The Ending

It took a few years, but this blog was indeed finished. Catch up on the rest of the story under Wild > Spain at https://cosmofalcon.wordpress.com/

Woof!

The New Routine

There is an organised schedule here which makes it much easier to get into a routine. We're up for breakfast at 8:30 then out to work around 9ish. Get those beautiful chestnuts gathered up until lunch at 3pm. After that, the day is yours.

Buen Vino is primarily a guest house rather than a farm - like everywhere else so far - so sometimes we're expected to help serve the guests in the evening. Lucky for us there aren't many booked to stay at the minute so we have plenty of free time.

Four of us wwoofers are staying in a cottage down the road from the main house. It's a great little place except for several leaks and a bit of a fly infestation in the bedroom. I'm happy though; we have heaters for the cold nights and fine comfortable beds.

The other day, we finished harvesting early due to a torrential downpour and brought ourselves back to life by sitting at the fire and roasting panfuls of freshly-gathered chestnuts. Knob of butter, pinch of salt - delicious!

So far the food has lived up to my hopes. Particular highlights have been goat's cheese on toast with honey dressing; succulent Iberian pork stroganoff with creamy potato bake and green beans; potato curry and pork curry with an amazing mango, banana and pickled lemon chutney. And, of course, plenty of buen vino.

After dinner, we had a good chat with hosts Sam and Jeannie. They're nice folks and have some great tales to tell. I was impressed to hear when Jeannie was younger she travelled across the USA, squatted in Hugh Hefner's mansion and went on a VIP tour of Disneyworld with the Osmond brothers! There was a glint of mischief in her eyes as she recounted the experience, no doubt recalling some outlandish shenanigans which she wasn't so keen to have us all know about. 

Donny Osmond, or Justin Bieber?

The glitz and glamour of California seemed a universe away as we shuffled back down the silent moonlit lane to our cottage. It's no bad thing. I'm looking forward to a relaxing weekend of quietude in the leafy hills.

Third Time Lucky

Finca Buen Vino, near Aracena

When I close my eyes I see chestnuts. It's only been two days but many, many conkers have been gathered.

So far, I'm happy with this new farm. We were collected from Aracena bus station by Jeannie Chesterton, one of our new hosts, and whisked away to their hilly farm estate. Originally from Scotland, Jeannie is an amazing cook. She holds cookery courses at the house several times a year. I was looking forward to my dinner!

Later we met husband Sam, a writer, and their son Charlie, who is also a qualified chef. 

Our reception was much more relaxed and down to earth than that of previous hosts. We grabbed a grateful bite of breakfast then headed out to find the other wwoofers and get harvesting. 

Another immediately notable difference here is the climate. Although we aren't too far from hot, dry Seville, there is a lot of rain in these parts. The area is at such an altitude that it has its own micro-climate. I'm told that it gets the most rainfall in Spain. Looking up some figures, it seems that December in Aracena can see over 300mm of precipitation. That's almost half what "rainy" Manchester gets in a year. Rain in Spain.

Needless to say, it was raining when we started our great chestnut endeavour. I was never more glad of my trusty mac-in-a-sac. Finding our wwoofing companions James and Mons already tackling a steep, chestnut-studded slope, I tightened my hood and became one with the conkers.

Barely

Buzzel seemed offended by our decision to leave and wouldn't give us a lift into town. So we had to wait around all day for one of the Swiss women. 

I was beginning to wonder if we would be allowed to go - maybe Buzzel was concocting some nefarious scheme to enslave us and force us to clean his infested barns and caravans for the rest of our lives. 

I was cleaning up cow dung when he appeared on the path in front of his house and stood laughing at me with hands on hips. 

He was completely naked. 

I mustered a horrified failure of a smile before quickly scurrying away, attempting not to look terrified. My mind was filled with nightmares.

Thankfully, none of them came true and to my immense relief, we escaped. The journey with the Swiss woman was a little edgy - she seemed guarded and mistrustful. As she was one of Buzzel's subjects, I answered her probing questions with careful, measured responses. She dropped us off in Tarifa and I revelled in an invigorating wave of relief.

We met up with our German friends Julius and Katja, who were also wwoofing, and agreed to share an apartamento for a few days.

A Glimpse of Reality

We stayed for the best part of a week. For company there was the mad King Buzzel himself, his Swiss women, the simpleton neighbours and a Chinese Chi-healer who I never encountered. I wouldn't be surprised if he only existed on Planet Buzzel and was undetectable to the rest of us lowly humans.

