Striking out alone

The day started later than recently as I lay in til nearly 8am and only dragged myself out of bed because I was thirsty and gagging for a cuppa.

Misty start once again

The day once again dawned very misty and, after I had put the kettle on to boil (priorities, right) I took the camera with me with the watering bottle into the temporary nursery room, and snapped a few pictures out of the window. As my regular commenter had warned me, the soil in the seed trays had gone pretty hard; I'm going to keep at them tho, just water them every day, and as soon as I can get some proper potting compost I'll start some more off.

Sun just starting to break through

Initially today I was slow and didn't feel any rush but then I remembered that I had to get cash out and take it to the building yard and get back before the architect was due. This caused a rush of activity with another lovely shower (how did I not have putting a shower in as my top priority before I arrived?!) and then I was in Thomas and off down the hill towards the local town. As I dropped below the cloud level the mist cleared and the view was outstanding across to the other side of the valley. I'm not sure if this picture really captured the light and the atmosphere but I am putting it here just to remind myself really.

Leaving town, ploughed fields and mountains

I parked in town and paid 1 lev to the old gentleman who now patrols the parking spots near the places that I want to go; it was free there last year, got the cash out and left within ten minutes; the ticket does give me parking for the entire day however I had no need after this. It's a bit of a waste but whatever. I decided to follow the incorrect road out of town on my way to the builders yard, to have a bit of a cruise along a road I haven't been since the first ever visit and just to relax a bit. I took my own advice and stopped regularly on the way to take pictures of the views.

Emerging from the clouds, lovely views

The road I took climbing windingly up out of the valley and into the mountains that I have photographed often in my morning pictures. After a short while of driving again through some quite thick cloud I suddenly burst out into sunlight and the view to my right was so good I pulled over to the side of the road and took some pictures, enduring the strange looks of a truck which had to overtake me. Oh well, I'm Anglechenin, I am allowed to do crazy stuff like that.

Right on the top with the vista, and the cattle

The next beautiful view occurred as I reached the top and the vista opened out dramatically. There was a little place to pull over at the side of the road so I went in there and then stood on my seat in Thomas, precariously as my sandals were a bit slippy, and managed to capture both the view, and the cattle which were grazing in the foreground. People can ask why I can here and I will just show them pictures like this.

From there I focused more on the driving as I had come a long way out of my way and was starting to wonder if the road would go where I remember it went. I took one wrong turn and ended up near one of the houses I had viewed once, driving past a train station on the way out and back where someone attempted to flag me down quite vehemently; I was not about to stop though both being in a hurry and not understanding the language. After this I pretty much directly drove to the yard and thus I have closed the circle on another little bit of the geography in this region. The man was there and I paid him and when I asked for some sacks he pointed me to a huge pile and said I could have as many as I wanted. Result! I grabbed a sack full of other sacks, chucked it in the back of Thomas, and headed off.

Mud tracks from yesterday...

On the way back up the new road I went past the bottom of the cheren put from my friends village and saw the tracks I had made yesterday coming down there. I realised that I forgot to add this episode to the blog yesterday. It was quite hairy, with Thomas sliding sideways at times and I had to resort to 4WD Low Range to extricate myself from the mud at the bottom. These tracks are the ones I made clearing the mud as I drove away and have survived lots of traffic, and the rain we had yesterday. I don't think I will try that route again until it has been dry for a while and the mud has died down.

A lovely and unhealthy breakfast

I arrived home and immediately set about cooking some breakfast; I had some old bread ends that were getting a bit stale so I had decided I'd fry it today and I did, along with a couple of eggs and some slices of the faux-bacon (which is actually really nice). It occurred to me that I would not really be losing much weight if I persisted in eating like this so resolved to get some muesli from the shop when I went later.

I was just about to set myself at the first task of the day; moving the waste left over hay out of the room which will be the kitchen and into the end room of the green long house near the humanure collection point when Lubo the architect arrived, slightly early I may add. We had a brief chat and he said that the kmet was not there (this was the main reason for his visit so I don't know why he turned up if he knew he couldn't do that) and also he told me that my owings to V.i.K were needing paying. I had him on the phone to my internet supplier to try and work out the problems with my sending email over SMTP (I'm not totally sure how this resolved itself; I just expected to be told a routing solution and be done with it, but oh well) and then he measured where the spiral staircase is going to go. I really do not know how much of this is necessary as Bekir will surely just do the correct thing here (and probably will ignore the plans anyway) but Lubo also told me that, to put the fencing up, I needed permission and he would sort it out. I need to get a bit of paper to say I can fence my own land off? I don't think so, nothing has ever led me to believe that but he said it is included in the original fee so whatever; let him make himself feel useful.

