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August in Review

September 2, 2010 in Fun Stuff, Making & Baking, Nature, Organic Gardening, Team News | No comments

What’s fresh?

(Noting what’s fresh & local to know what I can grow & when and a record of fresh pickings from our garden to improve future planting plans, manage gluts better etc)

From the store:

  • Lettuce
  • Figs
  • Apples
  • Peppers
  • Nectarines
  • Peaches

From the garden:

  • Onions

  • Cucumbers (in the weirdest shapes but all tasty)
  • Tomatoes
  • Chillies
  • Melon

To be honest its been a tough month for the garden.  Whilst the tomatoes, peppers & chillies have enjoyed the heat, other veg have given up.  The runner beans flowered but the flowers mostly died rather than turn into beans; the courgettes have been flowering but no fruit have survived; the radishes may yet form their purply pink fruits under the parched earth but I’m not holding my breath and its definitely too dry for lettuce!  The squashes are starting to form fruit but even the pumpkins have suffered in the heat with fruits forming and withering so I’m not sure how much will grow & ripen.  I planted more peas (soaked the seeds and just shoved them directly in the ground) and remarkably these have grown into plants and are flowering and fruiting but there are only a handful so will only bear enough for a taste.

I am proud of my melon though (no sniggers, please!).  Sadly we ate it before it could be photographed and shown here in all its glory.  It was yummy and a first for the Camp Full Monte garden!

In the flower garden, the passion flower has climbed and bloomed and is magnificent:

Sowing & Planting

(Building a record of what I need to prepare for next in the garden)

Too hot to sow anything…

Baking & Making

(A chance to reflect on the culinary success & failures of the month & share crafty moments)

My homemade pizza seems to have been a hit this summer.  I make the dough from scratch using a lovely recipe from Leith’s Vegetarian Bible, make the tomato base using any squashy toms I have, diced up onion, crushed garlic and handfuls of my basil and then bung onto the pizza any odds & ends left over from lunch: kulen (spicy salami), strips of peppers, cheese etc.

And making…?  Ends meet… just about.

Reading

(Love sharing the books I’m into)

Finally finished Wally Lamb’s The Hour I First Believed’!   We’ve had a “week off” (more of that later…) so I finally found time to finish this book.  We were tired of each other after nearly 3 months together!

Freed of the ‘have to finish what I’ve started’ syndrome, I then picked up a book that a friend had lent me and one that she said was a really quick read.   I think my brain made a link between ‘quick’ and ‘light’ so I was expecting this book by Chris Cleve to be ‘easy reading’ in the sense of an easy subject matter…

Not so!  But it is a fabulously written, compelling book.  I whizzed through it in a day or so and reflected afterwards that its the first book I’ve read for ages (maybe ever?) where the name of the main character isn’t revealed and where the words all flow together within the sentences and yet this doesn’t irritate me & make me tut: “Poor punctuation!”

I am now reading Margaret Attwood’s “Cat’s Eye” and it occurs to me that as an author, she is growing on me – like a love of olives.  I was unsure when I first tasted her.  Then I kept being given samples and devouring them.  Like an olive, in my opinion the quality can vary but when she’s good, she’s very good.  Also, you have to be in the mood.

This book is brilliantly written.  She creates huge descriptive statements with very few words.  And uses numerous, short sentences to great effect.  It is strangely compelling, this story.  Not in an “Oh, I can’t wait to find out what’s happening!” way, but because one falls for the mood & the style and simply doesn’t want to stop reading the words, those beautiful constructions of words.  Ms Attwood has a lot to answer for – she is stirring up my latent desire to write…

What’s the vibe?

(This month’s gut reaction)

Stuffed!

I feel ‘full up’.  It started with the Italians…

We had a group of 6 young folk from Italy turn up at the beginning of the month with great names like Frederico, Fernando etc.  They bought meat and veg and cooked us all a gorgeous barbeque.  They only stayed a night but we had a lovely evening with them, star gazing with full bellies.  This was the start of the increased meteor activity culminating in Perseids on 12th August.  That night the night sky was stuffed with shooting stars.  We 3 Camp Full Monte-ers were alone at the campsite that night and we dragged foam mattresses and loungers down to the lowest terrace to ooh and ahh at the numerous ’svezde padulica’ (new local term we learned thanks to Dragan, our first Serbian visitor who stayed the night before the main event).  We must have seen 50 or 60 and 1 in particular slowly arked across the blackness, leaving a visible trail that had us squealing with wonder.  The absence of the moon made the darkness even darker and more dramatic.

The arrival of our friends Matt & Charlotte and their kids Jacob and Holly brought with it much eating & drinking –   chocolate, Bombay Sapphire, huge lumps of Gorganzola and 35 year old Port… I put on a kilo (mind you the tummy bug I’ve had for the last 2 days that has found me lingering on the loo has helped me shift that kilo… I can think of nicer ways to go).

Sharing precious times with dear friends in the hot August days has made me feel stuffed with life, with sun, with friendship.  Now that our season is all but over and paying guests are almost at an end, we are probably stuffed financially too but we’re too happy to think about it right now.

Listening to

(Trying to listen to some new tunes every month)

Not doing well on breaking into the many ‘unplayed, unrated’ tracks in our expansive collection but enjoyed some familiar foot tapping songs that Jacob and Holly enjoying performing to!

Fun Stuff

(‘Nuff said)

We enjoyed a night of great live music at the Herceg Novi EkoFest.

A bunch of people, passionately led by Sasa Cvetkovic, did amazing things to turn the upper fortress in Herceg Novi, known as Spanjola, into an incredible venue for art and live music.  Our mate Nikola’s band was the best and we danced and cheered – de-mob happy after so long on the campsite without a proper night off!

Thanks to Katie, we also made it to Boka Noc for the first time ever.  The ‘Night of the Boka’ sees people creating elaborate floats from their little boats and parading them in the water in Kotor marina.  We were lucky enough to get a ride on Fiona & Dave’s rib to join Katie & Tim and the dogs on Monty B to watch the parade (well, ish… visibility wasn’t that good but better than being jammed in the heaving throngs in the old town) and then enjoy the fireworks over the old walled city.  It was fab!  And the endless G&T’s helped too!

The biggest load of fun came in the form of the W-B family… It was very special to have them here.  I’ve known Charlotte since we did a counselling course together nearly 10 years ago.  She was quite ill when I met her and her daughter Hol very young.  Over the years I saw her mend and grow.  I got to know her gentle, kind, infinitely patient husband and then introduced them both to Steve.  The 4 of us have many fond memories of evenings filled with food, wine & laughter.  Having another child was a struggle for them but in time Jacob was born and completed the circle perfectly.  Having met most Thursdays for years, me leaving the UK was a big shock to Charlotte’s routine and a test of our friendship.  Having them here was something I imagined but didn’t quite think would happen.  Steve and I were both a little nervous… kids on the campsite for a whole week?

It was a blast, a great excuse to have a week off (well, apart from poor Nik who had some ‘real work’ to do)  and so interesting to see the way the space was used by our friends… The hammock became a ship; the basement became a ‘den’; the kitchen was transformed into an art studio most afternoons.

