Slow burns are us

Yet another ‘oh my god, what have we walked into here’ start has turned around again :).

When we arrived here on Monday it was to a rather odd welcome of a typical farmer mumbling and not making eye contact looking at his feet and saying his wife wasn’t here and could we park in the camping field next door. We decided that would be fine, found a spot, loved the view, enjoyed the hook up and ate from our tinned goods stash.

Yesterday morning we wandered over to the farmhouse just after 9am but there was noone to be seen so after some debate we decided if we hadn’t worked the morning we were unlikely to be getting any lunch and should therefore go and buy something for lunch. I also wanted to get a wide brimmed hat to keep the sun off my face and Davies has either lost, eaten or worn out sock supplies in the weeks since we left home when I’m sure he had a full week supply but when we did some clothes crate rearranging on Monday he was sadly lacking so we added socks to our shopping list too. We popped a note through the door to say we’d gone off for food supplies, would be back around lunchtime and to ring if they needed us along with my phone number and headed off into the nearest town.

Willow baulked at the hills and flatly refused to climb one of them which meant we had to do a rather scary reverse down a single track round around a corner and back into someone’s narrow drive for a 7 point turn with me standing to stop any traffic and shout helpful things like ‘keep her coming, whoa, STOP!’ etc. We found an alternative route and once she was warmed up she chugged up and down hills okay. We’re learning she needs careful treatment and lots of cosseting!

Ivybridge is a funny old place; a real mix of local shops selling local produce (probaby only to local people ;)), random high street chains such as Peacocks (good for wide brimmed hats and boys socks) and very expensive charity shops. We got lunch and something for dinner incase we needed it then headed back. We had lunch in the van and then went and knocked on the door again. This time Glyn was there and said ‘d’you want a job?’ to which we said yes so we spent a happy couple of hours mowing the grass in our camping field. I’ve never used a mower before so very happily learnt all about what levers did what, how to start it (petrol), empty the grass box and so on and then ploughed up and down in fairly straight lines while Ady did raking up the grass. We had a few chats with Glyn and he gave us a box of eggs, then at 5pm showed us all the cows and said it was time for tea.

We headed back to Willow and I sat inside in the sunshine blogging, the kids ran around playing and Ady sat chatting on his phone to a friend, then taking arty pictures of the hot air balloon that drifted across as the sun set. All very beautiful :). Denise arrived home and came over to introduce herself and apologise for not having been here before, check we were okay and arrange to see us at 9am down at the farmhouse this morning for work.

So today has been far more what it’s supposed to be about. We spent nearly an hour drinking tea and chatting with Denise and her mum, hearing what WWOOF host experiences they have had and telling what WWOOFer experiences we have had, expectations and so on. We were then given some gardening work to do, shown tools and brought out tea, coffee and home made cake at 11am. The kids were off walking the dog and playing and adventuring around the farmyard.

I was fairly grumpy first thing as I really don’t like gardening at all. I find it pointless and boring. I don’t mind planting or tending or weeding fruit or vegetables but I am just not interested in flowers and shrubs and I never know what is and isn’t a weed. I don’t feel like I’m achieving my aims of learning new skills. Plus at this place, a very gorgeous 9 bedroom farmhouse that is in a state of utter disrepair with windows falling out, slates off the roof, barns falling down it felt like trying to polish a turd. I said this to Ady who told me I sounded just like my Dad – not one of his phrases (I think I heard it from Layla actually) but I’m sure he’d love it and use it if I told him it. I cheered up when Ady came to work alongside me though and we could chat while we worked.

I cheered up even more at lunchtime when we were called in at 1pm for a real Famous Five feast – ham, jacket potatoes, salad, home made coleslaw, boiled eggs, followed with tea and coffee and bread & butter pudding. All that was missing was lashings of ginger beer!

We went in to the front room after lunch to be introduced to Denise’s Dad who had a stroke 4 years ago and is bedridden in there with carers coming in round the clock. Hard to see who was once clearly a hardworking, strong man running a huge farm in it’s day laid out like that 🙁

Back out to the garden to carry on round the front this time. We made a good start but it was raining and although we kept thinking it would pass over it got heavier and heavier until we were starting to get pretty wet. The kids were in the kitchen playing and chatting to Denise’s mum so we finished up the bit we were doing and decided to call it a day on that. We’d been told there was other stuff to do up at Glyn & Denise’s (they are in a bungalow next to the camping field, two fields up from the farmhouse) under cover if it rained so decided to go and do that instead, promising to return to finish the gardening later in the week if the weather picks up.

We walked back up the fields, quite steep, put me in mind of Steward Wood 😉 and found Glyn and Denise in the bungalow so joined them for a cup of tea, and more cake (lemon drizzle this time, Davies fell in love with it and wants the recipe so we can make it in the van, never had so much home baking away from home ed camps!) and sat chatting to them for about an hour. We then went out to help Glyn with the evening cattle feed. The young calves have calf formula which smells just like ice cream and is made like baby milk formula. They drink it from a long trough with teats. The rest of the young cattle have feed and a constant supply of hay. They have had a variety of ages and breeds here but all beef cattle, alongside the camping field but in years gone by have done dairy farming too and had pigs, sheep and were once self sufficient in fruit & vegetables (and I guess meat, eggs, dairy etc too) for two families along with running a B&B in the farmhouse, showing it can be done but on a bloody big scale – they have 145 acres here.

Once again I suspect we won’t learn much practical hands on skills here as livestock contact is limited to two half hour feeds a day (although Glyn does do milking at the farm down the road a couple of times a week and I am angling to get invited along when he’s on a shift on Saturday afternoon) but there is a wealth of experience and historical having tried these things here spanning three generations so plenty of time to chat and learn hypthetically from them.

Dinner was beef stew – from their own cattle, followed by home made pineapple upside down cake. Definitely the best fed we’ve been anywhere 🙂 Will need to do lots of strenuous gardening tomorrow to work it all off ;). We all had showers and chatted with Glyn & Denise for an hour or so after dinner before wandering back to Willow in the field next door.

I downloadede a few Morpurgo books for the kindle yesterday and read the kids ‘Cool’ last night and the first chapter of ‘Kaspar’ tonight which was nice. We’ve let bedtime stories slip so it’s good to get back to that again :). Had a phonecall tonight from Mum & Dad who are coming to stay near us next weekend (Easter) which will be good.

My face has stopped being itchy and swollen but the skin is now all flaking off and I’m not wearing make up because it just looks silly. I’m hugely relieved to have stopped it in it’s tracks this time though and fingers crossed it won’t come back – I think I’ll stay on the daily antiH for the summer.