Good morning, evening, night and on ! It is with a great joy we are sharing some summery news !
You are many to write us this last weeks, many wanting to come visit this summer, unfortunately, we have been obliged to refuse most of your request since we are full ! About that, we feel it’s necessary to precise we have realized how important it is for us to keep the “1 week for visitors, 1 week without” to be able to take some time for ourselves, to do activities in a smaller group, live experiences that consolidate the group of permanents. Therefore, we can only receive people for two weeks per month, with means 15 to 20 people at most. That’s not a lot for our desire to share what we do with everyone but we try to be patient. Sure, a time will come when we will be able to receive more people. Although we have received more than a 100 people !
Until then, we’re evolving each day a bit more, with our hands, minds, our ways of exchanging and communicating, accepting and loving. To answer some of the commentaries we receive which we have found quite relevant, here a detailed summary of some of our summer activities :
1. Renovation of the floor which separate the cave from the garage : we used palettes to make a floor of 3,20 m to 3.60 meter without beams, without buying anything and, therefore, with the minimum impact possible. However, we have used some used screws and some electricity for it.
a. Europe type palette of 120/60cm. Strong and ideal for this kind of structures. You can get them in particular with the heating engineer, carpenter, seller of windows and verandas.
b. Free standing structure with included shelves for the harvest.
c. Isolation with clay extracted from the land, wet, steeped and mixed with straw given by the neighbors.
2. This room has been renovated to welcome our brand new bike-washing-machine ! It’s been some times we wanted to do it. Thanks to some videos on the internet and the precious help of two visitors, one mechanical engineer and a mechanic, we have achieved it ! Some hours of work for a lot of satisfaction. The only drawback, we were missing a tool to dismantle the pinion and therefore we can’t complete the wringing. It there is any amateurs to give us a hand on this, be welcome !
a. washing machine with the opening on top, it’s easier. You can find it in the waste reception center or in second-hand shops.
b. we fix the pinion on the wheel of the barrel. It is the easiest way we found. You don’t need to buy any belt.
c. We turned the bike upside down so we can pedal from an armchair. Ungrowth is no synonym of torture !
d. you got yo make everything very stable, that’s why we took of the outside shell of the washing machine.
e. Recipe : with a washing powder made out of bicarbonate or ashes, pedal gently for about 15 to 30 minutes depending on the dirt, you shouldn’t go over 60 turns per minutes ; empty the water bringing down the evacuation tube, put clear water, pedal more intensively for 5 minutes, change plates if necessary, empty the water et pedal even stronger. (here it’s where we’re missing a bigger plates on one end and a smaller one on the other, next step to achieve 700 turns per minutes!)
3. We reap and reap and re-reap to cut the grass and prepare some vegetation cover. This technique has been used since last year and proved quite efficient :
a. Reap dry grass (preferably before the seeds are out), put the grass the way you want for culture, in big layers (40 to 80 cm).
b. Let simmer for some months, ideally a whole year, but after three months, it is already quite good.
c. the earth go smoother, life is developing in it, undesirable weeds are stifled, you can directly plant or seed.
d : The results in images :
Many others things happened and are happening, but the newsletter is getting big ! On a practical level, we will launch the renovation of the barn’s roof ; continue isolating the roof of the house with straw wet in clay (exit cal and cement for more coherence) ; keep on plan the different spaces thanks to our wonderful landscaper Pierre (see drawing below) ; start the construction of a sweat lodge in the forest ; reap, mulch et prepare the winter garden ; continue our ongoing learning of giving, unconditional loving, selfless sharing and renewed joy at every instant !
A great program to look for and we hope you’ll be many to come experience this with us ! Here the next visiting times :
September : du 7 au 14 et du 21 au 28.
October : du 5 au 12 et du 19 au 26.
Looking forward seeing you (again) soon, fraternally,
The Eotopia Family.