Charlotte found a spot under some trees where she would do her best reading:

Nik was embraced by the family.  He became known as ‘Sherpa Nik’ as he agreed to take them hiking up to the rock above our land on their last night.  Jacob is a real boy’s boy so he was well into it and despite being scared at the very top, Holly was so impressed with her hike and the view up there she mentioned it in the Guest Book as her very favourite thing.  Here’s most of the family chilling out with Nik…

We had some fun nights playing TacTic…

The temperature was in the mid 30’s when they first arrived, so Matt & Steve decided that getting one of the many paddling pools inflated and & filled was definitely worthwhile.  This was not without its dramas – the ground had to be levelled and 12 (count them, 12!) barrow loads of sand dumped and raked level for the pool to sit on.  Charlotte was on pool cleaning duty but as she dutifully scrubbed and rinsed she noticed many little punctures.  Undeterred, Steve & Charlotte found and patched them all and filled the pool up slowly & deliberately being careful not to empty the stream syphon.  Here’s Steve in the early stages of pool erection, wearing his pool gown!

And here’s the pool up, filled and being enjoyed…

Jacob was utterly fascinated by the compost loos and at night with his head torch on would examine the hole very intently!  It was a bugger to get him to close the lid after he used the loo though!

Here we all are before sad farewells on this, their last morning…

The more observant of you will notice we are sitting on… a sofa!  We have been missing a comfy seat on the campsite of an evening when the 3 of us want to put our feet up with a beer and look at the stars and we discovered an old sofa in the basement of our house.  With much pushing & shoving we (well, Nik & Steve) managed to get it out & into the van.  Once levelled and be-strewn with a throw, it was the perfect crashing out space and since it opens up into a sofa bed, it works well as a comfy place for 2 people to lie in the sun and read a book.

Tim Time

(Bizarre & extraordinary happenings?  This is Montenegro)

The Telegraph Ex-Pat edition contacted us regarding a feature on Montenegro.  They emailed us a bunch of questions and having provided answers the journalist decided that she had enough interesting stuff to do the article solely about us!

The first we knew about the article being published was when we got a call from the national newspaper here in Monte.  The man from Vjesti said he’d seen the article and was translating and publishing the entire feature.  It wasn’t really a question – like “Would it be ok to…?” it was more of a statement.

The next morning we get a call from Jadran Radio – the coastal radio station – seems we’d made the front page of the newspaper and now they wanted an telephone interview.  Initially Steve took the call but because the first recording didn’t take, they phoned back and this time I answered so it was my dulcet tones that went out on the airwaves some 5 minutes later.  A local friend was most bemused when he heard me chatting on the radio!

Whilst all this was going on we were embroiled in last minute preparations for the arrival of the W-Bs.  I had a sinking feeling that all this publicity might attract attention and that our friends may get caught in the midst of it.

Sure enough, just as they had arrived, stripped off and were tucking into lunch, I heard a vehicle drive past very slowly.  It turned around and stopped.  It sounded like a police landrover.  Steve pulled some clothes on and went to investigate with Nik bringing up the rear.  Nik returned to inform us that 2 customs guys were quizzing Steve and that we’d better get dressed as they were coming in!

Steve handled the visit brilliantly.  The Customs guys were asking: do we have rooms for rent?  do we have paying guests?  Steve decided to welcome them in and show them that there was just a few tents and a family of our friends visiting.  They got the full tour and read all the signs in local language, impressed by the compost toilets and the solar systems.  They persisted with questions about visitors and prices and in the end Steve told them how much to hire a tent.  It seemed like they just wanted to know for their own benefit and one asked if he could come back with his wife one day!  The dreaded questions about “where is your camping licence?” never materialised and despite our concerns, van loads of police & inspectors did NOT turn up and the world didn’t end.  The timing was actually perfect as it might have been more difficult to manage the situation with ‘real’ naturist guests.

Later that day as I read the newspaper, saw us both naked on the front page and then saw me in my knickers and boobs a-dangling on page 9 (still never made it on page 3 then!) I reflected that if 5 years ago someone had predicted this moment I would have told them they were nuts!

One Green Thing

(One more step along our green journey)

I spent many hours lovingly cutting & sticking corks for this month’s green creation:

(Charting the weather for us and our garden)

Hotter than July!  Sounds like a song… Well Mr Wonder, if you were singing about August – you were right!  It’s been HOT.  And dry.  You can almost hear the earth gasping.  We don’t have enough water to irrigate the grounds so we watch it turn brown.  Since the flower garden is also mostly a disaster, that too gets little water.  The brave cinia and geraniums soldier on but little else survives…

Working… Progress!

August 22, 2010 in Team News, The Build | No comments

I have been so slack at keeping this blog up to date – apologies but a limited internet connection on the campsite, combined with an unlimited work schedule has meant more doing and less writing about doing!

So here’s a run down of all the tasks ticked off the list this summer:

The basement door has been painted a tasteful silver grey and the ugly piece of pink polystyrene that was wedged in the top of the door to stop people hitting their heads as they enter has been replaced with a strategically placed piece of wood, nicely painted white to blend in with the building…

The kitchen is looking great!  All shelves, cupboards & hooks are up.  Now everything has its place and commonly accessed utensils etc are within easy reach.

The laundry sink is tiled!  It was a labour of love for Steve who patiently, single-handedly completed this project.  It has really grown on us and has become our favourite thing in the kitchen!  Almost the day after it was completed, guests arrived and innocently asked: “Can I do some some washing?” – “Yes!” we gushed! (and then ran off to quickly erect a washing line and dig out the pegs!!).  Despite our reservations about it not being wide enough, everything fits in it fine!  It’s great for scrubbing the big ole pan I use for most of the cooking and its a good place to leave pots and pans soaking over night.  This is a poor picture of it (taken at night with a flash) but you get the drift…

A scabby old cupboard we salvaged has been painted with white gloss and is a nice addition to the communal building.  Our eco books and Guest Book live atop and I try to keep fresh flowers displayed there too.  Inside live all the board games, packs of cards etc…

We have signs!!!  This one was artfully drawn up by Gav during his stay with the chalk board pens he brought with him from the UK.  A piece of old wardrobe is transformed into a posh sign, varnished and protected from the weather…

And here’s another of Gav’s masterpieces… A back of a wardrobe was painted dark green and became the perfect canvas for our roadside sign.  He even tried to reproduce the letters in our font and using a part of our logo:

The final sign is Mr Nik’s great work… The campsite name & phone number positioned here draws people’s attention to the bell (just above the sign) and means we can leave the site without worrying about missing business – people can phone and let us know they have turned up and we can dash back…  You can’t see it in this picture but to the right of the sign is a motion-activated solar spotlight.  It illuminates the sign and the gate at night and works brilliantly!

The last shower has been tiled!!!!!  All 3 showers are now in use, shower curtain up – job done!

