Chinese Pirate Ship Found in Olhao!

Heavy storms, strong winds leave Chinese junk nearly 100 metres inland from the coast of Olhao in the Eastern Algarve

Jack Sparrow was asleep in the Fiat Ducato

Almost like a scene from Pirates of the Caribean, we came across this monolith of a wooden boat, propped on stilts about 100 metres away from the water next to the industrial estate on the Eastern edge of the port of Olhao. It is fantastic but weighing in at several hundred tonnes, and lying untouched for four years, slowly dying. The same thinks me, as the world. After the Russians \ Iranians diverted the main sources to the Aral Sea, enormous tankers can be found HUNDREDS of miles from a small lake that is left of this once mar fantastico. The Iranians are trying to redirect water to start filling it again, but too little too late I guess.

Fretwork and Chinese writing, this was an emperors ship

Eventually a sluggish not Jack Sparrow emerged from the white van to tell us that this boat was given by the Chinese to an Englishman who sold it to a Portuguese man who moved it here four years ago. I want it, I really want it. I want to dig a hole on my garden and plant it there and live on it, complete with scull and cross bones and a few skeletons. We didn't get to look around it - I suspect a packet of cigarettes and a bottle of red from Sete Estrelas might do the trick next time.

Still an active boat yard with low technology, love it

Welcome to follower no 19, Linda Barreiro, the Sunflower. One more follower and the cat is saved - we move on to a purple rhino next... or a few politicians maybe. There is an opportunity next month for a volunteer at Quinta Stuart, to strip and sand some tipi poles and erect it and help finish off the new eco bathroom. Room, light lunch and cooked dinner offered. You can contact me at stuartmerelie@gmail.com. One person only.

In response to a followers question, I don't put my e mail address around too much as I get swamped with volunteer requests and it wears me out!!

This green green Spring continues, now sitting out at sun down and lots of solar hot water. The need to water my new fruit trees more is a reminder to mulch them and with the dying off of the Bermuda Buttercup weed, time to attack the tall upright weeds which are now exploding out of the ground. It is time to stop planting any more trees and carefully extend and modify my irrigation. Every time we go away, we lose so many trees and find that drought resistant trees have been watered by mistake, wasting my rain water only water supply. Kind of reminds me of a boat out of water....

Echium and Peppers, summers coming

Sun, Sex and a burnt prawn curry at the OK Quinta

Good Morning Portugal!!

Well, I feel blessed to be alive this week after being pursued by Tony One Tooth, Paula Non Stop, Valdemar the Winge, four GNR officers and oh yes two members of the Ambient Death Squad AND a few hundred caterpillars. For those with little time to read my missive, I survived, I partied and I am dead good looking.

For fourteen years, three pine trees overhung my friends property, on the neighbours land. Never a neighbour seen, I cut them down. After being affected by those horrid caterpillars, just as I had fallen three massive pines, the prodigal neighbour arrived... 

a) Tony One Tooth, Patriach, one long bottom tooth.. " It's like having had my legs chopped off!"

b) Paula Non Stop, wife of above "Unbelievable (x 100)"

c) Valdemar the Winge "Like losing my son.."

d) The police "Sort it yourselves"

e) Ambient "Sort it yourselves"

Moral of the story, get a good owner on your side, check with other locals the status of the Winge Family and don't get caught in future. Cost me a nights sleep though.

 It's tricky being the Robin Hood of the Landscaping and Permaculture world. A tough life but I love it!

The sun is out and the future is great. Whilst bankers moan their lack of bonus, our chickens are laying well, cabbages, beans and onions abound. I look forward to the future, to equality, to enjoying simple things not expecting new cars and fancy meals but teaching my kids backgammon and last generations card games, pic nics, bike rides, camping, window shopping, hey even smiling!! Read again what I have just written and these are activities that bring immense joy and cost ZIP. What fun the BMW service bill?

Two litres of boiling water in 26 minutes - in March?

Solar Prawn Curry anyone?

The new solar cooker from Spain is now set up and is incredible. I see no reason for anyone cooking during the summer days to use electricity or gas. They deliver to Portugal and the web site is www.generador-electrico.com. This dish was about 100 euros delivered - worth every cent. It gives out the heat equivelent to a big gas ring. It isn't going to take long to get the investment back and it really is easy to use.

