Week 35

The heat continues to dictate our work, or lack of work, this week with the odd heavy storm thrown in.

Happy flowers

Up bright and early Monday morning to water the garden and take advantage of the early morning coolness. After a melon and fruit breakfast in the courtyard Pammi gets on with tying up any straggly plants before doing her Reiki practice. Meanwhile I paint the benches in the kitchen garden and the stair handrails. The paint dries really quickly so I just put thin layers on so that by the time I reach the end I can restart and the paint is totally dry. By about 0900 though the paint is starting to thin too much so call it a day with that job. Pammi has left me my gardening instructions (how has it happened that I am now a trainee gardener??) so next job is to plant coriander and parsley in the kitchen garden. Then pick and freeze the mountain of beans we have, it takes hours but at least I can sit in the shade whilst topping and tailing them. Thirty two servings are bagged and frozen before my last job of weeding the strawberry bed and the paths. By 1630 the heat is too much and I call it a day. Pammi is still working in the holistic barn so I grab a book and sit in the shade for a while. Pammi calls it a day not long after and after a bit of  a chill in the hammocks we have our evening meal of homemade fishcakes and stirfry veg. Later that evening we take a stroll around the village and decide to pop into one of the local bars which we have never checked out before. We order two small vodkas which turn out to be triple sized, cannot wait to order a large next time, bet it will be served in a jug. We take our drinks outside and are immediately invited to join a couple of locals at their table. A nice chat later we go before we are tempted to have another vodka and then would never find our way home again. Safely back home we enjoy the cool evening with the dogs before grabbing some sleep before it all starts again tomorrow.

Third mountain of beans today

Strawberries are all but finished

The 0600 alarm comes around far too quickly Tuesday morning but the garden needs water more than we need sleep (or maybe not). Watering done, my gardening instructions for the day received and understood we can now sit and have our breakfast before starting again. But first the benches and rails get their final coat of paint and look really good now. Pammi goes off to the holistic barn to meditate and do Reiki whilst I start weeding the garden. I swear that as fast as you pull them out they regrow instantly, like a trick candle that you can never blow out. You think they are out then, up they pop again. After weeding a few sections of garden I lose the will to live so go around tying up the tomato plants that are now shoulder height and grow by the minute, although unlike our neighbours none of ours are red yet. There is no shade in the garden so just after our salad lunch I call it a day. The new rifle sights need zeroing so I spend a very enjoyable few hours doing that and just firing off a few rounds. Before the neighbours think world war three has kicked off I stop and decide to read for a while in the shade of the umbrellas. By the time Pammi has finished it is early evening and is starting to cool down. We have a pea and mint quiche for tea, followed by playtime with dogs and an early night.

Wednesday morning we spring out of bed as the alarm sounds, or rather we both try to ignore it and bury ourselves deeper in bed, but it has woken the dogs so we have no choice but to get up. Watering and weeding are on the work orders this morning so we both crack on. The odd three minute shower punctuates the hot weather and is just like having a warm shower alfresco. But they do nothing to cool the temperatures. In a barn I found an old 'chopa' head, a metal hand tool used for raking weeds out of small areas. Just what we need. As it has no shaft I make from from an old scythe handle. Whilst in Blue Peter mode I also cut up an old camping mat and make a kneeling pad for Pammi for when she weeds (which hopefully she will be back doing very very very soon). Toot, toot, toot, toot, toot heralds the arrival of TH. He brings us some courgettes and cucumbers which is really kind of him. But of course I have used totally the wrong wood for the shaft for the chopa and the knee pads are useless. He takes the chopa away so he can redesign it, in reality he sharpened the head and whittled down the shaft a little, but hopefully Pammi will love it anyway for when she is back weeding (enough hints that I hate weeding yet?) Later that day Borko comes to fix the hinge on the front door and it is really great to see him again and catch up on his news and his new German Shepherd puppy. He soon has to get back to work though so off he goes, just as G from up the road arrives. He is laden with cucumbers, courgettes, apricots, tomatoes, chilli's, peppers, plums and blackberries which are a all a gift for us. These people are insanely generous, we will never starve here. We all sit in the courtyard drinking coffee and trying to make sense of each other which is getting easier but is a long road. A really nice surprise to see him though. As he is a master gardener we give him a tour of our veggies in the hope he will bestow some wisdom on us, which he does by teaching us how to thin out our tomato shoots. Master class over he is on his way. Such a nice guy. We have so much veg now that we have vegetables roasted in the clay oven for that nights meal. Late evening we have really heavy rainfall, awesome, no early morning watering for us tomorrow.  

Pammi shelling walnuts, a gift from Baba B

Because of the heat the dogs are shedding fur so they need grooming every day

Our new weeding tool called a 'chopa'

Thursday is earmarked for a day trip to Ruse. We need to do a bit of shopping for items we cannot get locally but more importantly are going to set up a direct debit for our electricity bills. Or more accurately Moni is going to do it and we will sit looking totally blank next to her in the bank. Which is what happened. Moni as usual sorted everything out for us. Shopping done we got home, unloaded the bags and TH arrived. Yet more courgettes come our way and then off he goes. That evening we make homemade pizzas and spend a very enjoyable evening in the garden with the dogs.  

Pammi bought some new wellies today

Plastic plant pots with a solar light inserted, is there a medical term for our obsession with pots and solar lights?

These are dotted all around the sunlounger area and look really effective, they just do not photograph very well.