A random shelf unit that we salvaged was transformed into a handy bathroom cabinet by Nik & I.  It’s a place for guests to put their toiletries and has hooks to hang shower puffs, back scrubbers etc…

Access around the site is an issue.  We really need purpose-built steps in lots of places down from one terrace to another but its just too costly right now so we are trying to do the best we can with the materials available.  One of the routes our guests want to take is from the basement down to the lower terrace, without having to walk up stairs, through the building and down stairs again or the even longer route of all the way down the garden to the steps by the stream.  Nik loves to work with stone and doggedly sought out the necessary stones, lugged them up to the building, wrestled them into place and created a set of steps that run down alongside the concrete steps from the building…  You can hardly see them in this shot but that’s a measure of how well they blend in with the existing stone wall!

Intent on tidying up the side of the building, Nik persevered with mattocking & raking the ground level and then barrowing loads of sand & gravel to cover the earth (which turns to a claggy mess when wet if not covered over!).  It was really hard graft but the look was still spoilt by the ugly side view of the steps.  Then I remembered the piece of bamboo covering we’d salvaged from Maja’s Grandma’s place and it fitted great…

I finally got my cork noticeboard finished and marketing material in place!  The signs inside the building still need to be branded with our logo etc but at least we have ditched the unprofessional looking bits of carboard and have decent, laminated signs in Serbian and English for all key messages…

Alongside all these projects we’ve done some tidying & prettying-up (made up word alert?) – the basement is a really nice space now with room for both laptops, a library for our guests, cushions for chairs and roll mats neatly stacked and easy to access.  The second plastic bottle window for the kitchen area has been completed and all these panels stack nicely in the basement.  The mess and disorder in the workshop finally got too much for me and I had a good old clear out.  The torn canvases soaked in mouse-pee have been removed (we managed to salvage some good pieces and scrub them clean); all the rags have been washed and sorted; the floor has been swept and boxes rationlised.  You can actually get into it and find what you are looking for without too much hassle now!  And the second wine bottle window that we decided not to grout around (it lets in more light this way) now has a neat wooden frame around it, courtesy of Nik the Carpenter, and its painted a nice dark green.  It finishes it off really well and has attracted approving comments.

Then of course there’s the ongoing maintenance of the site.  We’ve had to do some work on the greywater system and the compost loos have kept us busy too but these are for future posts in the autumn when I have more time – there is much to share here about our experiences of DIY green sewerage and toilet systems!

The waterless urinals are close to completion so I’ll report on this project, with pictures, soon.  There are only a few key projects outstanding in the building: tiling the toilet walls; making hand rails for the steps out of the building and tiling these steps with lovely old tiles donated by fellow eco warrior Paul.  Then, apart from the inevitable ongoing touching up of paintwork and further modifications to the kitchen to continue to use every inch of space to best effect, the communal building will be done, done, done!  We are very proud – knackered, but proud!

Having got this far, the work ahead for the autumn, winter & spring will all be focused on the grounds.  There is much levelling of earth to be done – we need more tent pitches and a level eating area for the 10 – 15 people we need to attract most weeks in the season next year.  There are also areas of the grounds yet to be uncovered – spoil from the building works remains and once this has been dug out and used to fill in and level ground we hope to create new nooks and crannies for: another hammock, shaded seating areas and at least one outside bathroom (we have one bath and an offer of another!)

Hopefully now you’ll realise that my lack of blogging is for good reason!  Wish us luck with the mammoth tasks ahead…

July in Review

August 13, 2010 in Den, Frugal Living, Fun Stuff, Making & Baking, Nature, Organic Gardening | No comments

What’s this???  Halfway through August and only NOW a review of July???  I know, I know… Better late than never???

What’s fresh?

(Noting what’s fresh & local to know what I can grow & when and a record of fresh pickings from our garden to improve future planting plans, manage gluts better etc)

From the store:

  • Lettuce
  • Sweetcorn (but not as yummy as ours…)
  • Blitva (mangel)
  • Raspberries
  • Blackberries
  • Nectarines
  • Peaches

From the garden:

  • Lettuce
  • Beetroot
  • Onions
  • Rocket
  • Radish
  • Courgettes

  • Carrots
  • Sweetcorn – best crop yet & soooo delicious!)

  • Cucumbers (in the weirdest shapes but all tasty)

  • Runner beans (about a kilo every other day for most of the month!)

  • Tomatoes

Sowing & Planting

(Building a record of what I need to prepare for next in the garden)

Too hot to sow anything much except more basil & coriander…

Baking & Making

(A chance to reflect on the culinary success & failures of the month & share crafty moments)

We’ve been eating a lot of salads and faves at the mo are:

Beetroot Salad Greek Style (cooked & diced beetroot; beetroot leaves wilted in water from cooking the beets; garlic & olive oil)

Cucumber & Dill Salad (thinly sliced cucmbers; cider vinegar with a little sugar dissolved in it; fresh dill)

Rocket & Pecorino (or any hard, strong cheese shaved into the greens with olive oil & seasoning)

Here’s me with a table full of salads, as usual:

And making…? Not much – making our guests happy has been work enough

Reading

(Love sharing the books I’m into)

Still reading Wally Lamb’s The Hour I First Believed’  – so you know how busy I’ve been.  The fact that I’ve been reading it for 2 months is no reflection on the writing style or content – it’s a great book!

What’s the vibe?

(This month’s gut reaction)

In relation to my gut … bloated!  Have been eating way too much bread and know its not good for me.  Back on the salads now & trying to cut out those carbs!

In relation to our business, this month the mood is – happy!!!  We’ve had more bookings than we thought possible (have had paying guests every week since the second week in June and this is set to continue until the end of August).  And more importantly, all our guests have been happy campers – both in the sense of being sound folk with great attitudes and in the sense of leaving us with smiles on their faces and glowing reports in the guest book!

Listening to

(Trying to listen to some new tunes every month)

Not doing well on breaking into the many ‘unplayed, unrated’ tracks in our expansive collection but enjoying some familiar chilled sounds, especially: Zero 7, Damien Rice, Teitur & Morcheeba.

Also had an 80’s revival period during my party when me & my girlfriends danced to some real ole goodies such as: Jocelyn Brown;  Earth, Wind & Fire, Kool & the Gang etc…

Fun Stuff

(‘Nuff said)

Jo turned 40 a couple of days before me & his girlfriend Zuzana organised a surprise party for him.  An extra bonus was that Carrie was staying with us so could come too.  Carrie & I were introduced a couple of years ago when I did a stint in the UK, working as a consultant and our then boss realised we had Montenegro in common (me living here, her having bought a house here).  She & I hit it off but never really got to spend much time with each other.  We met briefly the following year when she (and her then partner) came to try to move things forward with her house here.  We stayed in touch and helped her with Montenegro paperwork stuff as best we could.  Now, a year and many life changes on, she came to Montenegro as a single woman on a mission to decide whether to renovate the house or sell.  We let her stay in our house (which was a bit of extra cash for us & a peaceful, luxurious retreat for her) and during the week she joined us at the campsite a few times and we got to know each other better.  She is bonkers and a total scream!  We had a lot of fun at the surprise pool party, deciding to jump in rather than be pushed!  Here’s Carrie trying to unstick her soaking wet top from her back (that she told me afterwards was wool – oops!) and me wishing I hadn’t worn such white, see-through-when-wet clothes!…

Here’s me & Zuz, the great party organiser:

And here’s the big guy himself:

We (but especially Carrie) had pink-fizz induced hangovers the morning after the party as we drove over to Zanjice to meet Mil and Miso.  We had introduced Carrie to our friend Mil as a useful Serbian-speaking contact and recommended our builder Miso.  The 2 of them met us over at her house to size up the project.  By the end of her visit Carrie had fallen in love with Monte all over again and we hope that she gets a reasonable quote for the job from Miso so that she can renovate the house (complete with olive mill & press, which if she realises her dream, will be the central feature in an amazing kitchen!).