One of my other investments this week is The Owl Energy Monitor. Full reports on this have been done by Permaculture Magazine and it is brilliant. Not as brilliant as having a purely solar electric system like Rainbows (check out Jonathon at ola@rainbowcommunities.org if you want a good high quality installation) but fantastic to see where all your beer money is being wasted on standbys, silly plugs etc. It consists of a sensor fitted to the incoming supply of your fuse board that trasmits to a clock that you can sit anywhere (mine is on the kitchen worktop) that tells you precisely how many watts you are using or how many euros per day et you are spending. I have struck a deal with the suppliers to import them to Portugal and the price will be around 60 euros. E mail me at stuartmerelie@gmail.com if I can help you.

Standbys, transformers and just naughty plugs - this machine saves money by showing you how much you bloody waste!!!

Just in case you thought I took time off, I have just finished my passive solar cooker, mentioned in my last blog. We had teething problems - lack of heat after we fitted the black painted tin surround and had to resort to lining the sides with tin foil. The bottom is still black and acts as a heat sink and we broke the 100 celcius barrier this week end (white bit on end of finger to prove it!). And yes, it makes great bread. 

A great week. Small investments, good savings and great food. Good luck John LW and Judith, best of luck on your return to UK and see you somewhere soon xx. Life's great, don't use a bank!

The solar cooker. 100 celcius free of charge.

Finally a night in my own bed! Without Boris Johnson..

Not a reference to Boris Johnson's boast of never being short of a woman in twenty years (there is a ruder version of this comment, but I'm writing this sober for once!!) but my return from 9 days on the road. It's all well going on holiday but a number two on your own loo and a good bit of loving in your own bed can't be beaten.
Whoops, I just sank down to Boris Johnson's level............ must get my hair cut as well.


We took Betty (The Camper) up to Portalegre to see my eldest daughter. About 100 km east of Lisbon, it is a sleepy town in the middle of cork oaks and wheat fields - not a single horta (veg. garden) to be seen - no little vegetable plots or corners of self production to be seen. Only the occasional Modelo or Lidl. It gets very hot in the summer and frosty in the winter but come on people!
The police there take great pride in fining the generally poor population there for harmless activities - two of Becky's friends were dragged out of school and fined 50 euros for picking oranges from the trees on the street. I would rather die in prison, hopefully not by some six foot four transvestite pretending to be Boris Johnson...


Part two of my travels was down towards Almeria in South east Spain. Unfortunately bad weather stopped my visit to Dave and Laura's earthship project (check out their great blog and join their newsletter at www.earthship.es) but there was lots to do there. Mainly drinking, eating and a visit to the famous honey mines at Otivar.

Breakfast in Salobrena, sponsored by theteeshirtshop.com


Although it is a region surrounded by plastic greenhouses and high fertilizer use, there really is a lot of good growing going on there and not to much mono - cropping. Whilst one field is potatoes at least the next is spring cabbage or lettuce. The infrastructure of Spain still continues to expand - new motorways abound and there is general feel that large industry is strong, though I saw a lot of small shops closed \ for rent. I went to help a friend of mine who is renovating a small town house near Motril. After being let down by three local builders he is tackling the rebuild himself. We experimented with a product called Pumasec, Capa Blanca. It comes in a 25 kgs readymix bag and you just add water to a sort of ice cream consistancy and then trowel it on like English plaster. New to me, not the throw and smooth mix we use but quick and pleasingly it dries after six hours to a bright white finish. Whilst not a natural or eco product, it ain't have nice Mum, and easy cheap (3 euros a bag, each bag does 3 square metres) so within low budgets. Anyone know of an equal here in Portugal??






One hour to do 3 square metres, whilst not perfect, it is well acceptable and also claims to be waterproof. Note this is the finished colour - no painting required!


Highlight of the trip was a drive up to Otivar to the honey mines. High on a steep hill, North of Almuncar, this has been a regular haunt of mine for twenty years. Every inch was cultivated and watered by tiny canals zig zagging down the valley. It seemed a little abandoned with more emphasis on the ubiquitous building, but still fresh air and real life.