It was like a breath of fresh air one day when a sane Englishman turned up. It was no coincidence that he chose to drop by on an afternoon when Buzzel was out and about somewhere. 

Philip was the man who built the yurts. The various carpentry equipment lying around was his. That explained why Buzzel had zero interest in working with it. It was also Philip who signed the place up to the wwoofing scheme. So it was his description we had read online. He was the host. Unfortunately, we were too late: had we come a year or so earlier we could have learnt some real skills and had the chance to see some cool places in the area. 

What a filthy old liar Buzzel is, keeping that out of date description online so he can attract free labourers.  

Even worse, when Philip decided to move on from Planet Buzzel, the evil emperor tried to claim Philip's yurts and equipment as his own property. What gratitude after years of free usage. Buzzel was obviously too comfortable making money from Philip's work. Sadly, a legal dispute is now underway.

After my experiences, I can't say I was terribly surprised to hear this. The crazed solitary "Buddhist" suddenly turned on a generous companion in order to further his own monetary welfare. His self-serving hypocrisy is repulsive.

My stay on Planet Buzzel had been a remarkable one. I was now more than ready to head back down to Earth.

Eagle-eyed

The weather has calmed and it's quiet now. I realise this is another isolated place. Three Swiss women come during the week and run a small aromatherapy business in one of the buildings here. Who knows what kind of arrangement they have with the dirty old despot. We don't see much of them. 

A couple who live on a neighbouring piece of land also come over now and again to do some cleaning. Cleaning what, I don't know. Maybe they follow Buzzel around his house, mopping up the hypocrisy as it accumulates in his wake. The guest house and other yurts are all empty. There is no one else around.

With fewer people about my attention moves onto nature and my surroundings. The light brown rolling mountains dotted with grey and green, and of course the white of the ubiquitous wind turbines. The trees and reeds by the lake, all facing away from the wind, permanently angled, lop-sided. The gentle ripples of the wind on the water. Tentative birdsong and grasshopper sounds, the occasional bell or chime on the wind. 

There are turtles in the lake and I've seen a few raptors soaring high above, seemingly motionless as they glide through the air. One eagle even floated down to perhaps fifteen metres, casting its eye around the lake here. I stood silently in awe of its majesty as it made a few slow circles then effortlessly glided away towards the mountainside. It took a while for the little swallows to return to their water-skimming.

Cows

Today we were cleaning up a big metal barn full of every bit of wooden or metal junk you can imagine, the more potential for injury the better. One corner of it is supposed to become a kitchen. This would replace our existing "outdoor kitchen", which consists of a metal table, portable gas cooking stove, a few utensils and a hosepipe suspended above a ceramic bowl. The barn is pulsing with filth so it's going to be a hell of a job.

We were doing what we could - which unfortunately isn't the experienced handyman job Buzzel seems to expect - when we spied a stray cow in the yard. Mark went out to open the gate and let it join the rest of its herd outside in the neighbouring fields. 

I'm sweeping up rat droppings when I vaguely hear some noise. I step into the doorway to see what's going on. The image I'm presented with is of Mark walking slowly towards me, shaking his head dejectedly, while a blurred brown mass of about forty cows streaks past in the background - up the driveway and into the compound and gardens beyond. Blank incomprehension turns into astonishment, then into frustration, then incredulous wonder at how Mark could have messed up so colossally. Instead of one cow out, forty were in. I decide to take action, clueless as to the size of the task that lay ahead.

After perhaps half an hour of dashing about waving a stick, screaming obscenities and plunging knee-deep into a shitbog in a crazed attempt to herd the cows back towards the gates, my bitter distress at the lack of progress transforms into amused appreciation at the absurdity of the situation. This is reinforced all the more hilariously when Buzzel comes bursting out of nowhere onto the path in front of me, brandishing a staff in both hands above his head and ululating mad, foreign howls. Mangy old Fucker is of course at his heels, doing his part and barking his wizened lungs out at the huge brown beasts trotting around the lake in front.

If the compound is similar to a resistance refuge in Half-Life 2, this cinematic moment was like the old shotgun-wielding priest appearing out of the blue right at the moment when you're most in need of help.

He didn't make much difference though. We spent another short while roaming about in vain, chasing the surprisingly nimble animals. Eventually, we decided just to let them graze and relax for a bit. Then, later, it was easier to usher them out, calm and organised, using walkie-talkies like real handymen of the country.

Planet Buzzel: Refuge of the Swiss

I'm sleeping in a yurt by a small lake. It's located next to a scrap compound which is part of a small estate owned by an aging eccentric Buddhist hoarder called Buzzel. 