Turning 40 was much more fun than I thought it would be! My actual birthday was on a Monday – a naff day for a celebration!  I had a lovely day nonetheless.  Here’s my birthday breakfast – with the unique birthday ‘log’ & ‘leaf’ cards from Nik in clear view:

We took off to the beach for the day, leaving the site in Olivier & Tanja’s safe hands (really, how lucky were we to have guests like these!?) and I was treated to a fabulous pedicure on the sand by Amy.  Just to laze around all day with the occasional dip in the crystal clear water was a luxury…

The celebrations of me leaving my flirty 30’s and entering my naughty 40’s happened the following weekend and were made extra special by 6 old friends making the trip from the UK to be with me.  Fran & H are work buddies from my TK Maxx days.  We’ve known each other for about 15 years and they know more embarrassing stories about me that everyone here put together! (Ouch!)

I’ve known Gav & Rick even longer – we met at Loughborough University which is pretty much 2 whole decades in my past now…  The boys hung around for a couple of days after the party which was ACE and gave us time to indulge in our favourite things: drinking & playing Bridge:

Dear girlfriend Ditsch (pictured here at the 40th party, on the right) I have known for 25 years and love her even more as the years roll by.  Vince her lovely hubby who has become our friend too, can just be made out behind me in this photo …

The preamble to the big party was an amazing day out on a flotilla of beautiful boats.  Steve had asked all our sailing buddies to help ferry folk out to our favourite beach in Zanjice.  They were all so generous and gave me & my friends an incredible day to remember.  Steve had organised everything for a bbq on the beach and we spent a wonderful day, eating, drinking and cooling off in the water – in between hopping from one gorgeous boat to another!

Skipperesses Katie & Laura are pictured here – Katie & Tim sailed the Monty B and hoisted a special birthday flag for me; Lauar & Tony whizzed me, Fran & H out to the beach on their new racy yacht and my friends were fascinated by the way the couple deftly ‘tacked’ baby Amber!

Dave & Fiona’s rib was the speedy water taxi ferrying people to & fro (Dave’s here on the far left) and Paul’s amazing luxury yacht took us home in style that evening (Paul is on the far right here)

It was fitting that my Goddess Daughter, Grace,  should be there to share the fun.  She was a sweetie all day!

Here’s the view of the boats from the beach, with the little motor boat The Bounty too:

The big party was on Saturday night and was largely due to the efforts of the inimitable Danny Parish who helped decorate the campsite, organised the most beautiful & delicious (not to mention HUGE) cake and provided delicious salads.  Here she is, with Fran beaming at her:

Old friend Dave Bennett had ‘photoshopped’ a fantastic picture of Steve with a comb-over for his 50th, so Steve emailed him for revenge!  Steve calls me his wonder woman (I’ll leave you to figure out why!) and Dave provided a fab pic of Wonder Woman’s body with my face on it which Steve made into a T-Shirt for me with the caption: “Wonder Woman never ages… she just gets badly drawn”.  Here I am proudly (!) wearing it, along with the gorgeous blue necklace & bracelet that Maja bought me before she buggered off to the UK and missed the party!

And here’s a photo of THAT cake – see, I wasn’t kidding…

It’s funny how things turn out.  I ceded control to Steve for the celebrations (much to everyone’s amusement, I think!) and the night turned out to be perfect.  Sure, there were dear friends & family missing – there always are… you just can’t get everyone you love in one place these days.  But I had such a fabulous time with the special folk who were there.  I danced & danced; got drunk but not rudely so; sang ‘old skool’ tunes at the top of my voice; laughed & laughed and treasured every moment.  The weather was amazing – there was a huge downpour just before I arrived (I was banned from the site during the preparations) and was initially worried when it was still raining a little at the start of the evening but it cleared up and the storm moved off to the left and provided the most amazing lightning storm for us to gawp at!  It was like nature had laid on fireworks for me!  The moon was bright, the air was fresh (which was great because we were dancing so much we needed the coolness) and the company was wonderful.  Here’s what one friend wrote about that night:

“At your magnificant party i drank like a fish and danced like a shaman, and only had to stop (not because of my bruised feet) but because i was laughing too much – Joy is a funny thing. Thankyou again for so unconditionally offering me such a release – you are both such remarkable, beautiful and excellant people”

Tim Time

(Bizarre & extraordinary happenings?  This is Montenegro)

Steve’s laundry sink has become our new favourite thing in the campsite kitchen (pictures to follow soon, I promise!) but the hassle he had trying to get the plastic trim to edge the tiles & the right coloured grout was frustrating (for him) and funny (for us!).  He started off at one tiling shop on the edge of town.  Nobody there.  He waited & mooched around for a bit.  20 mins later – still nobody.  If he had spotted any mint green tile edging or grout anywhere in the warehouse at this point he would have grabbed it and just left some cash but none to be seen.  So he had to brave the town centre and the nightmare that was a dug-up one way system.  Battling his way to the store he was told – no.  No chance.  What about Azzurro?, he asked (another store on the way into town that he had chosen to drive past because the car park was full).  No. No chance.  Any other suggestions, apart from No?  asks he, bravely.  He gets sent off to a shop right the other side of Herceg Novi – a full 20 mins out of his way…  The woman there looked at the colour he was trying to match and said, accusingly, “But this is an awful colour!  Why did you choose this?”  Not only was she not helpful, she just tried to get Steve to buy any other colour under the sun except the one he wanted, regardless of the actual colour of the tiles!

Exhausted from the verbal bashing he got there and leaving with a grey grout that he didn’t even want (but anything to shut the madwoman up at this point!) he drove, dejected back through town.  He had so hoped to get the materials to finish the job that day…

Driving past Azzurro this time, he noticed the car park was empty.  He decide to try it anyway.  “Yes, sir, certainly sir.  Here’s the grout you need”.  But no trim.  Growling at the (now redundant) grey grout he drove back to the campsite and decided to pop in to the very first store he had visited some 2 hours previous.  This time there was actually a real person there and the right colour trim was whipped out in no time!

One Green Thing

(One more step along our green journey)

Struggled to think of something for this month but then realised that our re-use of water is probably worth a mention… We are so conscious about the water we use and every bowl of water used to wash dishes (that isn’t too soapy or filled with meat scraps) is used to irrigate our flowers and grass.

Weather Report

(Charting the weather for us and our garden)

July brought summer to us with a vengence.  It went from being sunny & comfortably warm to being hot, hot, hot!  We’ve had the odd crazy storm and downpour of rain but far from complaining that summer proper isn’t here yet, we’re loving the respite from the beating sun and thankful for every day the gardens get watered by nature and not us!