After this we arranged to go down to the V.i.K offices so I could pay the bill and then I was going to head into town, hopefully with Lubo, to start sorting my residency card and also raid the trees and mulch area again. Before this I had to get Sassy back in her cage and, as you can see from the video, she wasn't really having any of it. I am not sure what had spooked her so much but she was racing around the room for a while before I thought to video her. Eventually I calmed her and she allowed me to pick her up without any problems and let her jump out of my arms into the cage.

The bill payment was painless, though I didn't understand when she asked my name; I know what this is in Bulgarian so I reckon it was just a bit too fast for me. I really need to focus on learning the language, a fact which has been reinforced over and over to me today. I left the office to see Lubo in his car and about to drive off; no help for me there at the immigration office today then. I shrugged and got in my car and headed towards town. There is no point coming here and not being able to operate without a crutch, or at least give things a go.

I parked up in the centre at my normal carpark and made my way through a lovely park towards the council buildings. The first place I went to a really friendly man spoke in a heavily accented american accent and explained where to go; he was really helpful and chased after me when he realised he had said the incorrect door. I found my way from there straight to the correct office and this is where the success came to a slamming halt. I had been warned that the lady in this office was unhelpful but that word does not sum up how deliberately (and from the looks of it at time, self entertainingly if that is even a word) this woman was difficult and obstructive. She spoke fast, muttered, covered her mouth to obscure her words even more, and didn't even attempt to be helpful or assist me. In the end, when she wandered off to answer the phone, I took my leave to ring Lubo and see if he was available after all. It turned out he was on his way to Sofia and so he said he'd help on Monday or Tuesday, when I'm seeing him next anyway. I didn't bother going back up to the office. There are some things you need assistance with, it seems, and she is the first Bulgarian who hasn't gone out of their way to make me feel welcome. Oh well.

I brought the tree back like this

From there it was over town to the place where my friend and I had got a few trees and the buckets of mulch. There was another car behind the gate this time but I pulled my spade out and filled two bags, and picked up a huge bushy tree, and put them in Thomas. Just as I was thinking of filling the third and final bag a couple of guys walked from the road and went to the gate and pressed a buzzer I had not seen before. Even though they were smiling and saying "OK!" at me I decided to take my leave at this point. I will go there next time and ring the bell and double check it is OK to take the stuff I have been. Not today though.

After this I went past Lidl for my food shop and while I was walking around I found a set of six large bucket type things supposed to be used in the garden and exactly what I was looking for to hold the wood near the petchka. I grabbed one set and it was all of 8 lev I think for all of them. Amazing. I should have bought them out. I may have to go back soon and get more, for my neighbour, who took one look and asked me to. Next time I'm there, if they haven't sold out, I will.

Impromptu lunch

And so, with some successes and some failures, I headed home with a tree flapping around out of the back of Thomas. I arrived home and made myself a brew but before I could get stuck into it my little lady appeared with a sweet bun and a bowl full of Ayran. She sat next to me on the stacked plastic chairs and watched me eat it, then headed off rapidly the way she had come. She is a strange one, I'll give her that, but very welcoming and caring.

Padlock fitted

I had been about to make myself a small lunch when she arrived and this bun took the edge off my hunger so I decided to not chase it and just get on with the tasks I set. First of all was putting a padlock on the outhouse (even though all the windows are out it just makes a point that it is my property now, and to stop using it please) and this was achieved very quickly indeed.

Bringing good productivity to this walnut tree

Next I remembered that my dad, having finally seen a number of storks, had left me his Martenitsa to bury or adorn a tree with. Now I know this is not how it is supposed to work but he only saw it on the last day so wasn't able to get up here to do it. I reckon this is fine and I chose one of the newly budding walnut trees to tie it to. I would love a large harvest from these this year as well.

The chickens took their opportunity well

I had been efficient in all this, loading a barrow with the hay that was going to be put into the outhouse I had just added the padlock to, and leaving said barrow full of hay by the front door to be pushed to its destination after the Martenitsa had been placed. Silly me. The hens had obviously spotted this lovely pile of never-before-pecked-at hay and they were all over the barrow as soon as my back was turned and having a great time. They scattered as I approached and so I was able to deposit the load in the end room where I had planned without loosing too much to their depredations.

The last of the hay to be moved

The room-which-will-be-the-kitchen had apparently been cleared of all the hay my neighbours wanted and just had a small pile left in the middle. They had been in with their bags the day after I arrived and cleared loads out so I was left with the task of making this room fully available for work to start as soon as possible. I figured it wouldn't take long as it was just bits and pieces left over. I was correct and after a few barrow loads I was down to a very small amount left and decided to finish it off tomorrow; it was not hard work but time consuming as the barrow was too narrow to fit through one of the doors so I had to push it through carefully at a steep angle to get through.