Swiss in origin, Buzzel is bald, lean, chicken-necked and has a pair of glassy eyes which look right through you. He's also nearly deaf and speaks as if he has false teeth. His mess of a dog, who Mark has named "Fucker", is grey, shaggy and filthy. He has a small patch of fur trimmed above his hind leg - Buzzel hasn't got around to doing the rest. Fucker's eyes are also like frosted glass. Worryingly, so are those of the semi-feral cats roaming about (including "Lisa Left-eye" who sits there squinting at us all day). I fear for my health around these creatures, Buzzel included.

When we arrived at his finca, I thought perhaps we had stumbled upon the lair of a madman. I've never seen a scrapyard like it: oil drums, wooden sleepers, bits of metal, huge transport containers, all sorts of old tools, equipment and machinery. Even a speedboat, tractor, caravans and some massive unidentifiable industrial machines just lying dormant around the place. And it's nearly all in filthy disrepair. It's a breathtakingly ridiculous place.

Things made a little more sense after Buzzel showed us the guest house on the hill. As our end of the territory is dirty, disused and dangerous, the guest house is clean, stylish and beautiful in a rustic farmhouse way. It also has the best views over the coastal mountains, the Strait of Gibraltar and the silhouette of Africa in the distance.

Once presented with this bigger picture of Buzzel's world, his motives and ideas became evident. He wants willing and able handymen to manage and maintain the behind the scenes work on the estate, enabling him to loosely supervise and thus enjoy his semi-retired Buddhist mechanic pastimes. Even better for him if they come as volunteers and all the compensation he needs to provide are groceries.

It's dishonest of him to lure wwoofers into a place which is obviously not an organic farm and which does not provide the advertised opportunity to learn green-woodworking. This is another pitfall to look out for when wwoofing: some listings are out of date or unverified.

Nevertheless, we decided to stick around on Planet Buzzel for at least a few days.

Planes, Trains & Autobuses

Up early for a fun day of travelling. It started with a walk to the station, then a train to the airport, a flight to Malaga, a bus to Marbella, a bus to Algeciras, and finally yet another bus to Tarifa. Needless to say we were a little tired upon arrival in the small town.

So much travelling between farms is far from ideal. However, we didn't have much choice due to our unexpected departure from our previous hosts. It's easy to see now how unprepared we had been and how much better it is to have alternative places and people already contacted.

Our host had told us to call him when we arrived in Tarifa. He wasn't answering his phone. I got in touch with a girl who worked on the farm who gave us some convoluted directions. We decided instead to rest for a while in a nearby café.

Mark produced a box of cigars from his bag and so we sat and smoked and watched the surfers and locals drifting around in the hot mid-afternoon sun. The situation felt pleasantly absurd.

A long while later, we reached our new host who collected us soon after. It turned out he had been in town all day but had forgotten his phone. In terms of organisation, another discouraging first impression.

Animal bullies

Sleep at night is often disturbed by the dogs bolting past, barking at the top of their lungs, bouncing off the tent in their frenzied rush to chase whatever animal it is they've scented nearby. Sometimes I wonder if they do it just to mess with us.

Asleep in the tent one night, I slowly returned to consciousness. There was something fluffy moving across my face. As the surreal haze gradually cleared from my mind I realised it was one of the cats. The tent door was open a crack. She must have squirmed through and promptly snuggled up with me. Apparently I murmured "Thor" as I woke up with her on top of me. Thus, she is named. 

Thor comforted, sleep resumed. But later that night a horde of cats climbed onto the roof of the tent, depressing our ceiling chaotically low. At the same moment one of the dogs managed to shove her head through the door and rested it on the floor, motionless but for her eyes watching the squirming madness within.
 

Thor doing what she does best.

The Miller

Mark and I went for a wander around the hills to reflect on our options. On our way back to the farm, we passed by an old mill in the valley. It looked to have been converted into a house and was fed by an ancient stone canal system. As we hiked past, an old man appeared from nowhere and hailed us. In perfect Spanglish, we greeted each other and he introduced himself as Amable, the miller.

I felt like I had somehow slipped into a Cormac McCarthy novel. Amable, accompanied by his beautiful little cat Nica, launched into a speech about the centuries old mill, millennia old canals, and how dangerously unforgiving he is when anyone tries to dump rubbish nearby. He has spent several decades and many thousands restoring and maintaining the waterways. There was a mischievous spark in his eyes as he repeated his warning about respecting the land.

It seemed to me like there was more wisdom to this man. As we parted ways, I was contemplative of his simplicity, dedication, and stubbornness. I later heard from Mrs. Host that he was known to fire rifle shots in the air when he took a dislike to someone. 