Guest Appearance

July 29, 2010 in Camping News, Naturist, Team News | 1 comment

I can’t believe this is my first blog entry for a month!!!  Apologies to anyone who actually looks forward to these updates and has started to give up on me…

The good news is that I have just been too damn busy to blog.  And not just with partying & having fun (I can see my Mum’s concerned face & wagging finger!) – although to be fair, there has been quite a bit of that too!

I have about 20 mins to get this post posted so I’m not going to mess around with fancy words & poetic descriptions of the events of the past few weeks.  I’m here to chuck up some photos and give you a brief run down of the visitors…

Bob, (Saint Bob, patron saint of lovley guests and general good luck charm), you know about by now.  Here’s a lovely picture of the 3 of us & sweet peas from the garden sprouting from Steve’s shoulder!

Next up came Benjamin, all the way from California.  The soon-to-be professor found us in the Lonely Planet (we had an entry long before we even had the campsite set up but thankfully the web address is correct and people can still find us!) and we stayed up til silly o’clock talking eco.  He commented on having the best night’s sleep in Montenegro at our campsite.

Then we spent a pleasant evening with Jonathon from Camping Cheque.  Sadly I don’t think we’ll be able to work with his organisation but he gave us plenty of food for thought and was our first French guest.

1st July was a very special, happy day… Nik returned to his heart home – the Balkans – & became a key member of the Camp Full Monte team again:

Next to arrive was Wally… an old class mate of mine who found me on Facebook and made it to Monte after the second week of his tour in Belgrade got cancelled.  We hadn’t seen each other for 24+ years and he certainly saw more of me than he’d ever seen!  I was anxious about how the week would go but once he arrived I relaxed.  He was great fun, easy to be around and very supportive.

During that week we had visits from special friends:

and their kids:

At the same time, Nik’s friends Ema & Alex & baby Viktor came to stay at our house in Topla to combine a holiday with catching up with Nik who they know & love from his Macedonia days.   Sadly I didn’t get any pics of dear Alex but here are the Mums & kids…

Next up was Marcus & Annabel (from the UK and France respectively but now both living in Portugal).  They were pretty self contained but we understand that not everyone wants to eat with us and get involved and it didn’t stop them enjoying our space and leaving some lovely comments in our now very precious Guest Book.

Olivier & Tanja, a beautiful Belgium-Flemish couple became part of the family for nearly 2 weeks.  They were just the sweetest, nicest folk and loved the campsite, the wildlife and my cooking.  It was so easy to be around them, to play games, share a bottle of wine etc and we have so many great memories of their time with us.  Here they are with my friend Carrie (who hadn’t visited the site since the old days of field tent up top and was gob smacked by the progress)…

Two Hungarian guys, Adam & Christian, were waiting in the car for us one day when we all returned from the beach.  They hadn’t booked or even emailed a tentative enquiry – they just showed up!  Thank goodness we arrived when we did or else they might have given up on us!  (needless to say we are now on the case with proper signage & a telephone number).  They were great fun and so, so smart!  We learnt loads about Hungarian politics, history & culture in the 3 nights they were with us.  I turned 40 on the day after they arrived and they brought out a little chocolate cake with candles to celebrate.

My birthday celebrations brought a whole bunch of other folk – not exactly guests and I haven’t downloaded any of the pics from the week long celebrations so all that will have to wait for another post…

Yesterday, Emma & Andy arrived from the UK.  They plan to stay at  least 3 nights and maybe longer… August sees a steady stream of guests – mostly in their own tent and mostly for just a night or 2 but guests nonetheless and the Dish of the Day is selling well in advance…

More soon, I promise!

June in Review

July 3, 2010 in Den, Frugal Living, Fun Stuff, Making & Baking, Reduce Reuse Recycle | 1 comment

What’s fresh?

(Noting what’s fresh & local to know what I can grow & when and a record of fresh pickings from our garden to improve future planting plans, manage gluts better etc)

From the store:

  • Lettuce
  • Carrots
  • New potatoes
  • Spring onions
  • Strawberries
  • Peaches

From the garden:

  • Lettuce
  • Radish

  • Rocket
  • Runner beans

  • Peas

  • Courgettes

Sowing & Planting

(Building a record of what I need to prepare for next in the garden)

Planted squashes gifted by friends – I germinated them and we split the loot!

I am delighted to report that we have a marrow plant!!!   I have been lamenting my short-sightedness in not saving seeds from this wonderfully versatile veg and all the while, a plant was growing, from seed in the compost!

Planted out my lavender plants that I had grown from seed.  I’ve got 3 healthy plants that have gone into the borders of the flower garden.

Planted 2 tiny persimmon trees, grown from seed:

Baking & Making

(A chance to reflect on the culinary success & failures of the month & share crafty moments)

Picked some of the beautiful courgette flowers and dipped them in a light beer batter.  Gently fried them for a couple of minutes… divine!

Painted glass jars for candle holders and made a wind chime from holey stones collected on Zanjice beach:


Reading

(Love sharing the books I’m into)

It’s a measure of how busy we are that I have no time for reading!  Still reading Wally Lamb’s The Hour I First Believed’ and really enjoying it.

What’s the vibe?

(This month’s gut reaction)

This month the mood is – optimistic!!!  Bookings starting to slowly roll in; first guest loved it so much he came back!; 2 other visits already in June (one American soon-to-be professor and a French guy)…  Keeping everything crossed and smiling through!

Listening to

(Trying to listen to some new tunes every month)

Have listened to lots of music, loving the sound system at the campsite… but unfortunately because the laptop is down in the basement whilst we are listening to music up in the building, I’ve no idea of the names of artists and tracks half the time!

Fun Stuff

(‘Nuff said)

Enjoyed the company of an old friend.  It was wonderful having Kirst here & was so sad to say goodbye…

Here we are at our friend Therese’s villa:

where we laid in the sun and had a dip in the pool:

This is what I loved the most – laughing my head off with a special, beautiful buddy:


We had a very special evening on the campsite with friends Katie & Tim.  There was a massive storm close but high enough up and far enough away so that we heard no thunder, only witnessed the incredible lightning.  We sat outside in the early hours watching the sky light up right above our heads in forks and flashes that had us gasping with wonder.  And in between the illumination, we were humbled and awed by the masses of stars that crowded into every gap in the clouds…

We hosted our second proper party on the eve of Summer Solstice.  Thankfully the numbers were smaller, as we had to dive for cover from the rain early on and it got pretty crowded in the building for a while but the storm held off and the evening warmed up and we all had fun.  The Full Monte Feast was a big hit and the Sangria was delicious and didn’t give us a hangover, which was a bonus!  We had a great fire going and a hardcore of us sat around it until the early hours but only 3 of us actually managed to stay up to greet the dawn.

