Reflecting on Six Years of Homesteading

My wife, Konswan, and I arrived on Flores Island during the final days of January, 2007, with $7000 dollars and ambitious dreams.  Neither of us had any construction experience nor a forestry background.  We had kept small gardens and done several ornamental landscape projects over the ten years we had rented houses together in the United States.  It is a massive understatement to say we were not prepared for the task that lay ahead of us, and yet we felt we had to take the risk if we wanted to make the world a better place.  We heard that small and quiet voice within ourselves clearly state to trust that all would be well, even if we could not understand or anticipate how.  We made the leap of faith and began the restoration of an abandoned stone house with orchard space.  A tall order for two dreamers who possessed years of higher education, but no practical experience beyond weekend camping trips in North America’s National Forests. 
We had read the teachings of the worlds’ great philosophers and prophets, and listened to lectures from this century’s equivalents, however nobody was actually applying the ideals set out by these socially accepted wise-men.  That ideal is to turn away from the hollow and fleeting pleasures of the physical body and to embrace the spiritual path that unfolds when we make our relationship with God of the utmost importance--a process of simplification from outside distractions that encourages a peace and calmness as we become one with our creator.  And so, with a sense of destiny that only faith could provide, we jumped into the project of converting a ruined stone house situated in the middle of an abandoned fruit orchard in the middle of the Atlantic on the Azorean island of Flores.
Flores Island had been colonized in 1475 by the Flemish initially, but the colony was promptly abandoned when the long winters, comprised of endless rain storms and intense hurricane-force winds, induced the inhabitants to move to other islands within the Azores group.  Later, the Portuguese successfully colonized Flores Island and over 400 years the population stabilized at 12,000.  The isolation of Flores from the rest of the world forces the island’s residents to become ‘Island Sufficient’ or to perish.  Ships bringing supplies are always eagerly awaited, but often are delayed, once up to seven years!  After the Salazar dictatorship crumbled in 1974 during the Revolution of the Carnations, the population was free to travel abroad.  Three-fourths of Flores’ inhabitants left over the next years, leaving the remaining 4000 inhabitants with much free space, but few economic opportunities.
Over the past six years we have experienced a mixed bag of tremendous good fortune and spectacularly bad luck.  We have done our best to capitalize and maximize on our good fortunes, while ‘keeping the faith’ when dread and fear threaten to paralyze us during the disasters.  We have learned to find the border between Fear and Prudence, a vast grey area that can lead to endless indecision if not explored and mapped.  
Now we are nearly finished with our large and dangerous construction jobs.  We are eagerly awaiting the birth of our second child in August 2013, while dreading the time constraints that will accompany such a large responsibility.  Now we need to finish building a bathroom, then start installing a kitchen and a children’s bedroom within the protective shell we constructed over the last years.  We are nearly finished installing the hydro-electric system that will generate all our electrical needs and allow us to have lights at night and keep a chest freezer and have a clothes washing machine.  Hopefully these time saving devices will allow us to focus on our children and also to allow us the time to pursue our writing careers. 
At this time, we find ourselves in a precarious position with the local police owing to not having a Portuguese drivers license.  The process to obtain a valid license is simple, but requires that Magnus return to Arizona, USA, to obtain the necessary documents.  In order to accomplish this, we must raise 1500 euros for air travel.  The documents themselves cost only 8 euros, but they cannot be sent via mail, they must be applied for and received in person only.  We now have a road to our house and two vehicles, but we have not been able to use them for over a year now, since the police explained the law to us.  Without the use of a vehicle, the isolation of our farm becomes like a prison that we cannot escape, especially during inclement weather, which accounts for November through May.  In addition to the prohibition to drive, our road is not passable to vehicles that would normally deliver construction materials. So we have to drive our 4X4 jeep to pick up materials.  We cannot buy nor sell the necessary goods that would allow us to thrive in our endeavors.  As our son, Odin, matures, it becomes increasingly important that he has the opportunity to interact with the many other children of our village and learn the necessary social skills, but without the option of  a safe, dry and wind-free vehicle in which to travel to his friends homes, he too is a prisoner in our beautiful home.  We have the vehicle but need funds to get the drivers license that allows us to legally drive in Portugal.
We are on the verge of fulfilling our goal of being a self-sufficient farm.  When the electricity project is complete we will have the free time to write articles or even short stories for publication.  The fruit trees are producing this year and will double their production yearly with minimal maintenance.   The gardens are built and only need to be weeded and planted every year.  Our chicken flock is healthy and producing eggs and offspring yearly.  The road we built is functional with four-wheel drive vehicles, a limitation in many ways, but better than having no road access to our house in the middle of the forest.  We have utilized the gift-monies that our friends and families have donated to us.  The monies have allowed us to double the size of our home and buy a 4x4 jeep; as well as double our land holdings that allow for our new road and, to raise enough vegetables to feed us year round, and to expand the orchard space in the coming years.  Now we find that we need just a little more funding to get through the next year, and we humbly turn to the hundreds of readers that read our blog monthly.  If you believe in a future that involves small families living harmoniously with nature and you believe in the power of faith to motivate people into a closer relationship with the Creator and Creation, whatever your faith may be, and if you believe that the world could be made a better place by individuals making difficult and mindful decisions then please take the time to make a small donation using the button at the top of our Blog.  Thank you for your time and support.