View from the bar at Otivar. Every terrace can use the valletas (little canals)




Paco the terrier nearly ripped my hand off. At 17 he still works guiding the honey pit horses up the steep hillsides.


Yours truly securing his haul of Otivar honey. As a non complex glucose it breaks down quicker in my body and also lasts indefinitely without refrigeration. Two years supply!!


The restaurante near the honey mines has a fantastic bread oven combined BBQ. A small door to the side of the bread oven acts as a chimney and the man cooks all the meat on a rack there. Project number 76 is forming in my head!!






The oven door is perfect - to the left the heavy round counter weight makes lifting the door effortless. Mmmmmm... jealous!


Finally back home and in my own bed. The cold has returned, wet weather, soggy life BUT I have been working on a solar slow cooker. Even in its unfinished form I put an oven thermometre in and it went up to 90 celcius. Things are coming together, solar slow cooker, my tin foiled satelite dishes, my rocket stoves - anybody on for a course in carbon free cooking??
See you next week.




The solar cooker - a piece of double glazing found at my bins along with the blue insulation and a few offcuts of planks. Just needs lining with tin and black paint. So so easy.

FREE COMPETITION FOR ALL FOLLOWERS

Thousands of prizes not to win in this dangerously easy to play competition!!

Competition Question number one, which is the real cabbage?

I was driving back from Albufeira yesterday and noticed that where the orange sellers were on the main road there were several prostitutes. Quite amazing, hooker, oranges, hooker, oranges. Some of them were quite juicy!

From no work on Tuesday, I have just picked up about four weeks hard graft:-

1) Ripping out an old Lavender hedge and replacing it with native Escalonia (less water, more permanent).

2) Removing some non native pines and pruning a few vain bound citrus

3) Hanging some golf nets (well saves the man driving to the driving range so I guess that reduces some carbon use).

4) Helping Calvin at his tipi centre near Monchique - see link on right, his bookings are going really well, just shows guys, do something different and you will be rewarded!!

5) Rebuild a dry stone wall pushed over by a big Olive.

Great, just as we are heading North to see my daughter for Carnival then a few days near Almeria to see an old pal.

Quiz question number two. Why oh why didn't Portugal invent the tapa?

One of my most impressive achievements this week was buying an excellent book on identifying mushrooms, and promptly finding and identifying three different mushrooms on my own land!!

Quiz question number three. How many were edible?

The book, lest I forget to name it is The Field Guide to Mushrooms and other Fungi of Britian and Europe, published by www.newhollandpublishers.com BUT purchased through thebookdepository.com - miles cheaper than Amazon and the postage is included (still cheaper than Amazon by two or three euros every time!!)

I found the Brown Mottegill, non edible and appears after rain especially on manure (covered my garden with manure...)

Also the Deadly Web Cap, super toxic and stops your kidneys from working..

AND the Common Ink Cap, edible but very past its sell by date..

Good though, and the book will travel with me this week. Amazing how many of them seem to grow where manure has been added. Might be nice if I could even find an edible one.

This week I planted some Tomatoes outside and some melon seedlings under five litre water bottles (empty, but I guess you guessed that..) and fixed a pig of a job. The outside sink had stopped draining, I had to remove two banana trees that the sink waste waters and eventually chip around and smash the drain to find a few inches of solidified cement and sand. One of our last woofers was very keen on washing his hands so every time it started to accumulate at the end of the tube - I was impressed that the bananas showed no signs of putting roots into my drains,. Man the beer tasted good after that job!

Keyhole surgery was needed. Competition question number four. How long did it take me and how many beers did it take for me to stop swearing at the woofer??

Amazingly these drain blockers started life as a little grime on someones hands..

And Owl finally finished her blog about the Owl house, a really nice little wooden chalet that we are renting out nice and cheaply this summer. We include free bicycle hire and breakfast, for only 220 euros a week (one or two people).

Please visit her website at rusticrentaltetreatalgarve.blogspot.com

Answers to all quiz questions to stuartmerelie@gmail.com. There may actually be a few prizes!

See you next week, Stu  x

Three Walnuts, three Cherries, three eggs

After a couple of dry days, Stuart unfreezes himself from the Cryogenic Crypt!!