And of course, there’s been the footie…  We couldn’t escape the World Cup because Bob was such a massive fan and when England pplayed Algeria, we invited Bob and all the boys round to watch it on our big screen:

Tim Time

(Bizarre & extraordinary happenings?  This is Montenegro)

Bob would walk down the hill to the nearest petrol station to watch the football and the friendly folk there looked after him.  When we went to pick him up after the Spain-Portugal match on his last night and have a farewell drink with him, the lovley guy behind the bar got out his bottle of delicious Russian vodka and shared it around…  It was obviously a very special bottle and the liquor was so smooth – I’m sure if I were him I’d be trying to save it and savour it, not share it around with random english folk!  So kind!!!

One Green Thing

(One more step along our green journey)

Steve painstakingly dismantled an old wardrobe, salvaged from Maja’s grandmother’s house, and used the wood to make an amazing cabinet that surrounds our 2 gas fridges and cupboard space and has sturdy lockable doors to make closing up the site easy and effective:


Weather Report

(Charting the weather for us and our garden)

June has remained changeable.  We have had more rain than usual; some terrific storms; cloudy, overcast but warm days and some scorching hot, gorgeous summer-like days.  Will summer proper ever come?

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Bob’s your uncle…

June 22, 2010 in Camping News, Team News | 5 comments

This time last week things were looking gloomy… bookings were so thin on the ground as to be disturbingly scary and we were starting to have serious discussions about not if, but when, we would pack it all in for the winter and head for cover in the UK.

Then, ‘Bob’s your uncle’, Bob turns up!  Bob is our first guest and he came out of nowhere.  We got an email saying he was heading to Dubrovnik and was thinking about visiting the campsite and next came a text saying he’d be there on 16th June in the afternoon.  When we got the text we were at our house in town, struggling with our marketing.  We packed up our stuff and jumped in the car, arriving at the campsite late at night.  We cleaned and polished into the early hours so we would be ready for Bob the next day.

As ever, there was this horrible knot in the pit of my stomach all morning – waiting for him to arrive.  What would he be like?  Would he be suitably impressed with the tent we’d prepared for him and the campsite in general?  What if he didn’t like my cooking (he’d requested our Dish of the Day)?

As Steve went off to pick Bob up from the bottom of the hill, I finally saw my first tortoise on the land this year.  I took this to be a good sign… in the Chinese culture, tortoises are loaded with symbolism.  Its inanimate shell represents the lifeless rock that is acted upon by divine inspiration (the breath of the heavens) to produce life.  Maybe we were due some divine intervention?

Seems that way… our first guest has turned out to be the most amazing chap.  He’s in his late 60’s but full of energy and a sense of adventure.  His partner was supposed to be making the trip to Montenegro but had to change her plans at the last moment, so Bob changed the traveller’s name and flew out in her place.  He found us on the internet and thought we might be fun.  He wouldn’t describe himself as a naturist but he’s enjoyed being naked in the sun on various trips so didn’t see a problem.

We hit it off straight away.  By the end of the first day, as we were sharing a bottle of wine over dinner, we already felt really comfortable in each other’s company.  He’s a fascinating character – full of stories of places he’s been, people he’s met, things he’s done.  He used to have a small-holding so he knew the struggles of tending the land, growing your own produce & trying to make ends meet.  We also share a love of music – he’s a massive Bob Marley fan and had been to Jamaica for the great man’s birthday last year; he was lucky enough to have seen some incredible gigs (Little Richard, The Everly Brothers, Ray Charles) and was a mine of information about almost every musical artist.  He was well impressed with the laptop & its 15,000 pieces of music.

Despite my worries, he loved the campsite.  He was awed by the views, the wildlife, the peace & seclusion, the birdsong and the stars. He would rise early and go hiking around the area, reporting back on trails he’d found and locals he’d met and in the afternoon he would doze off in the hammock. He had seconds & thirds of every meal – the plates wiped clean at the end of the meal told me all I needed to know about the acceptability of my cooking!

The nicest thing of all was how Bob made himself at home.  He volunteered to water the garden and to mow the terraces…

He insisted on doing the washing up after meals… Despite us pointing out that it was his holiday and he should be relaxing & letting us look after him, he was determined – he argued that he thoroughly enjoying mucking in with us.  It seems this is one of the ways in which the experience at Camp Full Monte is different and appealing…

He’s a footie fan so we took him to meet all our mates who had gathered at Izvor to watch the England game.  He had a great time and was in his element, shouting at the telly and getting to know new people.  He left us, reluctantly, on Saturday.  Plans had been pre made for him to spend time in Perast, but he left some of his stuff with us and will return later this week for another 4-5 days.  He’s adopted us, like a benevolent uncle, and we get frequent texts from him telling us what he’s been up to, nagging us not to work too hard and giving us weather & World Cup updates!

I swear he’s our good luck charm.  We now have another guy joining us for 2 nights this week  & a couple joining us next week, for 3 nights.  We have just got a further booking for 11-12 nights in July.  The idea of having someone else cook seems to be really popular with everyone, so the Dish of the Day is selling well.  On Sunday we’ll be visited by a rep from the camping team of a holiday company that specialise in off-peak holidays.  We’ll just let Bob do all the talking for us – he can sell us better than we can!  I’m dying to see what Bob puts in our Guest Book before he goes, but my favourite quote from him so far is:

“I love Montenegro.  I love it even more now I’ve met you two!”

Alongside all of this, there is hope for employment for us here in the winter months.  We won’t speak too soon but we may have found a great way to work with friends and earn enough money to continue to pay our rent here.

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May in Review

May 30, 2010 in Den, Fun Stuff, Making & Baking, Organic Gardening, Reduce Reuse Recycle | 3 comments

What’s fresh?

(Noting what’s fresh & local to know what I can grow & when and a record of fresh pickings from our garden to improve future planting plans, manage gluts better etc)

From the store:

  • Lettuce
  • Carrots
  • New potatoes
  • Young cabbage
  • Spring onion
  • Tikvice (big, thin-skinned, local courgettes)
  • Strawberries
  • Cherries

From the garden:

  • Lettuce – especially: Cut & Come Again, Radichio, Curly Endive and Cos
  • Radish
  • Rocket

In Nature’s garden:

Sowing & Planting

(Building a record of what I need to prepare for next in the garden)

Have sown more:

  • radish
  • lettuce
  • beetroot
  • carrots
  • rocket

as I try to succession plant to keep these veg cropping.  I was gifted some local beans (broad bean stylie, known here as ‘Bob’ apparently!) so have planted these and some more melons & pumpkins and today have been given a load of different squash seeds will get planted tomorrow!

And some more herbs:

  • the first coriander plant is already going to seed so I have planted lots more
  • basil – because I’ll need LOTS to go with all the tomatoes that are romping away!

The marigolds from last year’s seed are doing fine – the germination rate is poor though.  The courgette plants are BIG, and healthy fruit is forming. The pumpkins are stretching out but the melons are not doing so well.  Peppers & chillies were looking vulnerable (planted them out too soon – note to self!) but seem to be coming round. Carrots are forming well now & the runner beans & peas are flowering beautifully…

I finally have 3 strong cauliflower plants to be planted out soon.  The cabbages are looking really healthy & sweetcorn is finally getting tall & strong:

Baking & Making

(A chance to reflect on the culinary success & failures of the month & sharing crafty moments)

We bought a beautiful, big, fat, fish (unidentified – Steve’s best guess is a bream) from our fisherman friend and enjoyed half it’s fleshy meat steamed with garlic and lemongrass.  I boiled up the bones with leftover veg and the following day used this stock & the rest of the fish to make a deliciously rich fish stew.  Oh yum!  But stunk the house out!

