Where we live. In the foothills of this beauty.

A couple of beautiful videos below I saw this week, of our local Serra da Estrela mountain range, just 50 kms north east of us as the crow flies. We're in the foothills of the tallest mountain in continental Portugal, 2kms above sea level at its highest point (on top of a 7m stone obelisk as it's officially only 1993m high without that stone!).

The big river Zêzere where we take our guests every week for a wild swim and mud bath, actually originates up in these mountains. We've been as a family up there a few times over the last 8 years. Always so very majestic, with breathtaking views and crystal clean air.

Hikes for miles in all directions too. Well worth a visit before or after a retreat with us.

Wwoof Wwoof!

Hey ho peeps.

A couple of updates on the restoration work and then a piece from River I'll post up after.

Our third Wwoofer arrived yesterday. Liz from Kentucky, via Oz and Dublin and Edinburgh, who is new to Wwoofing. As is Peter who arrived direct from Hungary on Sunday, via New Zealand and Germany. As was Linwei, our very first wwoofer who came for a fortnight in February from China via Florence Uni. So our first 3 "willing workers" have all been first timers. As are we. And its going well.

Linwei helped us gather eucalytpus branches from the midst of the forest to make posts and fences and gates around the kitchen garden. Pruned one section of our woodland bushes then shredded the cuttings to make 22 bags of great woodchip to replace the sawdust we were using. And cooked the best egg fried rice ever!

Peter this week has helped put the soil on the green roof (finally!) ready for seeding shortly, dig over the new herb garden, countless wheel barrow trips with bark chip and compost and rabbit poop for the veggie beds, and an afternoon sawing down the young pine trees in the woods above the house. Plus a cheeky fishing trip to the Zêzere last night.

Our bedroom looks like a greenhouse as River has begun her annual seed push. Little veggies and flowers are in the process of taking over the house. Which is good cos we like veggies and flowers. Alot. And outside we've been busy preparing the beds to plant out the seedlings currently growing inside.

The wee mezzanine storage area is up in the treatment room, the new wood brushed with linseed oil and pigment, and fresh mimosa yellow lime paint caressed onto the walls. My first massage on that table was bliss. And boy how the back holds 2 years of physical labour. Looking forward to giving and receiving regular treatments with River.

And meanwhile Springtime relentlessly pursues her inevitable arrival as the Mimosa explodes in patches of yellow out of the forest heralding to all of nature around it to consider the possibility of allowing themselves to flower at some point soon. Stuff to soothe the soul.

May the Spring sunshine warm all your hearts.

Memphis

Welcome to Moses

Welcome to our new blog all about the journey of our new life project in Amieira, a gorgeous and remote village in the middle of the hills and forests of Central Portugal. It is here that we - "Tom and Jerry", Michelle, Vonetta, Andrew, Joshua, Eloise and our accompanying pets (so far Moses the dog, Angel, Harry and Blue the cats) – have chosen to invest our lives in creating a place of outstanding natural beauty. We are inviting people from all over the world to come to this magnificent place in the hope they too can find peace and healing for their lives.

To find out how we found this place and came together, you can visit our previous blog at http://poopineurope.blogspot.com/ . We are still not sure what we will finally call this project. Several names are flying around including Zion among others but at the moment its simply called Moses, because that's what the first houses we saw and bought have been called for a hundred years. And its also the name of the winters dog. Which, providently, is actually the reason we are all here.

Over the next year we expect to be working unbelievably hard to prepare the land for self sufficiency, renovate our old stone xisto houses, build new accommodation and restaurants out of cob, and install the latest water and power systems ready for guests to stay with us from April 2009. Some people will come to practice yoga. Some might take part in photography and art workshops. Some could fish and explore the relatively undiscovered treasures of this part of the world by foot, by bike, by 4x4 or on horse back. Some will visit just to stop and deeply rest.

Below are a couple of videos to whet your appetite on our progress. Sorry 2 are wonky so you have to turn your head to see them; Andrew is a bit new to all this video publishing thing. We hope to get internet installed next week in "Tom and Jerry's" place so will be better able to publish our progress here every fortnight. Watch this space. We will be open for booking shortly, but in the meantime do get in touch by emailing itscalledmoses@gmail.com or to "Tom and Jerry" or Michelle's emails (we will add these on the contacts shortly).

Vonetta and Michelle putting the final touches on the new state of the art self build composting bins constructed out of mimosa trees:


Vonetta in Monsanto park at the top of Lisbon showing "Jerry" the stunning umbrella pines that she wants to introduce to land at Moses: