Glass of Water

Water. Planet Earth is notorious for having a lot of it. Humans are known to consist mainly of it. All life depends on it. If one of us should forget to imbibe it in one of its many forms for a few days, it's game over. (Luckily our bodies have developed a reminder mechanism called thirst.) Unfortunately not all of us have equal access to it. And to many it's becoming harder to get, as insanely short-sighted farming methods deplete aquifers the world over. The possibility of war over access to water is becoming depressingly plausible.

Runner beans unfurl magically

In rainy Wales such intransigent problems seem almost far-fetched. When living in my caravan I was generally able to meet my drinking water needs by catching rain on the greenhouse roof, collected in a water butt, then manually poured into a gravity filter to eliminate any nasties. This is a vertical metal cylinder, the top half taking the water which slowly drips through two ceramic “candles” with carbon cores, ending up in the bottom half which has a convenient tap. Now I drink the water from the tap outside my dwelling which comes direct from a spring owned by my landlord. Apparently the Environment Agency testers say it's the cleanest you can get. It certainly tastes fine.

The works to replace the safety barrier by my land proceeds apace.

140 years ago the Corporation of Liverpool also had water on its mind. (Not water on its brain, that's something completely different.) The good citizens of Liverpool were increasing in number and all of them, not unreasonably, wanted enough water to drink. As things stood, the wet stuff would be running low as the population burgeoned. So the Corporation cast around for a solution and decided to make a new reservoir. They peered over the border into Wales and saw all the big hills with valleys inbetween, and water, water, water everywhere. They poked around for a while and eventually picked one that seemed suitable. It was big, it had water coming in, and was 68 miles from the city – near enough for transporting it by aqueduct not to be too expensive, and far enough that none of the Liverpudlians themselves would complain about the flooding of a beautiful valley. Granted there was a little village of Welsh people in the valley, but who can stand in the way of progress?

It is still here today, known as Lake Vyrnwy (pronounced Vern-wee I believe) and continues to provide drinking water, though perhaps not just to Liverpool now. At times of drought, the water level drops low enough that some of the drowned village becomes visible. It's about half an hour drive from my place and I made my first visit last Sunday afternoon. You come upon it quite suddenly, after a long twisty lane, the wide expanse of blue and the impressive structure of the dam appearing together, with the road taking you across the dam itself. This is a fundamentally disorientating experience – a lake immediately on your right and nothing immediately on your left. The RSPB are here explaining to anyone who will listen what manner of birdlife is on display. Forests and moorland surround it. It is beautiful and serene, if you can ignore the procession of Triumph classic cars making their Sunday outing. And the ghostly bells of the submerged village church echo around the valley. Well, perhaps.

P.S. My planning officer is visiting me on-site later today to discuss my planning application to keep my polytunnel and greenhouse. A rather important discussion! Stay tuned.

There And Back Again

Eight or nine years ago I had a job with Skype which required me to make myself present at their head office in London from Monday to Friday each week. Their offices were on a back street in an exhilaratingly bohemian part of Soho and my home at the time was a shared flat in a (mostly) ex-council block near Waterloo station, about one mile away. 

My asparagus survived the winter, then

I used to relish the commute. Partly because the twenty-minute walk took me through and past some of the more iconic set-pieces of the capital which to me at least never seemed to lose their appeal –  London Eye, IMAX cinema, Millenium Bridge over the broad Thames, Trafalgar Square, Leicester Square, Chinatown, Shaftesbury Avenue, and Soho itself. Partly, I'm ashamed to say, a sense of smugness at walking amongst crowds of other commuters who had just travelled a sweaty hour on a packed train to get to Waterloo.  And partly because the walk was long enough to give me a chance to wake up properly in the morning but short enough that I didn't need to get up too early. When Skype moved offices to Tottenham Court Road they didn't appear to consider the extra ten minutes it would add to my daily hike.

Fast forward to the present day. I have another one-mile commute to work each day which I either cycle or walk. The scenery is another feast for the eyes. And again I find myself looking forward to it each morning (unless it's pouring down, which isn't as often as you might think). 

Cwm Cewydd

In every other respect of course it's the diametric opposite of that earlier oft-trudged journey. My current home is perched halfway up a stunningly beautiful cwm (valley), into which the sun is at this time of year just beginning to flood with light as I set off around 8:30. A single lane, just wide enough for one vehicle, drops swiftly from the house then levels off for a time. Trees are everywhere. There's a sharp drop on the left beyond the hedge down to sheep pastures and the small river. An equally steep slope up on the right, possibly 45 degrees or more, is first pasture then further on dense conifer woodland semi-hiding an abandoned wood cabin that is now almost completely destroyed, a tree having fallen right on it, its contents just about visible through the splintered walls. 

Lambs play in pairs amongst the gnarled tree roots next to the lane, and as I approach they nimbly skip down and away to safety and their mother's bleats. Pinks, yellows, purples, blues are appearing in the hedgerow as the warmth brings out a range of wild flowers whose names always escape me (if I even knew them to start with.) A whirr of wings as a pheasant is startled, hurtling itself upwards then gliding down close to the water. Over there, I might be lucky enough to catch sight of a heron lazily flapping above the trees. Birdsong fills the air. 

The lane then drops suddenly and twists sharply right then right again (bike brakes on hard if I'm cycling) before meeting the burbling young brook, crossing it and following it for a short while. 

It's rare to meet another person on this short trip though occasionally a neighbour is walking their dog, or pottering outside their house, and we call out a good morning to each other. The lane at the bottom forks, I turn left and pass three traditionally-built Welsh stone houses and a tiny disused stone chapel before reaching the A-road. It is not a busy A-road. Normally I can just cycle straight onto it and fifty metres later cross over to my track entrance without seeing a car. 

Doing the reverse, up-hill, after a tiring day labouring in the garden is admittedly less immediately appealing but with the lighter evenings I am at least not tramping up in the dark any more. And at no point do I have to avoid anyone attempting to thrust a free Metro newspaper into my hands.

My first attempt to collect birch sap. It hasn't worked.
Possibly too late, or I didn't drill far enough in. 

P.S. My planning officer has been off sick so I haven't been able to speak to her yet.

Two Years Off Grid

My very first rhubarb harvest, picked last week. These I swapped with someone for a clothes rail.

Two years ago today I arrived in Wales, fresh-faced and eager, with a caravan, a chainsaw and a spade, and began to live off-grid on my land. So much has happened to me since that day it's hard to believe it is just two sun-spins ago. The sheer range of new experiences is overwhelming. Living completely alone for the first time. Growing my own food. Gathering my own drinking water. Harnessing my own electrical energy from the sun. Going from knowing nobody to being friends with lots of locals, Welsh and non-Welsh. Starting my first business. Selling my first produce on a market stall. Delivering my first salad bags, door-to-door. Directing my own time, day to day. Having my first volunteer work on my land. Having my very own compost toilet. Submitting my first planning application. Killing my first warm-blooded being and eating it. The list goes on.

It's a scramble to get to my river from the high bank, but it's worth it

I have been able to get a little way towards the dream of living a sustainable off-grid existence. Establishing a decent-sized market garden that produces enough to sustain me, both for my own veg and for income, has been my main goal these last couple of years and that's within grasp now. The rest of the dream – building a low-impact house, keeping livestock, living and working with one or two other like-minded, interesting and funny people – will have to remain a dream for now. It isn't just the collision with bureaucratic planners and highway authorities, though that is looking as if it's going to cause the crunch. I also wanted to find out whether I wanted to live alone long-term, which I now think I probably don't. And I've been able to assess first-hand what the land I bought is and is not capable of, in terms of providing a home, energy, food and livelihood. The answer to that is, I reckon, possibly one person but maybe no more. 

The frogspawn are back this year in the same natural "pond"

I now know that the Trunk Road Agency have a real problem with the entrance to my site which comes directly off the A458. They will not allow me to build a home on my land. They are even, as mentioned last week, directing refusal to my planning application to keep the polytunnel and greenhouse. (I'm still waiting to see what the planning officer will do with this, I'll speak to her tomorrow.) Also, as loyal followers of this blog may be aware, Snowdonia National Park Authority will not let me live in my caravan so I am forced to sleep elsewhere and travel to the land each day.

Blackthorn blossom

Blackthorn blossom

All of which leads me to suspect that my days here may be numbered. I'm just not sure how big that number is. If the planning application is turned down, and a potential appeal fails, then it's difficult to see how I'll be able to complete this growing year without risking an enforcement notice (and if that's ignored, a court summons). If, on the other hand, it is approved then I will be able to carry on this year as I am, but then it's where I can live which is the killer. My current arrangement is temporary. I can't live in the caravan or build my own house. So my only option to remain would be to rent somewhere nearby, which is not affordable on the income of a veg grower. (I guess getting a mortgage would be out of the question for the same reason). I would have to get a regular part-time job on top of the growing, all a long way from the "dream". Or who knows, the planning authority may change its mind, or someone will give me a suitable house, or the apocalypse happens... As they say, a year is a long time in horticulture. 

Nearest beds from L to R: asparagus (beginning to show), rhubarb (coming up well), beetroot (a third of the bed has been seeded), kale (not planted out yet), mange tout pea (the visible half was started indoors and then planted out, the other half directly sown into the bed and just coming up), and spinach (completely direct-seeded, not yet germinated). The next 6 beds will have : cabbages, cabbages, cabbages, french beans + turnips + carrots interspersed, runner beans (the frame is now up), and spinach + fennel. Beyond that in the distant beds: lots of salad leaves, potatoes, onions, mooli radish, sweetcorn and gherkins(!)

Hoodie On

Ash beginning to blossom

Have you ever tried pulling a jumper over your head whilst it still had a clothes hanger lodged within its arms and neck hole? Neither had I till last night, and being oblivious of the hanger lurking therein was rather startled to discover that that my head, rather than slipping neatly through the hole as it had on countless occasions before, had got jammed between the perimeter of the neck hole and a hard wooden bar. What the problem was became clear to me immediately. I didn't panic. I did briefly consider just pushing on through and sorting it out later but then remembered the hook which might possibly lacerate my neck on the way past, so I had to perform a rather undignified reverse procedure and extract the hanger whilst not wearing it. My excuse, before you dismiss me as a complete imbecile, is that it was a hoodie jumper, the hood of which completely obscured the hook of the hanger. OK you can dismiss me now.

Rhubarb, and pea shoots in the distance

So that was the highlight of my week... let's see, what else. I had my very first taste of birch sap. A friend of my landlord's had extracted gallons of the stuff from a few large birch trees at the equinox full moon, when the sap was rising at its best apparently. We were served it in small sherry glasses and after all the build-up I was expecting something, if not alcoholic, at least pretty potent. It was clear, like water. It didn't smell of anything, like water. And after a swig, it tasted almost exactly like water as well. It was only the aftertaste, a slightly unusual flavour left on your tongue, which belied its origins. You can make wine from it too which holds a little more appeal, to me at least.

Over the Easter weekend I was away up in Lancaster with my folks. When I left it was cold, cloudy and quite wet. As soon as I'd gone, someone threw a big switch and turned summer on, the works – blue sky, hot sun. Only in Wales, mind – England was carpeted in a huge fog blanket the whole of Sunday. Ordinarily this wouldn't bother me too much, as long as they didn't flick the switch again on my return, but I am at this moment the caretaker, father, mother, of hundreds of tiny seedlings who all depend on me for their lives. They are all housed inside the polytunnel and greenhouse, protected from the wind and rain, but unfortunately not from the blazing sun which quickly ratcheted the temperature inside up to the mid-thirties. I returned on Monday to find an awful lot of very wilted looking pea shoots and other seedlings in various states of disrepair. Once I'd rushed them all out into the shade and watered them most of them began to get their colour back but a few, sadly, didn't make it. The tomato and aubergine seedlings on the other hand were absolutely loving it, shamelessly basking in the heat like Brits largin' it up in Benidorm. 

The polytunnel still looks bare..

..but some peas are coming up now. I'm still waiting for spinach, french beans, lettuce and borage to germinate.

When the sun is shining, the ground had dried out and all I have to do all day is potter about on my land sowing seeds, life seems pretty good again. I just have to ignore any thought with the phrase “planning permission” in it. Sadly it isn't always possible to do so, especially when I get emails from a planning officer. The latest is that the Highways Agency have objected to my planning application for the polytunnel, greenhouse and shed, on the basis that my land's entrance onto the A road has poor visibility. They have “directed refusal” on behalf of the Welsh Government. Quite what the site entrance has to do with my buildings I am not sure. Surely I am allowed to come and go as I please, with or without any such structures. Anyway the planning officer has asked them for more clarification (they specified the wrong A road) so I haven't had the chance to argue my case yet.

In the meantime I just carry on wearing my hoodie, sipping birch juice and sowing them seeds.

Rough With The Smooth

The reservoir at the Centre for Alternative Technology

You have your good weeks and you have your bad weeks. I'd say on balance I have a lot more of the former than the latter. Nevertheless once in a while, a bad week comes along and takes me by surprise.

Many of those who claim to be followers of Jesus Christ will this week be reflecting about his really bad week. Betrayed by one of his select confidantes into the hands of people who put him through a mock trial and then convinced the imperial authority to kill him using their most barbarous method. Deserted by his closest friends at his hour of need. Even God seemed to desert him. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” he cried out near to death, as recorded by the gospel writers Mark and Matthew.

Compared with that, all the weeks of my life so far have been a walk in the park. You never know what life will throw at you but recognising and being grateful for the good things each day brings, however mundane, is, I suspect, the way to keep positive in tough times. 

So my week has had lots of good things in it as well as bad. A chance to act in a drama at church. Being paid to teach a piano lesson for the first time. Being invited over for a tasty North African lunch at a friend's house. Having a fish and chips takeaway with a group of other friends. Sowing more seeds and seeing more of them germinate (and frowning at those that aren't). Getting an invite for a cuppa and chat with my next door neighbours. Little gifts arriving from my landlords and my mum. Taking my first bath since I arrived back in Wales.

The bad? Well, the heavy rain has turned everything into a quagmire and the wind keeps threatening to whip my caravan awning away. Living a hilly mile away from the land has its challenges, as I keep discovering when on my land that something I need is back up the hill, or vice versa. I accidentally went two hours forward instead of one hour on Saturday night, something to do with thinking my phone was set not to jump forward automatically but it did, which meant not only missing a crucial hour of sleep but also getting soaked waiting for someone to pick me up at 8am instead of 9am.


Worse, the North Wales Trunk Road Agency finally replied and told me that they would refuse permission for a planning application to build a dwelling on my land. They think the access onto the A road is too poor, in that the visibility is not great for oncoming traffic where the track meets the road. It is something I have suspected they might say but now it's confirmed. It means that there's now no route left to getting official permission for residency on the land.

So I am going to carry on this year, growing veg, selling it, and living away from the land. But this current arrangement of kipping in my neighbour's outhouse will not last forever, perhaps not beyond this year, so I am going to have to do some serious thinking about the future. 

On top of all that, the budding romance in my life is over - this week we called it off and decided we are better off as friends.

Sadly this is not all one big April Fool's joke!

The beginnings of a big firewood store