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Last replied
31 Mar 2024
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Description
Hey there, I am Harry from the UK and my wife is Lior from Israel and we recently moved to the North of Portugal and bought an absoloutely wonderful 5 acre farm. Still pinching ourselves that we get to call it our own. We have so much going on here, beautiful views over the Douro river, a waterfall and stream running through the bottom of the property, house fed from spring water and an abundance of productive trees inc: Apple, pear, peach, nectarine, cherry, plum, apricots, kiwi, persimmon, fig, olives all the citrus, loquat, walnuts, chestnuts, hazel and even recently found an avocado tree with uhhh one avocado on it! I almost forgot the grapes... we have a lot of those too.
We have a few woodland areas where Pines, eucalyptus, cork oaks, strawberry trees, willows and oaks are growing.
We live in a small one bedroom house (perfect!) and have a much larger house at the top of the property that is in need of renovation but does already have a guest bedroom that's good to go.. that's where you will stay.
So many trendy words these days i'm not sure which one to use anymore, but we don't use chemicals, we are organic, based on regen ag/permaculture/natural farming principles whichever word you like to use and I guess our vision is a to use a lot of different ideas from different fields of thought.
We both travelled extensively over the past 10 years and have chosen here to settle down and see what it's like to stay somewhere for more than a year! I will reiterate that we have really just moved here so still getting our head around things, the challenging task of moving to a new country and getting to grips with the language etc as well as dealing with responsibilties and all those kind of things ;) so patience is needed and don't expect to arrive at a fully functioning, easy flowing farm as we are not there just yet!
On that note, we still haven't got our visas 100% sorted yet so the farm is also missing some animals, we will in the future love cats, chickens, ducks, goats and sheep but need to make sure we can actually stay before commiting to them.
Through lots of volunteering experiences we've found that it's best to just ask for help for a few days at first, check that we are a good match and both us and you are happy with the set up before committing to a longer stay :)
UPDATE: I recently fractured my shoulder and have had to rest for a couple of months but am back to feeling strong again! So looking for some hands to help us with a few tasks that are in need of doing!
Read more below :)
Types of help and learning opportunities
Gardening
DIY and building projects
Farmstay help
Creating/ Cooking family meals
Help around the house
General Maintenance
UN sustainability goals this host is trying to achieve
Cultural exchange and learning opportunities
I volunteered a LOT during my travels and hope i figured out what makes a good host or not. I gained a lot of skills and knowledge working with amazing farmers and growers and am happy to share all this with you too.
Lior can teach you Hebrew, or you can learn the Queens (am i meant to say king's now) english from myself.
Israeli food is absoloutely delicious and Lior is an amazing cook, she would be happy to share her skills as well as teach you about fermentation and food preserving.
Help
About 7 weeks ago now I dislocated and fractured my shoulder and have had to mainly sit it and out rest. Lior is particularly busy this term with teaching Hebrew online so I am looking for some extra hands to help me with a few jobs that really need doing.
These include:
Processing and carrying up the already cut firewood from around the property and potentially trying to make a little more.
Tree and Vine Pruning
General cleaning up of the property
Terrace restoration
Going to start growing our own food this season also so:
Bed prep
Seeding
Transplanting
Amendment making
The property is all terraced, but is on a steep slope so a somewhat decent level of fitness is required.
Even more so when carrying a refrigerator from the bottom to the top! (half joking)
In addition to this I think anybody with a particular set of skills that they are happy with sharing then we are flexible as well in what we want from our volunteers. If there's anything you want to learn that I already know how to do, i'm most happy to take some time out of our day to focus on this as well.
One of the tasks we think could be cool to do with the right people is actually making the volunteer bedroom/living space a little more cosy :)
Food time is always a great time to connect and an important part of our life. Any help with cooking/cleaning will always be greatly appreciated!
Downtimes are also just as important!
You will have your own space to relax and the complete freedom of our property to explore.
We like to play games in the evenings, watch movies and share stories with our guests!
Breakfast Lunch Dinner and inbetween snacks will be provied by us as well as the accomodation.
I should add that we eat a vegetarian diet!
Languages spoken
English: Fluent
Hebrew: Fluent
Accommodation
As mentioned above accomodation is a double bed in the downstairs of the larger house on the property. Nothing fancy, but also quite sweet. Unfortunately no toilet is currently installed there so a 20 second walk to our house is required for using the bathroom.
The end of winter is coming but it can still be a little rainy and cold. The guest bedroom currently has no heating but I often sleep in there when Lior is working nights and I find it just fine. We promise to make it as warm and comfortable as we possibly can.
Unfortunately there is currently no Wifi up in the guest bedroom but we do have it in the main house.
We will try and sort this out as soon as we can as well.
What else ...
There is a train station that runs along the Douro river just 5 minutes from the house. This can take you to/from Porto as well as further up stream. The closest medium size town is Resende where Supermarkets, shops, cafes and most other ammenities can be found, is around 10 minutes drive away. Having your own car will certainly give you more freedom.
A little more information
Internet access
Limited internet access
We have pets
We are smokers
Can host families
Space for parking camper vans
We have a large garage that you are welcome to park your van inside of
How many Workawayers can stay?
Two
Hours expected
You can decide. We do expect at least 4 hours of help each day of the week and anymore would be fantastic.
