Experience my off-grid homestead permaculture project - enjoy rustic simple life on Etna eastern slope, Italy

Details

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  Description

  Write me at least 6 to 8 weeks earlier to find space 🙏 I am always 2 months ahead with requests confirmed 👌
  
  ***October completely full***
  
  ***November stay: Crafts and DYI, getting ready for winter - looking for only one volunteer or a couple***
  
  ***Looking for a volunteer for a two months stay in december-january: I always host people for short time, I would find someone to stay longer in wintertime. Should be a person that loves to be independent, must like silence and a easy daily life, that is made of harvesting citrus sometimes, make soups, learn how to maintan tools and restore them, doing little repairs around the land, also build little stuff and fornitures with wood 😁 a chance to learn several things and read several books 🤸***
  
  *** DIY Opportunity*** Looking for two volunteer for the last half of February: we build a shed with canes! A rare occasion to follow all the process, from harvest to build! It's going to be tiri...fun! 😁***
  
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  Welcome to my page! Thanks to be here 🙏
  
  My name is Alberto, a guy born in a big city of the north of Italy that one day decided to change his life by moving to Sicily, between the Vulcano and the Sea, spending all the savings in a land and start living inside it, working every day on its maintenance and development.
  I started this in 2019, and the first years have been hard. Now life's here is quite easy, there's all the essential, and even more 💪
  
  I didn't go to university, and when I have bought this land I was not knowing anything...about everything!
  I can say this project is my university! I have learnt how to use tools, build, prune and graft, make an irrigation system, a solar system and build things big enough to live in 😁
  My english became fluent, I am increasing my self esteem and exploring my subconscious, developing manual skills every day and new capabilities every season. I always have help and company, I couldn't ask for any better 😁
  I am the only person living here.
  
  The project is 100% off grid,with water from the sky and electricity from the sun 💪 and from 2025 I can say I am indipendent 🥹 Finally!
  
  I have two trailers, a cozy shower, a fancy compost toilet and a little shelter for myself 😌 most of the things are built following the quincha method, just clay and straw 😁
  I have a chicken coop that has shown to be resistant to any possible attack 💪 It makes me proud 😁
  
  We have heaters to be warm in winter and a small small pool to be cool in Summer 🥹
  
  I give every meal, I guarantee a short hot shower everyday, I have friends passing by every other day, the sea is 4 kilometers far, and at just one kilometer there's a village where meet the Sicilian food culture 😁
  
  Life is easy here, and the work isn't stressful when everyone does his part 🤸
  
  FYI Before you read I would tell I host volunteers for two weeks then we can decide togheter if make it longer 🙏 from April to September I host up to 4 volunteers at time, 3 as average.
  From October to March usually 1-2 people, in depending on the request.
  
  December and January are the coldest and shortest days, I usually host only one volunteer, two most rarely.
  
  To be sure to find space in here you should contact me within 1-2 months in advance.
  There is a big dog, cats, chickens always around us, and lot of mosquitos (from April to October).
  
  The land is 7000 square meters, with many lemon trees, olive, pears, grapes, clementines, grapefruit, a few tropical trees, and herbs.
  I am few kilometers far from the sea, and some more kilometers far from Etna. We are 160 meters above sea level, and the subtropical climate allows us to grow many exotic fruits and live outdoors 9 months per year.
  Anyway we live outside 12 months per year 😎😎😎
  
  We are not a company, everything we produce is for self-sufficiency.
  
  Inhabitants of this land are Acab (the dog), Dima (the big one, half cat and half puppet 🥹), Azolo (the black cat and, the king of the Land 🫣), Gilda (the new arrived, a little female that always follows Azolo 🙂‍↔️) 20 chickens and Alberto (the only human) 😁.
  I have friends over often and you'll have the chance to know other good souls 🙏
  
  As you can read I am an easy going person, outgoing and funny, also empathetic, open minded and caring 🙂‍↔️
  I behave as a kid when I am happy and relaxed, as an "adult" when we work on priorities 😌
  I Just ask to the volunteers to wake up at time, keep the kitchen clean and honour the daily tasks, and be focused during the explanations I give, expecially for how to use water 🙏🙏🙏🙏
  I always need help with cleaning, cooking, walk the dog, feed the animals, gardening ect...plus daily quests!
  
