15th January
Brett has designed (in his head) a 10' x 10' mobile cabin we
can use as a summer house /bedroom; it'll be on skids (like the chicken shed)
so we'll be able to move it with the truck, he will clad it with the same
planks we used for the sleep platform rather than the bread oven wood he used
for the chicken shed and it will have a Onduline
roof (which is lighter than tiles).
Oh dear poor old Looby was shocked by the fence this morning
and I should think most of the village heard her shriek!!! Now she takes a very
wide berth around the chickens.
When we got the hens home on Monday and took them out of
their box we noticed that one of them was rather hunched up (the typical sign of an unhappy/ill chicken); the woman
on the market just grabbed them out of the crate and stuffed them in the box we
didn't get a chance to inspect them. She's been a bit hunched ever since but
has been eating and drinking along with the rest. However today we found her in the water bucket, she was very wet
and cold; so I dried her off, as best I could, with Looby's towel and we put
her in the drawer of the stove to warm up. Initially she didn't look very
hopeful,
she stayed very hunched up with her eyes shut, but after about an hour
she started to become quite vocal, then she started moving around, eating and
she even pooped on Looby's towel;
so we put her back outside with the rest of
her flock and are keeping our fingers crossed.
Brett went outside this afternoon and there's a large flock
of sheep under our olive trees, the shepherd and his wife were out there with
them; we didn't even hear them arrive.
It means poor old Looby will be walked on a lead again; she
was very good about the hen in the kitchen though, I told her "No!"
so she just curled up on her bed and ignored it.
The shepherd corralled his sheep as soon as it got dark
(5.00ish) and left a dog to guard them - it's a Serra da Estrela and it can
only be about six months old, it's so cute I'm going to take a photo in the
morning.
It's been dull and raining for the last few days so we had
to turn the fridge off over night again; it's been on for five days so we feel
quite lucky and we should have a few more days out of it if we ration it.
16th January
Callooh! Callay! all six
chickens came burbling out of the pop hole this morning and drowned hen is looking quite spritely.
The sheep were still corralled at 11.30 this morning and the
puppy was still there keeping guard, it was out all night in the rain, good job
it's got a thick coat.
This afternoon the sheep were outside the house eating my
peas (in the herb garden, I hadn't shown them to the shepherd) so I shooed them
off, they're really laid back not in the least bit skittish; it's a very pretty
flock.
Ha, Brett's turnip and carrot fermentation is working well,
but my Kvass has mould growing on it!!!
17th January
We need a shredder for all our olive prunings, then we can
use it in the compost toilet. So we met up with Jamie and Keren in CB with a
view to purchasing one between us (and P&M), well the good ones were 900€+,
so that didn't happen! And we didn't get to look at dogs either as we suddenly
realised that as we were going to P&M's for dinner we would have to leave
it with Looby for several hour having just introduced them to one another (not
a sensible idea).
When I was walking Looby back from her shed I came across
Louis and his wife tending their sheep (I tried to avoid them but didn't manage
it!!!), so I stood there while they spoke at me in Portuguese! One thing I did
learn (because I asked) the puppy guarding their sheep is only four months old
and it's a he, not a she as I had thought.
We had a lovely evening at P&M's, very relaxing and
warm.
18th January
Brett started building a duck house, some people we met on
NYE offered us some ducks and we found out last night (as they had given
P&M a drake) that they are Muscovies; just what we wanted, as they're not
as aquatic as ordinary ducks, so don't need a pond.
Louis came calling with a bucket of potatoes and a bucket of
oranges for us - the Portuguese are very generous. He showed us where the
Cleric's fonte is, just beyond our boundary (about 5m) at the bottom of our
front garden (i.e. about 50m from our house). It was built by the Romans and is
a public fonte and he said 'a agua e muito boa' (the water is very good), it
was used by the churches and the rich people as it's the best water around; this means we don't need to drive to get
drinking water anymore.
I 'googled' mouldy Kvass and it's merely a yeast
fermentation and just needed skimming off. So we tried the Kvass; it's salty,
slightly sour, nothingness - I don't get it, it's not unpleasant but I wouldn't
drink it through choice, as it's not particularly nice either! But people rave
about it, why?
At the beginning of December I put some of our large ripe
black olives in salt
to try to make Greek/Turkish style olives - the shrivelled
ones you get in jars without brine or oil.
We tried them today - they are
absolutely brilliant!!!! They're just like the expensive ones you buy in the
shops and these are free! I'm so
pleased, we used them in our pasta sauce tonight. And I drank a Portuguese
version of Sangria made with our wine and Louis's oranges.
I don't know why but I've always gained enormous pleasure
from eating and drinking for free; I used to love collecting hedgerow bounty in
the UK - elderflowers for wine and champagne, elderberries for port, crab
apples, damsons, sloes, blackberries, horseradish, field mushrooms and the
absolute joy of finding a giant puffball (we had quite a few of these when we lived
in Warwickshire). So having a quinta where we can produce our own olives, olive
oil, wine, fruit etc is wonderful for me, I get a real kick out of it.
19th January
Sunday ................... and we could hear the hunters way
off in the distance, it was so nice not to feel under threat of being shot when
I was out with Looby!
There's snow on the mountains,
but it was sunny and breezy today, so that means wash day. One
of the nice things about wash day is the stove gets lit early (to boil the
water on), so the house is nice and warm and snug, the less pleasant thing (in
the winter anyway) is having to do the washing, as it gets done outside and
when it's windy (like today) your hands get awfully cold; but the wind does
help dry the clothes and my Sheila maid finished them off this evening.
I resolved yesterday to do some drawing, so over the last
two days I've tried sketching the hens
and Looby,
Brett says this looks like Santa's Little Helper' (Simpsons)!!!
but they won't stay still for
more than a few seconds; I don't know how long it will last but I thought I
would try to sketch every day to try to improve my observation and speed.
Tomorrow we're off to Fundao again to buy more chickens and on
the way back we're going to visit the couple who offered us the Muscovy ducks.
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