Os Bombeiros de Oleiros são Heróis

Last Saturday, September 1st, fire came to Vale de Moses. It is the only natural disaster we fear, but comforting it is to now know that of all the elements, fire is the only one man can do something about. We can work together to put it out. You can't stop the winds from blowing in a hurricane. Nor the water from sweeping a home away in a flood or tsunami, nor the lava falling from a volcano, nor snow from an avalanche, nor the ground in an earthquake. But water kills fire.

We owe our lives here to the brave and outstanding service of more than 200 firemen, drivers and pilots, who with their trucks, helicopters and planes, battled tirelessly for 6 or 7 hours to put out the fire that if left unchecked, would have consumed everything in its wake.


A special thanks to our friends Barbara and Emma from the Mount of Oaks, who drove 2 hours to be by our side and also to our incredible guests this week, who arrived on the same Saturday. Franzisca from Berlin, Frida and Malin from Sweden, Sara from CercaSul in Portugal, Shilla from Austria and Jessie from Belgium. Even in the face of such violent destruction and fear, you chose to remain and stay the week with us, on yoga retreat, to relax with us as we found peace after the inferno.

Vonetta and Eloise were out in town at the time, but the quick response by Chris, Anette and Joshua (he was first to call the Bombeiros / Fire Brigade) and Frida, Malin and Franzisca (we had all just finished lunch) meant we were able to soak the land around the Monastic Adega and save it from destruction, before we were called away to the top of the valley for our safety by the police. I was only wearing flip flops and shorts while dowsing the 5 metre high flames as Chris held the hoses off the ground to prevent them melting. The others rapidly filled up buckets and soaked everything they could reach. If our Yoga Helpers hadn't cleared the scrub around the Adega in June, and TK hadn't cut back all the grass in the orchards along the river with me in May, it would have been a very different story.

After only a couple of hours though, once we could see the fires would be tamed, we almost immediately began giving thanks. That no-one was harmed. That none of the 4 houses we have restored were touched. That we have such an army of volunteers in our local town and from other Bombeiros in towns over an hour's drive away, had dropped everything they were doing that day, and came immediately to our aid. That they stayed with us with their trucks for the next 2 nights keeping vigil over the land. That I slept outside with 4 fireman on our veranda!

We are also, ironically, thankful that we are now a little safer here. The fire cleaned the forest of all the brittle, dry, resin filled bush or "mato" on our neighbours land around our valley. It will be years before it can grow into the danger that it was. Now, perhaps even this Spring coming, we will see the forest begin to burst forth with life. The small lavenders and gorses will have the sunshine and space to flower in abundance. And enough pot ash to create a spectacular colour explosion we won't have yet seen here. That's something to really look forward to.

Sadly we lost our apple and pear orchards. But we hope they too will grow back again. Our neighbour José Matteus said the trees might return if we cut them at the base just above the graft. We'll see. We can always plant more.

So this week, we stared our deepest fear straight in the face. And marveled at the way our heroes in the Bombeiros and our community gathered and acted to save us. We will never forget. Truly we are blessed beyond words.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.  Namasté.

Memphis

The Monastic Adega

Hey ho happy summer. While we've been running some lovely retreats this month, it's also been party time in this part of Portugal. Oleiros had its Feira do Pinhal 2012 extravaganza, where for 2 weeks 50,000 people come to our town of normally 4,000 to spend a few evenings with family and friends, shopping at the huge outdoor arts and crafts market, savouring the culinary delights of the local restaurants, listening to 2 stages of live music and watching the local firework company show off their world renowned displays.

And every village for miles also has its own 2 or 3 days of festas where the sounds of accordions resonate through the valleys into the wee hours of the mornings. It's a pity River and I have not been able to revel in this party season as much as the last few years, as we need good restorative sleep to look after, teach and massage our guests here.  Josh and Ellie spent the Feira do Pinhal sleeping over at friend's houses in town, so they were happy dancing til 6am and rising from the dead late in the afternoons.

In a few days all the annual kerfuffle will settle down and we'll return to the quieter rhythms of forest life. But I wanted to put this little season in context. Because at the same time we have also finally finished restoring the last of our stone houses, the Adega where one family in this valley used to make 4000 litrres of wine each year. It is now home to Chris and Anette from Denmark who will be living with us a while to deepen their practice of Suikido. They have worked really hard helping us turn the old Adega into a beautiful sublime monastic living space.

