Living the Good Life

Setting the Scene

Anyone old enough to remember the popular sitcom ‘The Good Life’ will understand the fascination engendered by the exploits of the middle class couple who turn their backs on the ‘rat race’ and ‘go back to basics’. This had always been a dream of ours, like so many ‘baby boomers’. However, this dream would have been unlikely to have ever reached fruition had we remained in England. Land there is horrendously expensive, there is very little sun for growing, and plants and seeds are expensive to obtain in the ornately presented garden centres.  The most we ever managed to accomplish when living in England was to rent a small allotment! 

The Good Life Made Easy

Land here is very affordable. We own approximately an acre in total, with established fruit and nut trees and very fertile soil. For anyone thinking of purchasing a property here – most houses come with established fruit trees and vines. The property also came with a number of outbuildings: a still house, smoking shed, a small barn, donkey shed, chicken coop, and a garage with inspection pit! There is also a well, again, a common feature in the rural villages. There is absolutely everything you could possibly need for a self sufficient lifestyle!

A further superb element is that a self sufficient lifestyle has been the way of life here for centuries, meaning that there is much good advice and local wisdom on offer; also a vast array of plants and seeds to share between neighbours at no cost. 

The markets and stores also afford every thing you require dependent upon the season.  And of course there are the long hot summers which provide a wonderful growing environment 😊. In addition to all of that, the air carries all the right bacteria to turn our grapes into wine naturally, as part of a long established wine growing region. 🍷

From an energy point of view, solar power is “a must” with so much sun. And winter brings a ready supply of wood for off grid cooking and heating.  It is such a satisfying feeling to see a full wood pile – more so than money in the bank!

Animals too are readily available, not only from the many markets, but also from neighbours eager to impart chickens and rabbits from their growing numbers. And of course, there is always a ready supply of natural fertiliser!

The Reality

One thing we have learned, is that we have a lot to learn! Like anything, there are principles and procedures that need to be mastered. Ignoring them leads to problems. For example, we noted that many of our neighbours’ peach trees had vertical poles attached to their branches. We didn’t understand why until one of our own branches snapped clean off our tree, so laden was it with fruit. Next year we will carefully carve out such supports for ourselves. This is just one of our many mistakes to date!

The weather has been something else that we have had to learn more about. The summers are scorching here and the garden needs a lot of water – it takes a minimum of an hour and a half each evening to water the garden. And then there is the “gragushka”! Oh boy! We have never seen hail stones like these in England – literally as big as golf balls! Thankfully we were inside when they landed, but they tore our crop to shreds. Lesson learned, preserve enough food for two years, just in case.

As mentioned previously, small animals such as chickens and rabbits are not feasible for us with a pack of dogs on the land! One or two dogs, maybe, but not five. As much as I would love to have chickens, this is something that will have to wait. Larger animals require an awful lot of up keep, and running a holiday business with frequent time away precludes us from this endeavour. And, to be honest, I really don’t think that we could bring ourselves to slaughter them. Though I would adore a pig, I think that it would just end up being another member of our mini zoo! However, we can procure both fresh eggs and raw milk from our neighbours, also Fresh meat at certain times of year. We can even obtain local honey from a neighbour. 

The ‘Good Life’ is hard work!

I also feel that I need to add that homesteading is hard physical work! Spring finds us busy planting and nurturing seeds. Summer finds us up at six to water the garden before the sun can scorch the plants, and we are then out there working until it simply becomes too hot. Autumn is our busiest time when everything not only needs harvesting all at once, but preserving. We often go to bed exhausted. However, this is certainly a healthy tiredness after years of sitting behind a desk! And it’s certainly a very satisfying feeling to see our shelves stacked with our own produce. It really is a good life 😊

This is a very good web site for anyone thinking of this lifestyle:

https://homesteadsurvivalsite.com

Our Progress to Date

We are now in our ninth year of attempting to live ‘the good life’. Each year we improve in terms of skill and knowledge, but this represents our progress to date.  We grow a lot of our own vegetables, especially tomatoes. We preserve these in various ways for winter – including salsa, sun dried, and pasta sauce. In addition, we grow an endless supply of fruit, which we also preserve. We grow and preserve all of our own herbs, and also tea! Making wine and  cider is something we particularly enjoy. We have come a long way since moving to Bulgaria.

We have a solar shower we can use outside in summer time, a solar oven (which gets a lot of use for dehydrating also) and also a very efficient solar cooker. Solar panels are one of our next projects. We have mainly off grid (wood and bottled gas) heating and cooking, and we use a lot of candles because I love them 😊.