If I managed the England cricket team, I would teach em to catch three eggs at a time, like me......

How oh how can that idiot Clarkson seriously insult Gordon Brown and get away with a light apology whilst Jonathon Ross gets a three month suspension for calling a hoe a hoe.... Incidentally, Damon Hill is the stig. Find him in the posh restaurant next to the Bottom Gear test track after most test sessions. 

Mind, I will insult old one eye if he lets the banks pay all those failure related bonuses. Didn't you and I think the world was like this:-

a) I make baked beans

b) You buy my baked beans

c) I buy beer and women with my profit

d) The breweries and lap dancing clubs buy my baked beans

e) Etc we all live happily ever after.

Shame we were all wrong. There were no baked beans, no lap dancers just banks and Jeremy Clarkson and One Eye and Barak O Laden. Makes the Olympics seem like a lunch fund compared to The 99 Red Balloon trillion dollars game. My solution is to have the Olympics every week, but pick a country where you would like to go to .... some of our guys must have been gutted at the prospect of getting the tube to compete instead of staying in some six star training camp full of Russian totty trying harder to win a British passport than falling off that b****rd of a  little beam. Sidney, oh yes please! No wonder we won so many medals, a new baby boom has just started there, all those little Rebeccas and Bradleys so cute...

Living room and kitchen (actually all one big room) at Quinta Stuart

A couple of dry days and a well waxing moon had to be the sign to do my final planting of the winter, so with Holly I dodged church and headed down to Estoi Market (2nd Sunday of every month). There is something nice about arriving early at the market as the stalls are being set up, familiar faces, bright morning sun and even a car park space. I am looking for a cart and have been offered a young mule so soon, I will make this trip and be able to park anywhere! I shall invent cart - rage, drinking whilst driving and lots more toad of toad hall stuff.

 In the meantimeBatistas smiley face acknowledged the fact that finally he had my long awaited tree order. Three American Walnuts (Species Lara, a bigger tastier nut) and three Cherries - known as Gingeira and the only suitable Cherry for the Algarve (the main variaties prefer further North, like the Sweet Chestnut). And another 100 onion sets for the heck of it. Oh yes and a few dodgy  DVDs and a top for owl that I should have kept for Valentines Day (Maybe I can steal it and wrap it again?)

Three Walnuts planted in a deep trench filled with my own compost. Although close to the fence, the land beyond the fence is left by the neighbour, so I may as well use his airspace!!

I planted some of the onions under my Nasturtian pots, water above, drips to plants below.

Life from the Yellow Submarine..***

Sunset as seen through my periscope



It is now 140 years since it started raining. Even Noah would have run out of Dodo steaks to barbeque waiting for it to stop bloody raining. I have to admit it was dry yesterday, but one day doesn't count. Especially since I didn't get any dry firewood in and now only the tip of faro Cathedral is visible above the water and there is a hazard warning light flashing in the yellow submarine that I think means:-

a) We are running low on plutoneum, so best not go to supermarket.

b) The chimney for the woodburner is submerged.

c) The bloody traction hyperdrive is playing up again.

(*** Viz the title, this is not some Beatles inspired skiff. I have always detested the Beatles, their music, their family and friends, except for Wor Heather, never mess with a Geordie Lass, Paul you old Cod. The submarine is actually black but the rust stains have turned it a nasty shade of wee...) 

The view from the camper window - who needs a beachfront house when you gotta camper!

We spent the week end in Spain, parked on the harbour at Punte del Morel, near Ayamonte, reading and eating and drinking, watching the sunset and trying to avoid being blown away by the tornado on Saturday night. Nice to get away. Staying put for 36 hours was a little like being in a hide - eventually the locals ignored us and continued speaking at 3,500 decibels like we weren't there. Good seafood and wine, a little short of totty though - could have done with Wor Heather.

Beach cycling - The Heather Mills Spanish Campionship,not, but good fun!

Back home, we had had 52mm of rain over the week end. That translates as 52 litres of water per square metre. Multiply that by our roof catchment area of 160 square metres and another 8000 litres of water into our water tank. It stands at an all time high of 2,05 metres (full is 3,00 metres or about 90,000 litres of water which should last us the summer (lots of watering, little is used in the house).