A Fantastic Year of Serendipitous Change

In the United States and Canada they have a tradition of ‘giving thanks’ on one day out of every year. It is a time to reflect on the bounty and benevolence of our universe and to gather with friends in celebration of our unlimited grace.

So much has happened in the past years that it is difficult to know where to begin.  We have had a whirlwind of events, people and projects surround us and uplift us.

Our humble cottage in the forest could only be accessed via a foot path one year before, the nearest road was more than a kilometer away ‘as the crow flies’.  All materials brought to our farm had to be transported on foot or by using our zip line.  Deadly trees still hovered over our roof, making every storm a potential disaster.

In an amazing series of synchronistic events that defy human comprehension, the universe has blessed our humble endeavor with its grace.

This year we have a road to our house directly, all the dangerous trees are cut and have been safely moved out of harm’s way; and we have built an annex to our cottage.

In addition, we have received a beautiful baby boy to share our idyllic life with. 

Our gardens are thriving with the increased sunlight available due to the overhanging trees being removed. We were also able to build three new retaining walls that receive the maximum sunlight available throughout the seasons.

Our winter crops are more abundant this winter than we imagined possible.

Magnus was honored to be chosen as helper for the annual Holy Spirit Festival and Luncheon.  This ancient tradition deserves an entire blog post of its own to explain. 

In short, it has been a fun filled and adventurous year and we are Thankful for all the fabulous changes in our lives; and eagerly awaiting more!

Spring is Coming

Spring flowers are coming up now, giving us hope that the rainy season has an end.



This is a view from our front door, where we will eventually build a porch to sit on.

The view corridor was tricky to carve out, but well worth it.

We love to watch the sunrise over the ocean and still be surrounded by mountains and rivers.

3 Year Anniversary of Our Arrival on Flores

When we arrived, we found that the jungle had overtaken the fruit farm, and that the house had fallen down!

Our original plan was to live aboard our sailboat, while we fixed the property. However, the shipwreck changed that plan and we began working on the house first. This way, we would have a place to live while we worked on the land during the following year.

Our next challenge was to get building materials to the site. The original builders had used Oxen to pull the stones along an old path. We had a modern idea...using gravity!

The nearest road is 150 metres, as the crow flies to our house. An inconvenience for us was the river and valley between the road and our house, making the trip by foot about 600 metres!

The send off...

Magnus´s mom and Steve spent their summer vacation helping to bag sand and send concrete blocks across the valley at dangerously high speed.

The recieving end.

Here the house is taking shape.

Now, the forest surrounding the house needed to be cleared.

Gardens and fruit orchards need as much sun as they can get, and this thick jungle was not helping.

We learned how to build free standing stone walls, allowing us to terrace our most protected property for food production.

Collecting stones from all over the mountainside, bringing them to site via foot and wheel burrow was a challenge. But now, we have an abundance of food.