This tablet contains the 3 elements of Suikido. Sui meaning water, fluidity, formlessness. Ki - life force, vitality, spirit. Do - path, way, life practice. Chris found the stone nearby the Adega and painted the characters the other week. As you turn the corner and see the tablet at the base of the stone entrance steps, it looks like it could have always been there. For those who have visited Vale de Moses you'll know that the terraces down by the river and apple orchard have a timeless quality. The rest of the world feels a mighty long way away. The invitation to be still and reflect, resonates in a way that can only be described as "elemental", surrounded as you are by forest, water running over a small fall in the stream and hand carved out bedrock everywhere you look.

With water gravity fed and solar heated on its way from a very old Moorish water mine 200m above the valley, without electricity using only candles and olive oil burning lanterns, a small practice space in the cavernous bed rock basement and 2 futon bed platforms made with wood from the old wine vats.

A big thanks to all our lovely Yoga Helpers, Tammy, Evelyn, Rebecca and Xana who worked so hard in June clearing out the space ready for restoration, and to our neighbour João Antunes and his sons Jorge and Filipe for helping us lay the ochre pigment coloured practice floor and turn the old grape foot pressing tank into an outside shower that doubles as irrigation for the orchard.

So there we have it. After 4 years we have finally finished the restoration of all 4 houses at Vale de Moses. And somehow this last one hints towards the direction that life might be taking here. A little more monastic. Coincidentally (!), in September we hope to also be hosting for a few days 4 more "monks". Nick and Juliette from the UK and 2 Bangladeshi Buddhists on a study trip from a Sri Lankan orphanage where they work. It will be a pleasure to welcome them into our home in the forest.

"A monk (from Greek: μοναχός, monachos, "single, solitary"[1]) is a person who practices religious asceticism, living either alone or with any number of other monks. A monk may be a person who decided to dedicate his life to serve other living beings or to be an ascetic who voluntarily chooses to leave mainstream society and live his life in prayer and contemplation. The concept is ancient and can be seen in many religions and in philosophy." Wikipedia.

A few photos below from our guests here this month. More to be found on our Facebook page. Enjoy.

Memphis.

Active Hands Yoga Interview

A big thanks to Bettina Shzu from Berlin for her interview with Vonetta yesterday...

Do you ever dream about traveling around Europe for a few months without a schedule or a plan? Either alone or with your husband and kids?
Do you ever dream about quitting a life that doesn’t fit you and finding through serendipity an abandoned stone farmhouse near a pond surrounded by wooded mountains?
Do you ever dream of teaching yoga, growing your own food, drinking wine from your own grapes, and raising your kids in nature?
Do you ever dream about making your life and home a healing project?
Most people have some sort of dream like these. But they say—someday I’ll get around to that.
Today meet Vonetta. She’s living those dreams right now in Portugal as a yoga teacher and massage therapist at Vale de Moses.

Read the full interview here on Bettina´s Active Hands Yoga Blog.

A few plugs

Just wanted to share the sites of 4 of our lovely yoga guests this month. First is Tashi Dawa, the beautiful dancing, singing, travelling, Aussie yoga teacher who won our hearts, taught us loads and encouraged us immensely during her stay here at Vale de Moses. Tashi, you have one more place on this amazing planet that you can consider home.

Second plug is for Chris and Anette (they're not the ones in the photo) who return on Monday to stay with us til Christmas in our newly restored Adega (new photos up next week) down by the river that runs through this valley, to deepen their practice of Suikido, a wonderful blend of dance, martial arts and yoga. We'll be building a new straw bale yoga shala / dojo this summer on the sugar maple tree terrace at the top of land, which we will be delighted to share with them while they are here.

Third 'shout out' is for the new yoga meditation pillows, Place, designed by Xana Lopes, a Portuguese shiatsu and reflexology therapist who is with us this week, and her sister. The pillows are big and generous and allow even for me to sit for more than 20 minutes without my body moaning. And that's saying something. We'l try to get some shots next week of the pillow in action to prove the point.

The last and most delicious plug of all today, is for a very special Dutchman, Jan-Bas, who is here to deeply recuperate after 2 years of hard hard work launching a precious gift to the world. The raw chocolate fair trade finest ingredients phenomenon Lovechock. They want to connect people with the pure essence of cocoa and put happiness inside of us all. Bless. If you are in Holland or Germany go ask your local health food shop to get it in. We can't wait til they start distributing this manna from heaven in Portugal. Força Lovechock!!