It is so soggy though, I dug a four foot deep hole for my wind indicator ( a Greek flag tied to an old tipi pole, cost zero) and even that had fallen over. I did manage to get a little more work done on the new outside Love Lounge and I think I will get into my workshop and build a couple of cold frames that will double up as solar cookers for the summer.

The corner trusses add a little extra touch. Got to save up for the roof now.

I have noticed my onions are loving this rain. Just been outside and picked some broccoli, chilli peppers, tomatoes, suedes (nabos) and dug some jerusalem artichokes. My broad beans have grown so quickly they have fallen over. The Almonds have finished their early this year blossom and I can see all my deciduous fruit trees budding up. Spring I guess is slowly approaching, if only I can find the instructions to land this rusty submarine...

Picked today from my garden. Now masterchef, you have 50 minutes to impress me!

Please Sir, can I have my greenhouse back?

Hopefully my automatic music file will be working by the time you reach my this blog!

I now understand why web programmers wear anoraks and don't have girlfriends - even with all the info handed on a plate it still took me 11 hours.

I just wear an anorak because:-

a) It has rained non stop now for 14 years

b) I found one on a dead programmer

c) It makes me hot, not dead sexy (which I am) but hot warm hot.

Ah yes I remember, we forgot to peg the greenhouse back down whilst building our new outside lounge. Really high Northerly winds and I woke up in the morning sans greenhouse. Two fences later, I found it in my neighbours garden.

The Scottish chill out summer lounge - with greenhouse attached

Greenhouse flew over a pergola, two fences and my palms!

I got the idea from some photos I found in flickr from a Scottish lady in France (google "la ferme de sourrou" in Flickr) and had some posts given to me by a Scottish couple nearby.

Since I am one eighth Scottish, that means that the construction is technically 1/144th Scottish.

Then again, maths never was my strong point.

What my finished "glorriette" will hopefully look like. No anoraks will be hurt in the construction of the above!!

Since the eighteenth century, we have been persuaded by laws and conscience to accept that all power, water and gas should come from a centralized source. We all expect mains water, mains electricity, telephones and gas to be plumbed to our front door. Some people even want a stronger electricity supply, better mains water pressure. How the heck can we run the sexy crome coffee machine, the microwave and the breadmaker at the same time otherwise?

It was at this point last year, after installing electric underfloor heating in my farmhouse was the point I woke up. My quest is this. If the electricity, gas and water supply tomorrow ceased, how would I survive? The answer is, I wouldn’t. But if I knew that on the 1^st January 2018 the grid would crash could I survive? I believe so. I have set myself ten years (now actually just under 9) to become fully off grid and fully self sufficient in water, food, energy and shelter.Food. This winter I planted a lot of fruit trees to take advantage of the winter rains. Underneath these trees I constantly rotate a large selection of onions, tomatoes, broccoli, corgettes, peppers, beetroot, anything that is in season. Since I have to water the trees, the vegetables get watered as well, and the greater the combination (currently random!), the greater the symbiosis and the better the veg and the better the fruit. As they mature, then they will require less water and create shade for growing more diverse vegetables in the shade as the Algarve sun blasts down in the summer. My chickens are a big success, free to feed and using little water and producing fantastic eggs. My ducks and geese were a waste of time, sincemy land is too small to allow them to roam,few eggs and as a vegetarian no use!I am learning to collect some of the crop as seed but it will take a few years to get any where near sufficiency. I guess I manage to grow 10% of my food, less in winter. More than some buggers though

... and now for something completely different:-

International economic systems based on the cow currency.

 SOCIALISM

 You have 2 cows.

 You give one to your neighbour.

 COMMUNISM

 You have 2 cows.

 The State takes both and gives you some milk.

 FASCISM

 You have 2 cows.

 The State takes both and sells you some milk.

 NAZISM

 You have 2 cows.

 The State takes both and shoots you.

 BUREAUCRATISM

 You have 2 cows.

 The State takes both, shoots one, milks the other, and then throws

 the milk away...

 TRADITIONAL CAPITALISM

 You have two cows.

 You sell one and buy a bull.

 Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows.

 You sell them and retire on the income.

 SURREALISM

 You have two giraffes.

 The government requires you to take harmonica lessons.