Join us at our growing homestead and ecofarm in Galicia, North of Spain

Details

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  Description

  Hello & welcome to Galicia! We are Alice (Dutch) and Alberto (Spanish). In the beginning of 2023 we bought a beautiful traditional farmhouse located in the green heart of Galicia (North West of Spain), where we are working daily to create a more sustainable, self-sufficient lifestyle for ourselves, our family and for others to share it with.
  
  Our land is about +/- 6000m2 with a vegetable garden with a big greenhouse, a vineyard of around 1500m2, many fruit trees and a natural spring. It is fully surrounded by a traditional stone wall with amazing views, forests and wild animals around. The location is rural, but in walking distance (2 minutes) to a quiet, though lively village with most amenities, +/-10 minutes by car from the town Monforte de Lemos and +/-30 minutes from the city of Ourense.
  
  Besides living a simple lifestyle and trying to become more self-sufficient and sustainable, we're planning to start a small-scale farmstay/camping. Note: WorkAwayers will only be involved helping out in the non-economical projects in and around our home and homestead.
  
  This beautiful green region of Galicia is called 'Ribeira Sacra' and it's one of the best kept secrets of Spain. Really, it is a hidden gem! It is not as rainy as other parts of Galicia and it has a more mild, meditarian climate. It's known for its wine production from vineyards on the steep slopes of the canyons of rivers Miño, Sil and Cabe. The area is slowly getting more discovered by tourists from Spain and abroad, but it's still keeping its unique authenticity.

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  Types of help and learning opportunities

  Help with Eco Projects

  Gardening

  DIY and building projects

  Babysitting and creative play

  Creating/ Cooking family meals

  Help around the house

  General Maintenance

  House sitting
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  Interests

  

  Culture

  

  Vegetarian or vegan

  

  Self development

  

  Sustainability

  

  Charity work

  

  Farming

  

  Plant care

  

  Music

  

  Gardening

  

  Drawing & painting

  

  DIY & crafts

  

  Books

  

  Cooking & food

  

  Carpentry

  

  Dancing

  

  Camping

  

  Cycling

  

  Team sports

  

  Nature

  

  Hiking
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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

  In 2019-2020 we've travelled the world ourselves doing WorkAway projects. Now we're finally settled down in an amazing part of Spain, trying to work towards a more sustainable lifestyle by creating our own homestead. If you stay with us you can learn from our experience and we are eager to learn from you too. Alberto studied Biology and Biodiversity and knows a lot about nature and wild foraging (incl. mushrooms). He is also the one with the most knowledge and experience with permaculture, regenerative agriculture, bio-intensive farming and market gardening. He's also quite handy and knows about general construction and you can practice your Spanish with him. Alice is very entrepreneurial, she is collaborating with very interesting non-profit organisations in the field of youth work an has a big international network. She has created many sustainability projects by and for youth. Her dream is to organise youth exchanges, training weeks, volunteer camps and educational activities at our homestead to (re-)connect (young) people to themselves, to each other and to nature and inspire them to create a more sustainable work & lifestyle. In September 2024 we organised the first youth exchange here at our farm for 20 youngsters from 4 different countries. Besides this, she's also a hard-working mom that keeps the household together ;-)

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  Au Pair Help

  Further details can be found here

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  Projects involving children

  This project could involve children. For more information see our guidelines and tips here.

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  Help

  We're looking for people that want to help us growing our homestead. We need help with maintaining and improving our +/- 6000m2 of land with a big greenhouse, many fruit trees, restoring 1500m2 of vineyard, helping with our food production/vegetable garden, making preserves and other products from our harvest, building new constructions, f.e. a chicken coop and a shed/porch, repairing parts of our traditional stone wall surrounding the land, reviving our natural water spring, fixing up old furniture and help with some renovation work on the house. Experience is very welcome, but not a must, motivation and a fun attitude is :-) Keep in mind that the work is generally pretty physical, but there is much work to choose from to keep it manageable, diverse and interesting.
  