All my creativity has gone into the campsite this month.  Probably the best example is the new, improved plastic bottle window – finished and shown here behind the breakfasting campers…

Reading

(Love sharing the books I’m into)

Finished Liz Gilbert’s ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ and enjoyed every word.

Currently reading a Wally Lamb book – haven’t read any of his since ‘She’s come undone’ and wondering where the book is going at the moment but enjoying it nonetheless:

‘Tis still the season for browsing books – there’s a whole stack piled up on tables: reference books of flowers, veg & herbs etc, etc.  No particular favourites to report this month…

What’s the vibe?

(This month’s gut reaction)

Struggling with this one this month – too busy doing, not feeling… I guess ‘happy but knackered’ about sums it up.  We’ve achieved a lot this month so feel pretty satisfied on that score.

Also, if we’re honest probably feeling a bit desperate – no firm bookings until end of August; little interest in the house rental and still so much to do on the marketing side that Steve & I struggle to agree on or make time for.  The volunteer that was supposed to show mid May never did and we haven’t heard a peep from Pedro for a while so maybe we won’t get his help in June either…  Roll on 1st July, when Mr Nik will be welcomed back into the Camp Full Monte fold again!

Listening to

(Trying to listen to some new tunes every month)

Not a lot but now we have a proper sound system on the campsite I’m looking forward to remedying this!

Fun Stuff

(‘Nuff said)

Some good laughs with our #1 posh camper, Danny:

Relaxing with friends after a successful & satisfying work day on the land…

The Irish were back in town for a week – yes, the inimitable Jimmy & Annie – and we enjoyed a fun, impromptu evening with them and some other mates, roaring with laughter.

And combining business with pleasure, our first ‘proper’ event the Full Moon Party…

Tim Time

(Bizarre & extraordinary happenings?  This is Montenegro)

This is my favourite story at the moment from Hayley, our friend at Black Mountain Holidays:

Inspectors turned up at an apartment in Kotor and found 2 tourists in residence with no tourist tax.  This is a 70 cents per day tax that holiday makers are supposed to pay and should be available from any travel agency.  In overly dramatic Monte-stylie, they were told they would be deported immediately if they didn’t purchase the tax.  They contacted Hayley for help after not being able to find anywhere locally that issued the tax.  Hayley got onto it and found to her amazement and disbelief that there was only one agency issuing the tax in Kotor and for the privilege they would charge the tourists 50 euros!!! This is crazy!  All other agencies issue the 70 cents tax, with little/ no commission – it’s just one of the things they are required to do and its not a money-making exercise!  Flabbergasted, she tried to find somewhere else the tourists could go.  The only place that was in the Kotor municipality (and therefore valid for issuing tourist tax for a Kotor based apartment) was in Risan, some 45 minutes drive away!!!  They have no car, were collected from the airport and will be taken back there but have no other means of getting around, never mind to Risan of all places!  Hayley threw a fit and as far as we know she & the tourists are holding firm against the ridiculous inspectors & agencies – if no-one can find them a place to buy the tax at the stated price – then tough!

One Green Thing

(One more step along my green journey)

Re-used old baby milk cans to make attractive containers for my dried goods in the campsite kitchen:

Weather Report

(Charting the weather for us and our garden)

May has been changeable.  We have had lots of rain; some terrific storms; cloudy, overcast but warm days and some scorching hot, gorgeous summer-like days.  Here’s hoping it settles down in June…

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Holy Cow

May 29, 2010 in Team News | 4 comments

Holy Cow!  And not in a “comic strip exclamation” way… no, no in a “revered by the Indians, sacred animals” kinda way… Really, honestly, there comes a point where you just have to give up and say: “Ok, guys – you beasts are amazing!”

So – there we were, painting the building  (thankfully, we’d just got down from the scaffolding because if we’d have been up it then: a) we might have fallen off as our jaw dropped to the floor and toppled us over and b) we might not have been able to rush to the defence of our garden in time…) when Steve just gaped and pointed.  I followed his gaze and saw 2 bovine characters munching away at the grass just inches in front of the raised beds!

What?  How?  Holy Cow?! (OK, that was in an exaggerated, comic strip stylie!!!).  They were not wearing bells so we hadn’t heard them coming and I swear we both glanced around for their parachute or the airship that had dropped them off…

Steve rushed off down the garden to confront the buggers and I followed, waving my arms protectively over my plants.  There was a moment when Steve realised that he was nearly eyeball to eyeball with 2 very big beasts and, well, they looked like they could really hurt an inexperienced English dude…  But he ‘manned up’ and in a deep, gruff voice starting shouting at them in Serbian and herding them off down to the lower terrace.  They reluctantly lumbered off with a sideways glance to the garden and the lush green goodies they’d just been cheated of, tripping over guy ropes as they went!  (No harm done Nik, honest!!!).

They found their way up beside the workshop and just as I was struggling to move the makeshift pallett barrier that we had in place, they simply stepped up the retaining wall of the compost chamber area.  This step up has got to be 3-4 feet high and is tough for even a long-legged chap like Steve to manage.  It posed no problem for these guys at all!  Gulp!

We shooed them out of the main gate and then, knees knocking, looked at each other in awe and wonder…

OK time to put on our Cow Detective gear again and figure out where the bugger’s had entered.  Virtual deerstalkers on and imaginary spyglass in hand we set off down to the lower terrace.  The really serious pallett fence, reinforced with barbed wire, etc, etc was… intact!  Phew!  So they didn’t get in there then…

Nope – trampled grass and a flattened hedge in one corner, behind Danny’s tent led us to the Cow Highway.  It was almost impassable for us – narrow paths, overgrown with spiky bushes and brambles, stony & uneven underfoot.  But it was littered with cow pats. The path had 2 clear cow routes – 1 branched off to the left down to the stream and the other led onto Jovo’s land immediately below ours.  This was BAD news because it meant that even if we blocked the entrance onto our land from Jovo’s, the cows could still wander along the stream and gain entry at some place further up.

We had to leave the camp and this meant dealing with the cow problem – neither of us could bear the sick feeling in our stomach when we even considered leaving the site unprotected…  Unfortunately as we began our now 3rd attempt at cow proofing (3rd time lucky?) the heavens opened.  Even with our full motorcycle rainproof suits on (all that remains of our beloved biking days) we got soaked to the skin as we carried all the bits of metal we could find down to the streamside.  Steve did a sterling job slashing trees to lay a hedge and piling up logs and obstacles.  By now we were way beyond underestimating the sacred beasts and really went overboard with the cow barrier.

In the bucketing rain Steve walked along the stream and looked for routes up where they could step over the terrace walls (now we knew what heights they could climb!) and onto the land and attempted to block their entry at every point.