  I often cook because I am Italian, I must keep the honour high 🤣. I am not a chef but whatever I make gets finished every single time 😎 But honestly I would completely delegate this, so if you are about to cook for everyone everyday (with help when needed and dishes) with a good cooking skills please indicate it in the presentation 🙏🙏🙏🙏
  
  I am Sagittarius, Aquarius rising, for anyone interested in knowing 🙏
  
  My first goal as host is make the workawayers feel comfortable, relaxed and safe, like they are at home 🙏 then make them independent in the land, punctual and focused.
  I look for respectful and easy-going people that love DIY, wildness, manual labour, curious to learn and happy to be completely involved in someone's life, kinda of au pair experience.
  We'll live in the same environment, share the same food, work in team, and become friends.
  I can tell my story, share my experience, teach what I've learnt throught observation and experience.
  I can teach you a bit of everything, but I'm not expert in anything 😁
  
  The time here is different: days are longer, and weeks are shorter 🤔 Remember It!
  
  So, what are you waiting for? 🥳

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  Types of help and learning opportunities

  Help with Eco Projects

  Light gardening

  Creative DIY projects

  Animal Care

  Farmstay help

  Creating/ Cooking family meals

  Help around the house

  Light maintenance
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  Interests

  

  Van life

  

  Hiking

  

  Technology

  

  Plant care

  

  Blogging

  

  Team sports

  

  Camping

  

  Nature

  

  Outdoor activities

  

  Animals

  

  Beach

  

  Videography

  

  Vegetarian or vegan

  

  Sustainability

  

  Self development

  

  Pets

  

  Farming

  

  Photography

  

  Gardening

  

  DIY & crafts

  

  Carpentry
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  UN sustainability goals this host is trying to achieve

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  What's this?
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  Cultural exchange and learning opportunities

  You could learn that you can feel at home even far from your house 😌
  This project is about developing to be off grid, so you can gain plenty of information around permaculture, gardening, building, solving problems et cetera et cetera 😁
  If you wanna start a project I can give plenty of tips 🙏
  
  DIY is the keyword here, and you could expect any kind of work here, in depending on what we are building (or fixing 🥲).
  Everyone here becomes familiar with the pickaxe, the shovel, the rake, the wheelbarrow and their proper way of using them without wasting calories 😁 then gardening is a big task, so you can learn how to prune, to graft, to plan a plantation ect.. in depending on the season you come here.
  Beside that there is always the weekly maintenance of the vegetable garden, so boooring! 🥱
  What else? I do not know yet, but I know will be tiring, that's why I am here 😁
  Life here is as a small familiar environment that turns strangers in siblings, and people here are totally involved in my life, knowing my friends and coming with me the few times I get out from here 😁
  I have used to go with volunteers to many projects around the area, that's why some feedbacks talk about that, but I found this exhausting and I slowed down this a lot 🙏
  
  This project is still rising, so by coming here you'll put your hands in something meaningful that will expand roots and will get bigger and bigger every year 🙏
  
  *Photography: in one of my previous lives I have been a freelance photographer, so I am able to teach everything about whatever camera you'll bring with you 🤗*

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  Help

  We work 4-5 hours per day starting at dawn.
  Daily tasks are clean up the facilities, feed the animals, walk the dog, collect eggs, water the plants, and prepare meals togheter 😁
  Once per week we deep clean the shower, the toilet and the roulottes, we sort the garbage and handwash clothes, we clean the chicken coop and we do maintenance on the vegetable garden.
  
  Help in the land is very varius, I cannot make a list 😭.
  Just be ready for workouts 😁 pickaxe, shovel, rake, gloves will be part of your dress code 😁
  
  I am also building a lot of little things, as I said, so we'll do some carpentry, woodworking, plasterings, we use lot of clay, straw and sand for making walls, and we give constant mainteinance to the land and the vegetable garden (late spring and summer)🙏
  
  There are two days off every five of help, (usually divided in 3 days of work-1 free-2 work-1 free)
  Days off don't have scheduled meals, but we can cook and eat togheter if you decide to spend your day off here 👌
  
  *July and August are crazy hot, with temperatures over 35 degrees for 8 to 10 hours per day, fighting against mosquitos, flies, ants and sunburns (expecially for really light skins).
  This temperatures affect the energies more than you think, and some people from cold countries have given up after few days because of that, discovering also new allergies they didn't know before 😬 I would say that insects bites and sun radiations are on a different scale here 🙏
  Please consider this advice 🙏🙏🙏 and choose another season if you ear whistles 😜 March-April and September-November are the best options, trust me pleeease🙏🙏🙏*
  