  UPDATE - Our second daughter was born in the beginning of February 2025, so we could also use some extra help with caretaking / entertaining of our 3 year old daughter.
  
  Particular skills/knowledge/experience that we could use at the moment are:
  - Help with the construction of our new entrance gate.
  - Gardening knowledge and experience - we have a lot of work to prepare for the new season, seeding, weeding, planting and improving the garden.
  - (Fruit) Tree maintenance - pruning and maintaining our old fruit trees
  - Dry stone walling - for restoring and enforcing our traditional stone wall surrounding the land.
  - Construction of simple structures - like a fence, stone terras, a shed, a chicken coop, a pergola, a natural playground
  - Repairing and securing our water spring and water basin.
  
  From September we need help with grape harvesting and wine making - No special skills or experience are required for this.

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  Languages

  Languages spoken
  English: Fluent
  Spanish: Fluent
  Galician: Fluent
  Dutch: Fluent
  German: Intermediate

  This host offers a language exchange
  Our 3 year old daughter is the best teacher to improve your Spanish skills. Alice is still learning to speak more fluently
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  Accommodation

  There is a spacious studio room available on the ground floor of our house for 1-2 persons in winter time. It has a double bed, a desk/table and there is a small sitting area. It is next to our covered outdoor kitchen (no smoking though) that you can use cooking meals for yourself, or together with us :-) the bathroom for our volunteers is located in our toilet unit of the campsite.
  
  In summer we offer comfortable tent accomodation on our land with a (shared) bathroom on the campsite and you can make use of our common spaces including our outdoor kitchen. There is also enough space to put your own tent or campervan somewhere on the land.
  
  Internet is available in and around the house.
  
  We offer 3 meals a day in return for your help 4-5 hours a day/5 days per week. Breakfast is more or less self service ;-) Usually we keep our lunch simple; sometimes we prepare something together and other times we make something for ourselves. We have a big (warm) family meal around 18:00. Depending on our schedules we can share meals or prepare them separately. We have a balanced and full-filling vegetarian diet, but occasionally we provide small portions of meat (chorizo, jamón for example). We do grocery shopping about once a week, so we're open to talk about your preferences and do it together.
  
  Bedtime for our daughters is between 19:00 - 20:00 o'clock, so from this time on we ask for your consideration to keep the noise down in the house.

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  What else ...

  From our house it's a short walk to the village (like really short, about 2-3 minutes). It has a small market 2 times a month and quite some amenities (2 small supermarkets, 3 cafes, a library, a bakery, 2 banks, 2 agrishops, a school and more). Also the biggest wine festival of the area, and probably the biggest one you've ever seen, takes places here annually at the end of March. Here all local wine producers sell and promote their wines and many music and art performences take place day and night.
  
  Furthermore, the house is surrounded by beautiful nature and old pathways to discover. The canyon of the Cabe is nearby and also a waterfall in the right season (from Autumn to the beginning of Summer) ;-) In our free time we love to go on walks and explore the area, so you're always welcome to join in, although this is a bit more challenging now with our two daughters at the moment. We also have a bicycle available if you want to go a bit further. In the months of July and August the public swimming pools of the village are open (about €2,50 p.p.).
  
  Public transport
  The nearest airport is Santiago de Compostela. The closest town with good public transport connections is Monforte de Lemos. There is a bus connection from the nearby village to Monforte de Lemos, but it's not very regularly. A taxi is about 10-15 euros. We usually drive 1 or 2 times a week to Monforte, so we can always pick you up or drop you off somewhere if we can combine the trip. From Monforte there are fast and easy bus connections to the city of Ourense. From there you can even reach Madrid in 3 hours by high-speed train.

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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

  We have a desk and good desk chair available with a stable internet connection.

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  Space for parking camper vans

  We have enough space around the house to park your van. Electricity could be arranged too.

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  Can possibly accept pets

  Yes, but they must get along with kids and other animals.

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  How many Workawayers can stay?

  More than two

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