Not very far down to the bedrock here

The main reason I stopped with moving the hay was to get on with planting the large tree I had brought back with me and so I picked a likely spot and got the pick axe and started digging a hole. It would have to be a large and deep one as this was a proper sized tree really. After about a foot or so of digging I hit rock and after another fifteen or so minutes I gave up trying to go through it with the pick axe. I was making some progress but not very much. So I filled the hole in and reconsidered.

My little neighbour collecting cow poo for me

While I was pondering my little neighbour appeared again and pointed to a spot I had previously considered and rejected as too close to powerlines/other trees. It was easier to dig here and I managed to get a big enough hole. I had collected a load of horse, sheep and goat poo from around the land prior to starting digging the first hole and this was vindicated as she went and found some and broke it apart to put around the other two trees. I was able to show her my bucket and she was impressed that I had already thought of it.

My new tree

The base of the tree with stake

We put a load of the collected dung in the bottom of the hole, then put the tree roots in and covered with some of the soil, then I put some more dung in and she trod it down very hard indeed. Finally I pulled the rest of the soil over and then it was trodden down again. She then wandered off and came back with a large stick to use as a stake but before I could do anything with it she said she had to run and off she went, appearing a few minutes later from her house with two huge buckets full of something and taking them up the track. I finished the job tying the tree to the stake and supporting both that and the tree with some large rocks around the base.

Little neighbour and Toplo Mush

I headed upstairs for another cup of tea and to chill for a bit and shortly afterwards heard footsteps on my stairs and both my little neighbour and toplo mush appeared. I had to get a picture of him and his grin properly so I got them to stand together and snapped a few pictures; he wouldn't smile properly at first but when he thought the picture was taken the grin broke through and I'm so pleased I managed to capture it. She had come clutching cups of coffee and he had been along the corridor to the room-which-will-be-the-kitchen which I now realise was a precursor to what happened later. But of that in a minute. We sat drinking our coffees and trying to talk (yes I really need to learn the language) and then they were off but not before emptying the contents of my compost recycling box into a bag and taking it with them for their chickens. I didn't expect that but it was a good swap for the food she has brought me.

Messy around the petchka

My final task of the day was to tidy the wood area around the petchka and to cut myself a load more for burning over the next couple of days. Now I had those excellent basket type things this was easy to achieve. I gathered together the wood I already had around there and put it into a basket, the smaller bits in one and the chunkier bits in another and then swept up the dust and wood bits that were starting to get onto my new rug already. This complete I grabbed some more wood from the waste piles in the attic and set to with the saw cutting it down.

Clean and tidy now

This gave me the excellent idea that if you are cold and don't have much wood to burn, just chop it up into smaller pieces and then you won't need the fire because you will have warmed right up. After about half an hour or so I had loads of wood to burn and decided to call it a day and stack it carefully in my new collection area. I am much happier now with the state of this corner of the room as everything is easily accessible and tidy.

Fresh salad from little neighbour

The activity had made me hungry and I was just about to set to cooking my one remaining pork chop to go with some salad and the cold potatoes when I heard a rattling and knocking. I have been able to 'lock' my doors from the inside for a while now, ever since the wind kept blowing the front door open last week, and so when I'm in and do that people cannot just stroll in as they are wont to do. I went down and my little lady was there once again, at the back door this time, clutching a handful of salad leaves and spring onions in one hand (for my dinner) and a sack in the other. She had come back to check on the rumour from toplo mush that the hay had gone from the room. Which as you know it had.

We went through to the room and I explained, as best I could, that I had cleared it out into the outside store room as I had workers coming into this room soon and I needed it clean. I apologised and I think she was ok though the fact remains it should have been cleared out the week before and not left after they moved the majority of it. I have told her I'll get it from where I have put it and transport it for her where she needs it tomorrow so that's another job I need to do.

Healthy dinner for  a change

I left her sweeping and picking up the hay into her sack and went upstairs to start cooking and pretty quickly I had knocked up a fantastic meal. It was exceptionally tasty particularly the onions and I have a few left over for adding to something tomorrow.

And so I am sat once again at my desk tippy tappying away to you or myself and listening to the snap and hiss of the petchka keeping me warm in the corner. I have had some excitement since I've been sat here as I heard the sound of cowbells and looked out the window to see the goats eating my new trees! Suffice to say I was outside very quickly shouting at them and chasing them away. Only a few minutes later I looked out again and some of the young cows were using the new trees as scratching posts, almost pushing them over. Once again I was outside and chased them off. I may need to protect them a bit; something to think about tomorrow as well.

I touched the petchka really lightly....

I'll sign this off now with a picture of my arm where I managed to burn it on the petchka yesterday; I didn't even notice it until this morning in the shower when I took the skin off without realising. It is not as sore as it looks, so don't worry. I'm away to pour my third beer of the evening so don't expect any sense from me from now on.