(If you’re wondering about the electric fence by now and thinking: ‘come on guys – sod the expense, just put the damn thing up!’ then we have to confess there’s a flaw in this plan… Electric fences need to be clear of undergrowth or else they’ll short out as boughs fall on them etc, so really we would have to erect the fence well inside out boundary, clear of all the stooping branches.  Sadly this would make it a hazard for our guests so we are resigned to using the fence on the palm fence boundary only to deter any human intruders).

There is a moral to this story: when 3 years ago the elderly villager pointed down to what seemed inpenetrable undergrowth and the stream and indicated that cows would come onto our land that way, we should have believed him!

Maybe now that we are giving the cows the respect they deserve, with a cow defence that’s truly worthy of them and have ceased all jokes about bbq-ing them, they’ll leave us alone…

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Cow Proof

May 18, 2010 in Den, The Build | 1 comment

It was a lovely sunny day and I was tending the garden when I heard a cow bell that sounded too close for comfort…  Dressed in just a baggy t-shirt and knickers I wandered down to the lower terrace where the sound was coming from.  As I approached the opening to the land below our land, across which we had erected a 3-stringed barbed wire fence, I was confronted with the sight of a large cow being driven by Jovo.  Jovo owns the land beyond our boundary and is the strange character from whom we bought part of our plot.

As my mind whirred to try & find the right words in local language to say “Er, please don’t let your cow come any closer…” I was rendered speechless as I watched the great beast push its way through the barbed wire barrier, snapping one of the strands in the process!  Once on the land it headed fast towards where it knew green things lurked in earthy beds… Jovo pushed his way through after his cow and ran after it as I came to my senses and shouted “Moja bašta!” (My garden!).  He managed to steer the cow back but it lumbered off out of control and ended up wandering around the other side of the workshop.  In the end he moved pallets and bricks to let the creature through and he drove it through the main gate which I opened for him and then locked behind them, wishing I knew the Serbian for “Get orf my land!”.

At the time I was hopping mad as I thought Jovo had been deliberately herding his cow through our land.  I’m still not entirely sure but have since looked up the word ‘Nazad’ that I heard Jovo shout at the cow and it means ‘back’ not ‘forward’ as I first thought!  So maybe he was trying to control his cow but failing or maybe he caught sight of me and decided to act as if the invasion wasn’t deliberate…  Who knows, but what we do know is:

  • the barbed wire fence that we thought was so impenetrable… wasn’t at all
  • this is definitely a route the cow had taken before – it was a creature on a mission & seemed to know exactly where it was going
  • cows can navigate seemingly impossibly difficult terrain – the cow hoof marks are in the carpet laid out beside the workshop.  This area was strewn with twisted bits of metal and is very difficult to traverse, a narrow strip of land with a sheer drop beside it… and it posed no problem at all for the bovine bugger!

Despite the distress (and the embarrassment of realising the whole time I’d been prancing around like a madwoman barely clothed!) I was actually so glad I was there to see with my own eyes what a cow can do and for Jovo to see how displeased I was.

So now we had proof of the cow, time to make the campsite cow-proof…

We spent the best part of a day erecting a pallet fence all the way along the edges of the campsite where we now know  the weak spots are.  The pallets have been nailed together with lumps of wood and barbed wire wound all the way through the structure.  We have piled up brambles and spiky bushes all the way and will continue to do so, hoping in time that the vegetation will grow up and provide even more of a barrier.

It remains to be seen if a sufficiently motivated cow could still force its way through this hardcore barrier….  We have done the best with the materials we have available right now.  Stage 2 is to get the electric fence up but that’s a big job and requires us to buy a load of wood to make hefty posts so we’ll be moving onto that as soon as we have the time & money.

This is a scheduled post as we are back on the campsite – probably bbq-ing beef!

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Weathering the storms

May 16, 2010 in Camping News, Den | 1 comment

We are feeling a little buffeted…

The actual storms have been pretty hardcore and its hard to sleep at night with the rain pummelling the thin material between you and the great outdoors and the wind tugging at poles and ropes.  But so far (and I hope I’m not tempting fate when I say this…) we’ve remained dry & cosy in our new ‘home’.

Our Weather Oracle tipped us off about some mental weather & strong southerlies and sure enough in the early hours of yesterday morning, the storm arrived.  Despite preparing the night before & battening down the metaphorical hatches, we found that things inside the shower block were still getting wet (“Oh, it’s a southerly wind – that means it’ll be blowing right through that gaping doorway and onto the tile cement! Doh!”).  We raced around locking even more stuff in the basement (thank god for that big, dry, clean space – what the hell would we do without it now!) and that’s when I noticed that one of the fence panels was about to blow away.  The wind had rocked the fence so badly it had snapped the metal bands holding it to the post!  In the driving rain we effected a temporary bodge with more wire and bits of metal post.

Then it was a dash down to the camping terraces to check the tents.  Matt & Amy’s tent had to re-pegged with more heavy duty pegs and most of the tents needed the guy ropes tightening.  By this time we were soaked to the skin & getting disheartened.  The walls & balustrades hadn’t yet had their second coat of heavy duty outdoor paint and the first coat was washing off.  The path to the shower block that Tim had dug and filled with gravel & sand was washing away as mud and rivers of waters ran onto it… One step forward, two steps back.  There was nothing we could do until the storm passed so it was time to de-camp and head for the shelter of our house in town.

Back at the house things weren’t much better.  Our landlord has helpfully installed 2 huge water tanks to provide us with water when the main supply fails and a sprinkler system to keep his garden irrigated so we don’t have to worry about it during the dry months when we are on the campsite.  However the plumbers have done a terrible job and our basement is now filling up with water so Steve had to dash about fixing the problems.  Last night the power went off and was still off this morning.  We have had a stressful morning watching the storm and worrying about the campsite and not even being able to do anything useful here.  Thankfully the electricity came back on in time to watch the Monaco Grand Prix and the storm has abated, for now…  Ironic isn’t it that at the campsite we have power when we want it and a dry basement!

Riding the waves of ups and downs is exhausting.  We were elated that we had several potential bookings for our house over the summer – some useful income to buy us another month or 2 out here, we hoped.  But now the interest has dwindled and we only have the place rented for one week in July.  The wider political & economic storminess (made up word?) isn’t helping either.  We always seem to pick the wrong time to change pounds into euros as we try to second guess the effect of the markets on the bail out of Greece, the UK election etc, etc…

We are surviving but getting a little sea-sick of it all.  The weather is set to remain stormy for the next few days which puts us behind schedule and we are racing to complete important tasks now before we host a naming ceremony for Matt & Amy’s daughter, Eloise next weekend and hold our first paid event this season – the Full Moon Party in just under 2 weeks time.

Bookings are still way too thin on the ground so the future looks uncertain.  It’s good news that we are getting interest and people are finding us on the web but most calls/ emails are from travellers with camper vans or caravans which we can’t accommodate.

We remain optimistic – what else can we do?  If you’re stuck on a boat in the midst of a raging sea, you have to keep believing the winds will change and the bad times will pass or else you’ll give up and drown for sure…

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