  The land every year requires some big jobs that I ask for help with:
  January: prune grapes, dig out oaks and blackberry shrubs;
  February: prune olive trees, pear trees, ivys, canes;
  March: graft olive trees, prepare the summer vegetable garden, seedings etc.;
  April: graft and prune citrus trees, harvest lemons;
  May: look after the vegetable garden, harvest medlars, weedings, work on safety against summer bushfire;
  June-July: build with mud 😍 water new plants, weedings, dig out oaks and blackberry shrubs;
  August: water new plants, make tomato sauce (1 to 3 days)
  September: harvest grapes (1-2 days), make grape juice, harvest hazelnuts (3-4 days), harvest prickly pears, new plantations (trees and vegetables)
  October-November: harvest olives (biggest task of the year! 3 days of heavy work and 2 extra days of rest after 😁), plant onions, fennels, peas, broad beans;
  December: harvest lemons (2-3 days);
  
  Almost everything here has been built by me and is runned by me, so for every random question about anything you could point your finger at there's a 15 minutes answer for that 🤣 Fun fact: many workaway hosts in the area have something in their land that I've built, like sheds, benches, sometimes compost toilets, irrigation systems, tree grafts etc...and this is how I make the money to run this land 😁
  So if you are about to trade comforts with this kind of knowledge you have found the right host 💪😌
  
  As I've learnt in a facilitation course, Dreams have more chances to become true if you tell others, so here they are 😁:
  - I am planning to build a little sauna with wood, clay and straw🥳
  - I would love to make a documentary of what we are doing 🥹 a good one! 60 minutes! 🥳
  - I'd love inviting Keanu Reeves here, do anyone has his number? 😂

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  Languages spoken

  English: Fluent
  Italian: Fluent
  Spanish: Beginner

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  Accommodation

  Volunteers will sleep in a cozy roulotte (with heating system in wintertime) 🤙 It's made for two volunteers (always same gender), with independent lights and spaces 🦸
  
  The outdoor shower has hot water every day 🥹 and It has been made to work 100% on passive energy.
  The water tank is few meters above the shower, so the water gains good pressure. Then a pipe gets into a boiler inside a old fridge full of rocks and the sun heats it during midday. If it's cloudy or rainy I can switch to another boiler over a old wooden stove to heat with the citrus prunings!
  Oh, forgot! The water is from rain collection 💪
  
  One thing to know about the compost toilet: I ask to pee in it as less as possible, and pee behind the tree you prefer that day 😁 this drastically reduce bad smells, emptying it is much easier and we do not have to find a way to get rid of tons of urine 🙏🙏🙏 and ensure the plants get their nitrogenous 🤣
  Curios fact: we use coffee grounds for absorption, because a friend of mine has coffee vending machines and we both have found a way to get rid of it! It works very good!!
  
  Water is really precious, so we ask to use it very very carefully :) A daily hot shower is guaranteed 🤸
  If you bring shampoos, soaps ect., please look for biological ones, because water goes directly to the trees 🙏 I provide natural soaps anyway 😁
  Water is microfiltered 🥳
  
  Kitchen requires lot of water and I have developed methods to reduce water consumption at his minimum, be sure to follow exactly the instructions I will give 🙏🙏🙏
  
  ***I can provide you all the working clothes you need (tshirts and trousers), safety shoes (must be used for many tasks), extra towels and extra warm clothes. I have a full closet of all kinds of clothing (sweatshirts, pants, bathing suits, blankets) so pack extra socks and underwear rather than an extra heavy layer 🙏***
  
  ***Volunteers MUST have a head lamp (USB recharge), plastic shoes and one towel for the shower, single bed sheets and a pillow case 🙏***
  
  We handwash underwear and socks, be sure you have enough for at least a week. I'll provide you warm clothes to destroy during work 🥳
  
  I would suggest to travellers outside Europe that stay more than a month in Italy that it's worth buying an italian simcard. It cost around 25 euros with a month of service included. You can use its data keeping your old number 😎 be sure there's space for a second simcard in your phone 🙏
  
  We'll always cook and eat togheter. I give every meal. I have a big pantry always full of stuff, enough for surviving months 😁 Alcohol and processed food are on your expenses.
  Getting dizzy here is tolerated, getting drunk is forbidden 🧐 among all my jobs here I am also the safety manager here 😁
  
  In this place animals are completely free, so don't be scared of a chicken try to jump to the table to chase your food, or the dog sitting next to you gently waiting for you giving him a piece of what you are eating 😁 and then...cats! 😼

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  What else ...

