiencing first hand, almost 24 hrs the ever changing seasons. So many people say that the country side is boring. Thats because they dont see the crazy busy activity happening in every inch of the 'wild' land.

And when you're in working organic small holding, man oh man, is there a lot to do and its never dull. Its keeping up with everything that makes it challenging. Bjorn's got a thing for problem solving and innovating, so for him, its constantly interesting and constantly invigorating. For me, its the poetry I find in the woods, in nature. The voice in my heart can be heard more closely whenever I am out here. Watching the clouds slowly pass over, learning the names of all the wild flowers... it just seems like the right way to live life.

Falling in love with a passion is amazing when you fall deeper and deeper in love everyday.

Passion. So elusive to me all my life. What is my passion? Some people have music, others have comics, sports etc. Its when something occupies your thoughts constantly, something you always find new meaning in, something that reflects your own voice and your own self. I dont know if you can call enjoying the countryside a passion, or perhaps, writing about it one. Even if its not, I think its close.

On our day off, we are going to this special forest where apparently it inspired JR Tolkien to write Lord of the Rings. Thats mad. I already find the normal woods we walked in Devon/Cotswolds incredibly beautiful and magical during wintertime already. I can only imagine how this beautiful these woods would be.

So funny, I've seen the woods all my life, on television. And they never looked like anything amazing to me. But to be in one... To hear the birds twittering from all directions, hearing the dried leaves crunch beneath your feet, seeing the light sparkle down through the canopy... sweetness. Even right now, as you read these words, they are only words, and they still cannot fully relate to another person what its like. I now understand why they have the term 'magical woods'. It sorta feels a bit like magic really.

Will write more about the lovely crooked end farm we're staying at now in the following entries.

All I can say is that its so far been hard but rewarding work. Learning alot, eating really well, and sleeping super well.

Now to nurse my nettle sting... Stay tuned.