Até já

Memphis

Life on Yoga Retreat

Olá bom dia!

Just finished our Rainbows on your Eyelashes week and what a privilege it was to have our guests with us this week. Such lovely people. I feel I am in a lucky place cooking through the day in the farmhouse kitchens, watching people at various lengthy intervals, coming in and out of the house, up and down the stairs to the loft studio, to and from their yoga classes and treatments.

I get to see what they look like pre and post yoga. Before and after their massages.   Afore needles and beyond. If I had to succinctly describe the differences in the appearance and countenance of our guests between these 'fore and afters' it would be this: They walk in. Then float out.

It's so rewarding to see people who are already fairly relaxed after a few days living with good food, pure water and forest air, descend the stairs and come to the kitchen for a cup of tea, sparkly eyed with seemingly all tension gone from their faces. You should see it. You really should. It's quite a sight.

Although Eloise has just baked another mouth watering batch of healthy cupcakes (seriously my mouth is watering as I type) which I am about to devour in the courtyard, I have to say that life here living on a yoga retreat is not all full of blissed out chilled loveliness. In our weeks "off" we work hard in the forest and gardens and adding finishing touches to the restoration work of the cottages.

I'll leave you a couple of vids below we've just posted up to our "We Love Moses" Youtube channel where you can compare and contrast our weeks 'off' and our weeks with retreats; between work necessary round the farm with a moment for example on Wednesday when the physical, rather than metaphysical, rainbows were discovered on all proverbial eyelashes present.

As we say farewell to our guests this week heading back to distant lands and distant shores, just wanted to say to them specifically, in public as it were, in the immortal words of Louis Walsh that the newly formed Mosettes (Hannah, Sarah, Anja, Tashi and Louise) are undoubtedly "going to be the next big Girl Band". Great songwriting and seriously star performance in front of the courtyard  fire last night. We thank you for the music! Thank you.

In peace. In respect.

Memphis

Walking on Water

Bom Dia. For those of you who have been following our blog over the last 5 years, you'll know the adventures we've had here at Vale de Moses and the times where we've needed more than a mustard seed of faith. Through all the restoration work to the houses and re-cultivation of the land, we've always known that one day people would come to this valley to find rest here.  But we never imagined they would also be able to walk on water.

We've just finished our 4th Yoga Retreat of the season, and it's a wonderful thing to watch how our guests relax and open their bodies and their spirits through the course of the week. Even their faces change. They soften.

Yesterday we all went for a wee trip down to the River Zêzere, for a mud bake and swim in isolated paradise. It is one of my favourite places on earth. The feeling of swimming out to the middle of the warm river, with not another soul for miles, floating on your back, admiring the Herons and Kites and Eagles as they circle overhead eyeing their next fish meal swimming beneath them. It's an experience I treasure.

And to top it off, thanks to a Portuguese artist, João D Filipe who was born in our village of Amieira, I now know that the River Zêzere is also the purist river in Portugal, as it runs to Lisbon for its drinking water.

The mud bake thing is a ritual too in its own way. We discovered the therapeutic and cleansing effects of mud baking in 2007 while wild camping in the Abruzzo mountins in Italy. And have since taken any given opportunity to smother ourselves in river mud and bake hard in the sun. Just as floating in pure flowing water of a river or the sea connects you to all the waters on our planet, so in some way smothering yourself in mud connects you to all the earth too.

We love it and it's a real joy to be able to share the experience now with others.

We have a week off until our next guests arrive first week of June for our "Rainbows on your Eyelashes" retreat. You'll be pleased to hear that we managed to get that big list of projects done in our last week off. Patio in the courtyard now has a red limecrete and stone, easy to clean floor. The chicken shed (more like palace) is finally ready for layers to move in. The kids have metres of new wooden bookshelves in their rooms. The farmhouse roofs have their boarded trim to protect the wooden structure underneath and the saloon doors are hanging cutely in the library so Moses and Saphira can sleep in the hall. Next week I'll be making and hanging kitchen and bathroom cupboard doors, and an outside fox-proof (here's hoping) fence for the chicken run.

The work never stops. But neither does the water flowing in the river. Nor the thanks for the life we have here in the forests of Portugal.

May you all get to walk on water this week.

Namasté

Memphis