  We are 30 km north from Catania, not far from the Giarre exit of the A18 highway.
  It is possible to reach us by train from Fontanarossa Airport (CATANIA! 🤪)
  Take a train going toward Messina that stops at Carruba (is a minor station half an hour far, and not all the trains stop there, so double check this please and ask to me if you have any doubt 🙏).
  Plane+train usually is the best solution for reaching me. Purchase tickets only throught Trenitalia site, double check also this 🙏
  I will come and pick you up at the station, no worries 🤗
  
  If you come by plane you must buy one that lands before 17:00 (5PM), would be better of you get to my Land at least a hour before dusk 🙏
  For leaving Sicily: unless you wanna sleep at the airport don't purchase flights before 9:00 (AM) 😏
  
  If your plans aren't set already, I also suggest you to wait to be here 3-4 days before purchasing the return ticket, so you'll know if you want to stay longer (or shorter 🫣)
  
  Walking around the surrounding area is possible but a bit awkward because the roads are not suitable for pedestrians 😟 use bikes is possible but remember all the roads here are pretty steep 💪 we are over a Vulcano 😁.
  
  There is San Leonardello Village, only one kilometer far from the land, that has a bar, a bakery, a tobacco shop, a fruit and vegetables shop, and a post office. Much closer to the land there is a chinese store that sells any kind of stuff, good if you need a mosquito spray, a charging cable, a memory card or just the pillow case you forgot to bring 😜
  There are two grocery stores twice the distance of San Leonardello Village 🙏
  
  I will pick you up and drop at Carruba station when you'll travel by train in your days off.
  You can reach Taormina, Acireale, Catania, Siracusa, Messina and other beautiful cities for nice one day-trips 😎
  Buses can bring you everywhere in Sicily, they departure from Catania station.
  
  Weather:
  Here humidity is high all year long, but you can manage it. Lowest temperatures are in January-February, going less than 4 degrees during the night, and maybe reach 15 at lunch time. The highest are in summer, we can go over 40 degrees...yes! Forty! But we go to the sea everyday when this happens 😁 and days are so long and nice that you forget everyday you have worked that morning!
  
  Mosquitos...we deal with them from February to November, being really annoying in May-June and September-November 🤷
  Ants! A summer nightmare!
  
  Spring is always the best season, unless you have allergies to pollens 🥺 sun, rain, wind, everything growing fast with colours and scents everywhere 🤩
  Summer is very hot, and that humidity makes you sweat all day long. But temperatures at night are just perfect 🥹
  Fall is intense, with lot of various works that change everyday, and is the chance to learn many little things instead of a few but big, as can happen in Winter and Spring.
  
  Heigth: Being more than 185 cm (6 feet) means feel a giant here 🤣 I didn't build the trailers but i do the prunings and I am 170cm (5'7"feet) so be ready to hit some branches with your forehead and be ready to harvest the lemons I couldn't reach 😁🤸
  
  Every candidate will have a half an hour videocall to make me show the Land, give further explanations and ask you some questions to be sure we are creating a win-win situation 💪
  BE SURE OF YOUR DECISION
  Life here is wild: most people fall in love in this environment, some others regret at first sight.
  Peeing under trees is the only choice, same for poo in the compost toilet.
  Life here is always outside, you have a roof above you only when you sleep and when rains, and life changes routine in depending of the season, so if rains for three days straight we come back to stone age till the sun pops again to charge the battery. It's the life I've choosen 😁
  I cannot be any clearer than this but still, rarely, even after mandatory videocalls, this continue to happen.
  Don't know how to explain more than I did already 😅
  
  I have hosted more than a hundred people in these years, and more than half of them come from workaway ❤️ I love this site and the wonderful work of moderators, that make everything simple but also efficient and transparent 🙏
  
  Tip: what hits my attention more than anything else is real kindness, a detailed profile I can read and watch, and a presentation that makes me understand my description has been read before writing me🙏 Have no feedback isn't an issue for me, feel free to write me if you want to 🙏
  
  My description is so detailed because in the time I always ask to the volunteers if there was something missing till they started to say no 😎😛
  I always have times more requests than the ones I could accept, this means that I always can choose good souls, eager to learn and help, and keep a high-vibe mood in this little paradise we are making 🙏
  
  Thanks for your time reading me 🙏
  
  
  Alberto

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  A little more information

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    Internet access

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    Limited internet access

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    We have pets

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    We are smokers

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    Can host families

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  Can host digital nomads

  Evenings are free from work here. 🙏 Signal here is very good 🙏

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  Space for parking camper vans

  Can't make you throw any water here 🙏 The maximum lenght could be 6,5 meters to fit 🙏

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  Can possibly accept pets

  I have a big dog, is a "complete" male, he's good with females and old males, sometimes if males are sterylized. he can't absolutely stand other males his size if not sterilyzed. If your dog chase or disturb chickens or cats I cannot accept your request 🙏🙏🙏

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  How many Workawayers can stay?

  More than two

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  My animals / pets

  Rina

  

  Chickens

  Free range chickens always ready to steal your food 😁

  

  Gilda

  

  Azolo

  

  Dima

  

  Acab

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