Rockface

A routine has developed. The olive trees aren't quite ready to be harvested so the main task is to feed them. They like goat manure. A huge pile of which has been dumped on one of the terraces. So, armed with shovels, buckets and a wheelbarrow, the wwoofers get stuck in.

The manure has been sitting in the sun so long that it has mostly degraded to a fine brown powder. It gets up your nose and sticks to your sweaty skin. Before you know it flies are everywhere and you've turned into a giant walking turd. If you want to work on an organic farm, be prepared to get your hands (and everything else) filthy.

Julius with a fresh delivery.

In the evening, I had my first experience driving on the right side of the road. It was a good challenge: navigating a small van past a truck on a narrow winding mountain track. With no fence before the sheer drop. And a couple of Swedish rock climbers in the back quick-firing me questions about the Irish economy. No bother!

Spending so much time on a remote farm can feel isolating, especially for habitual urbanites. So it was refreshing to get out for a beer that night, even if it was just to the village. We were a gaggle of wwoofers and climbers, exchanging opinions about our various home countries and occupations.

Everyone seemed tired as, before long, conversation was replaced by The Angry Game. Fellow wwoofer Julius, from Germany, initiated this ridiculous entertainment: two people lock eye contact with angry expressions - you laugh you lose. The champion was probably Arvidh from Sweden whose face was simply closed, devoid of weakness, much like the cold, impenetrable rock he spends so many hours scaling.    

Amongst Olives

Despite the tense atmosphere, this is a wonderful place. The house is set on the dusty hillside near a handful of smaller casitas, various tool sheds, and a copse of pine trees. The hills roll on in every direction, with the village Sella visible in the south and the sea in the east. The steep slopes have been landscaped over centuries into terrace steps, now covered with olive and almond trees.

Extensive: the farmland and village beyond.

From the house, a narrow winding path leads up to the next terrace. Past the chicken coop and a vegetable garden lies our wwoofer room and tent. You can take steps down to the orchard below where tomatoes, avocados, oranges, lemons and even kaki (persimmon) are growing. There are two black dogs running about, mother and daughter, and at least nine cats. The seven chickens are eager to be released from their coop, then eager to go back in again. Perhaps they remember what happened to five of their friends when a rogue dog in the area recently chanced upon them.

One evening I was watering the vegetation when I experienced one of those moments where time seems to stop. The light from the setting sun caught the spray from the hose producing a vivid, glistening rainbow. The tapered mountainside beyond formed a fitting backdrop, harsh dry brown, with the olive trees patches of life against the dust.

Tips for harmonious wwoofing

The hosts had forgotten we were coming, hence the astonishment at our arrival. They were disorganised and had taken on more wwoofers than they could handle, hence their stress at our presence.

Both hosts and wwoofers alike can learn from this. Two important things to remember:

1 - Be organised. Keep a diary and document everything relevant to wwoofing (contact details; addresses; times and arrangements).

2 - Communicate. Everyone has different needs and expectations. The way to happiness is to be open and honest with those around you. If you're not comfortable with something, explain your feelings. Chances are there is an easy solution. If not, move on somewhere better!

This sounds like very basic advice but, as I've learnt first hand, these qualities are too often neglected.

Wwoofing Begins

Bewildered, Mark and I shovelled down a quick bite of lunch while attempting to remember the names of the handful of other wwoofers in the kitchen. It was an international mix, with young people from Sweden, Germany, USA and South Africa. 

We were then led out of the main house, up the winding path to our accommodation. This was, in theory, a wooden room extended on the back of the hosts' cottage. But it was clear on entering that the four beds were already claimed. Great stuff. We threw our packs down and set off to find our evasive hosts.

Assured that we would be sorted out, I was asked to get to work. I had hoped for a little time to settle in and rest up first, but if work was needed then I was happy to pitch in. Alas, my helpfulness was unappreciated by Mr. Host who I quickly found shouting in my face. I'd done what I was told, transferring several loads of almonds into a storage container, but this wasn't good enough. Supposedly we weren't meant to stop working whenever we'd finished a job...

The rest of the day passed largely without incident and was spent helping prepare dinner for a dozen guests. As well as the washing up, of course! I should mention that most smaller organic farms in Spain seem to also operate as guest houses. So there is plenty of hostel/catering style work.

We eventually finished for the night. It had been a stressful and exhausting day. We trudged back up the path, threw together a tent that had appeared for us, and fell asleep to the sound of chirping grasshoppers and snuffling dogs.