Friday morning we are up weeding before the sun gets too hot. By breakfast time we have finished what we set out to do so after a leisurely breakfast I go off to photograph the sunflower fields for the website. We have been discussing getting a swimming pool for the garden for ages and have finally been persuaded by the heat that it is a good idea. A I am half way to Ruse anyway I go and get one. Of course when I get home the one simple job of putting up the pool spirals into a spiders web of other jobs. All of which need materials that I don't have, as you would expect, so off to Opaka on another shopping trip. Sand and gravel ordered, I go home and start levelling the garden. The delivery arrives ten minutes later, awesome service. But this levelling job is bigger than I thought so as it is late that can wait till tomorrow. Whilst I was out today Efan and Eva had popped in so that Eva could play on the swings, she is becoming far more confident around us now which is great. Tonight we are having a BBQ. Pammi, in between her normal daily jobs and gardening, has prepared fish (it is river fish, ungutted, just straight from the river, so she has to prepare it first) with courgettes, carrots and spices, potatoes and salad. Having been cooked on the BBQ Pammi then debones my fish for me. I hate bones in fish and if I find even one that ruins the meal for me. I am such a kid. But the meal was a real success and we had a lovely evening.

Field after field of sunflowers

They look stunning

Saturday's alarm means it is time to water again. That done we have breakfast of fresh blackcurrants and yoghurt. Scrummy. Whilst Pammi gets on in the garden with weeding, tying up plants, harvesting onions, courgettes and peas, I start to cut down the tree which is in the way of the new pool area. Yet more logs for the wood store. Meanwhile Efan and Eva pop in again. Eva has some flowers for Pammi. Efan surveys the new pool area then I am ushered up to his house to be given yet more cucumbers. Back home I then have to move the half tonne of gravel from the front of the house using a 10 litre paint bucket. Normal buckets break too easily and there are too many steps for a wheelbarrow. It is stupidly hot and takes hours. But eventually the old outside toilet area and the eyesore of the edge of the lawn is looking good. I then decide to remove some old bricks using a sledge hammer from the edge of the path. They must be the most rock solid bricks in Bulgaria. Normally just lean on a wall and it will collapse, cement is not widely used or in its proper mix. This brick however must be welded, super glued and molded onto the path. A few good swings of the sledge hammer just bounce off. So a lump hammer and bolster chisel are brought out. Note to self, never put finger between brick and lump hammer it hurts. A lot!! And causes your finger to explode and go black. Lesson learnt. Time to call it a day after Pammi has played nurse and kept a steady stream of ice cubes for my finger coming. A nice cooling shower and cold vodka starts our evening off and starts the numbing of the pain process. But we are having spicy potatas bravas cooked in the clay oven tonight which is always a favourite. Served with local crusty bread it is delicious. A few glasses of wine under the stars, a game or two with the dogs and then off to bed. God my finger hurts.

Blackcurrants and yogurt for breakfast

Tree coming down to make way for pool

Outside toilet area looking neat 

Area cleared, gravel down 

It is way too hot to be doing this

Eva in the kitchen garden

Not watering at night when you are enjoying chilling in the evening coolness is a great idea. Until that 0600 alarm goes off. But off it goes and up we get. Watering done. Breakfast of melon and scrambled eggs consumed it is time to start work again. Pammi heads for the garden as she wants to plant some more corn. She planted a few earlier in the week and already they are sprouting up. The leeks are in and she has even planted some more lettuce seeds as we are in danger of running out of lettuce. Today I will level and hopefully get the pool up and running. It is 4m wide so I mark out the area where we plan to have it. Nowhere on on our land is even, it slopes in all directions but this is one of the flattest areas. Using a spirit level with lengths of metal to give me the 4m length needed we mark out and level the area using sand and earth. Pool laid out I inflate the top ring as instructed but I cannot find the adaptor for my air compressor anywhere and it is impossible to make a seal to inflate the pool ring. OK, fill the pool with water and fill the rim with air tomorrow when I can get an adapter. That's when the fun started. According to my spirit level the land was pretty even. To the eye it looked even. But when the pool was filling the sand compacted even more and made everything uneven. No matter what we did we could not get the pool to sit flat. I was getting very irate with it so we called it a day. Next week I will buy a proper length spirit level, compact the ground and dig it out so that is level. What a waste of a day and a lot of effort. That said I think I introduced the neighbours to some new English words. Pammi was saved from my ranting when Samantha Skyped. An hour later as I was calming down Dora and Danni from next door popped in, not sure whether to see if I was killing anyone or just to see what we were up to. But Danni had wanted to come and see Pammi and had dragged his mum up the hill to our home. Danni had a go on the swing and then watched a bit of Mickey mouse on the PC before going home. Not much later in the early evening an amazing rain storm started. We were sat in glorious sunshine yet 100 metres away the village was being deluged. It soon came our way though followed by a lovely rainbow and the sun again. After the rain passed we were able to sit in the courtyard and eat our salmon and pasta with avocado salad in relative coolness. It was a lovely evening but not nearly enough rain for the garden after today's heat so I guess tomorrow the alarm will be set and another week begins.......

No matter what, we cannot get this pool level. Time to start again.

Rainbow after the storm

More lights in the sunlounger area, we really may need medical help with this addiction

Assuming I dont have a nervous breakdown next week setting the pool up, hopefully next week will be a good one when our first paying guests arrive. Hope you all have a great week. Take care.