Week 24

Well as forecast we had big storms Sunday night and it continued most of Monday. But rain can't stop work and I really want to get the sun lounger area cleared, so wet gear on and off to work! Sensibly Pamela touches up areas with fresh paint indoors and unpacks a few more boxes (we still have about 20 to unpack in the garage but we are ignoring them for now).

Torrential rain

The idea is this area will become a BBQ and sun lounger area. A good few weeks work though as all that wood has to be chopped and stored first.

When there is a lull in the torrential rain Stefan pops in. For some reason he wants us to bring our camera and follow him. Oh well, I got a few hours work in before the first interruption and this excursion may be interesting. Off we go to his house, he ties up his killer spaniel with the nastiest fangs we have ever seen, and we are beckoned into a barn after he has removed the goat that was blocking the doorway. Stefan had brought us to see his new born kid goats. Then we had a tour of his land when our question of water hoarding was answered. He had an old petrol tanker, minus the cab, sat in his garden along with an untold number of barrels all filled to the brim with rain water. There was then an intricate network of pipes that fed water to every piece of his land. He just opens the tanker valves and gravity does the rest although goodness knows how he got a petrol tanker into his garden in the first place. As usual before we leave we are given a fresh egg from his chickens and handfuls of herbs.

Stefans kid goats

No need for a downpipe when you have an old vine. Stefan cut a length of vine, inserted it into the guttering then into a water bottle. The rain ran down the vine into the bottle. We collected 30 litres of water in a few hours this way. Ingenious.

Tuesday the sun is back and it is into the mid 20's again. Pamela is out in her beloved veggie plot and I am chopping some  wood for stacking when TH, Stefan and Baba B all turn up at our house. Not sure if it was pre-planned with the others but Stefan had heard my chainsaw and knew it needed sharpening and was not running properly. How do they know these things? By the time he has stripped it down, cleaned, fiddled with every screw on the saw and sharpened the chain it is amazing the difference. Even I could hear the difference. Not sure what TH or Baba B wanted but they hung around. Then Stefan and I had a beer and everyone toddled off. Work resumes for a few hours when Stefan returns with a metal nut in his hand. Now, our Bulgarian language skills are probably that of a new born child so how he ever thought I knew what welding was in Bulgarian I will never know but off we all trotted to his house again. This time I had to also bring my chainsaw. He sets himself up on a couple of stools, sits Pammi in the shade and then proceeds to sharpen the chainsaw again but decides too many teeth are ruined and I should buy a new chain. Then off to one of his numerous outbuildings where he is building a grinder for sharpening tools. It is amazing, made just from old bits of metal he obviously found lying on his land, a massive old stone wheel, a motor and some very dodgy old wiring. He needed me to hold the metal whilst he welded. Good, at last we are helping someone instead of everyone helping us. Job done, he attached two bare wires into a socket and it fired into life. Pamela is given more herbs and off we go again. At least we do not need to water our garden tonight so just an evening spent in the courtyard eating and watching the stars.

Stefan

Gifts from Stefans garden

Wednesday is a scorcher but today Borko and the team are coming to install our new steps. It is great to see them all again and once they have given my work the once over they begin on the steps. The six main steps each weigh 250kg yet Borko manhandles them out of the trailer on his own. He is a legend. Within a few hours the steps are complete, including an extra bit of pathway that they had to wait for the materials to be delivered for. They did an awesome job and so quickly. It has transformed the front of the house and Pammi is happy as no more muddy slope. Once Borko and the guys are gone we have an early lunch and as it so hot take the afternoon off and test the sun loungers. We are happy to report that they work fine.

Borko the Man Mountain unloads the steps. He is awesome.

A great job done in only a few hours

Thursday is another really hot day with temperatures hitting 28 today. Pamela has a few jobs she wants to do in the holiday let and I need to weed the vineyard so spend all day clearing weeds. Not thrilling reading for you but that was our day. In the evening Baba B popped in and stayed for some food. As usual she is not impressed with our wine (we find out later in the week she worked in a winery for many years and is very knowledgeable about wines, no wonder she won't touch our plastic bottled, 2 litres for 3 leva, supermarket specials). However we soon discovered that she will not refuse hot chocolate and brandy. At last we find her weakness!!

A very happy Baba B

Friday is cloudy but still very hot so I crack on clearing the sun lounger area. There seems to be no end to the piles of wood but we will be grateful of these in years to come. Pamela is cleaning the holiday let in preparation of her sister and brother-in-law's arrival next week. They are coming to stay for a week which we are really looking forward to. Just as she finishes and goes to start planting out more seedlings Baba B comes to the wall and invites us for an evening meal. She makes a potato and yoghurt bake and a spinach and yoghurt bake which were both delicious and of course all washed down with Rakia and real wine.

Saturday Pamela does the deep clean of our house whilst I strim all the paths, the top land and our new lawn. It has grown at a phenomenal rate and needs cutting already. After lunch we Skype Pamela's daughter in London before Pamela tests another sun lounger, which she is quite proficient at, whilst I chop yet more wood. An early finish today as the temperature reached 29. After an early evening meal Pammi and I went for a stroll around the village without the dogs, something we have not done for ages and made a nice change. Tonight I got to use the water that we collected in our new water but. It makes life so much easier but even a full barrel, which was collected during one storm, is still not enough to even water the vineyard. We need more, at least another 2.

Sunday is a day of rest. Almost. We get up really early as it is forecast to be 30 degrees today and Pammi wants to get some weeding done. Whilst she does that I get on with some admin work for the holiday let. We then have a nice leisurely breakfast in the garden in the early morning sun. Pammi goes to plant out some more seedlings when Baba B calls her over. We cannot work out what she wants so off she goes. Half an hour later she is at our gate, new blouse on and wants us to go with her. I work out that we are about to meet some more neighbours who live at the top of our lane who we have not properly met yet. Again this seems all pre-planned as they are clearly expecting us. They are a lovely couple with an amazing house complete with a real bath and a swimming pool. It turns out they are master wine makers and are telling us that TH is totally wrong about the vines he has given us and that they will all rot from bugs. I have apparently totally wasted my time planting all the vines that I have! I am not going to do anything for now other than to see how they grow and if they fail I will pull them out and start again. They cost us nothing but time and effort which we have plenty of. Whilst there they also wanted to know about our new steps. They own a farm and their tractors etc use our lane so after an hour of drawings and charades I presumed that as our new steps are close to the road they could not get their tractors round the bend. Even using google translate app on our phones we were getting nowhere in finding out what the problem was. We offered to move them, but that was not necessary so we were at a total loss as to what the problem was. Time to call Super Monica then. As usual, even though it is a Sunday morning, she answers our distress call and sorts it all out for us. A complete star as always. It turns out the neighbours are concerned that the builders did a bad job and did not put our steps down to our garage. We never wanted them down to our garage. They are for guests who will arrive at the front gates but how do we explain that. Anyway drama over and we give a big sigh of relief. Later some more guests arrive who speak English and ask us the same question. At least we were able to put their minds at rest that we had work done exactly as we wanted and are so happy with them. We were itching to test the other sun loungers at home so made our excuses and left with Baba B who then wanted to Skype her daughter in England. That done off she went home and we spent a very hot afternoon testing sun loungers, Pammi's beetroot burgers and cheap wine. It is now 2030hrs and am sat writing this blog in t-shirt and shorts with a glass of vino. We must have been crazy to take on this new life at our age. Not!!

Vines sprouting

Spinach and lettuce

Beans, Peas, Radish and Rocket

Sun lounger testing area

Have a great week everyone. Take care.