More PIctures from Avondale

"There is not in the wide world a valley so sweet
As that vale in whose bosom the bright waters meet;
Oh! the last rays of feeling and life must depart;
Ere the bloom of that valley shall fade from my heart.
Sweet Vale of Avoca! how calm could I rest
In thy bosom of shade, with the friends I love best,
Where the storms that we feel in this cold world should cease,
And our hearts, like thy waters, be mingled in peace."
Thomas Moore- Avoca

March Fourth

Yesterday morning, Feargal and I started by clearing off the back balcony of broken roof tiles and muck. I stood below the scaffolding as he lowered cinder and cement blocks to me and I unloaded them onto a pallet out of the way. We stacked the remaining granite stones off to the side of the balcony and I brought several wheel barrow loads the the bottom of the scoffolding. We both agreed it would be worth while and much easier at the end of the day to set up a winch and line to life the buckets of stone rather than pulling the rope ourselves. Some of the stones we had gathered were very large and heavy, especially some round granite stones Feargal had brought off the hill. Once the winch was ready I began loading buckets with stone as Feargal worked the small crane to bring them to the balcony and unload them. About two hours of lifting stones and the first big load was on the balcony and we considered where to find some other larger stones to set the foundation of the round wall. Feargal brought down several more granite pieces while I went to the woods to search for as many white stones as I could find. I brought back a wheel barrow load and then we both set off to find some very large pointed stones which would be set around the points of the curve. We pushed the wheelbarrows high on the hill side and found some very large and very heavy pieces of granite and one especially large white stone. Bringing the boulders back off the hill was not easy and I strained my back in the process, but getting them up for the wall was worthwhile. The giant white stone was too large to fit in the bucket, so Feargal split it with a sledge hammer and took up the three large pieces. After getting the largest boulders of them all onto the balcony we took up a pressure washer and cleaned the dirt off of everything. I finished the cleaning and stood back to look at the several colors of different stone we had successfully hauled to the top. After we had finished, Feargal left to go into Dublin for a family dinner and allowed me to stay in the house to build a fire and watch some movies for the night alone. I cleaned my place and started packing my things in preparation for Monday. I went to the pub for two pints and got a bottle of wine which I had to myself while I sat by the fire and watched a move called 'The Soloist' and made some fried apples for my dessert. While Frances was in Dublin with Feargal, she printed off my Insurance Policy I needed and I was prepared for my appointment with Immigration in KIldare on Tuesday morning. When I made the appointment, I was much more confident about getting my visa settled as the officer I talked to even knew what wwoof was and the insurance I would be needing. Several wwoofers go through the office in Kildare and some are already working at Burtown House where I am moving.
I spent Sunday morning sleeping in later than I have in a few weeks and then finished cleaning and preparing my bags. I waited for a few clothes to be washed and hung them out to dry and went to The Meetings for a small lunch around one. I took a walk across the valley not knowing exactly where I was headed, just enjoying the clear day and beautiful sights. I came across a place called Avondale House which I had heard of in my travel book, but never planned to visit. There were several acres that had been used since the early 1900s for forestry research and variety trials by groups of students and graduates from around Ireland and the Uk. As I wandered around the large plots of different spieces naitive and exotic, I was over whelmed by its age and extravegant size. Some of the trees around the boarder where several hundreds of years old and had reached unique stages of growth. I wandered into an area of the oldest pines which led to the river on a path which once led back down to the meetings of the waters where I had started my journey that day. But the path had been blocked at the edge of the Avondale property by protestant farmers which did not want walkers roaming freely along thier section of the river. Many lawsuits and property has been debated to block this path which once led from the town of Arklow all the way to Rathdrum and furthure for nearly thirty miles or more. I walked back up the hills through a greenway past twenty reseach plots and headed for Knockanode. On my way out I was offered a lift back to the Meetings rather than walking all the way. I hadn't noticed on the way up, but I had walked over three miles and then a few more around Avondale, so I was very gracious for the ride. When I got back I finished the final stages of packing and cleaning out my area of the house so I would be ready to leave in the morning. Depending on where my next host agrees to meet me, I may be getting a ride at lunch from Frances or Feargal to a nearby village, or getting up early to catch a bus and a train up to Dublin and into the town of Athy on a five hour journey. Either way, I will be at The Burtown House by early evening and settled before my trip to Kildare the next day.

First days of March

Thursday, Feargal and I worked to rake and clear the areas we had leveled with the escavator and prepare for planting. Fist we hauled a crate of roof tiles and ridge tiles to the balcony so Feargal could finish the final sections of the roof. We used a large bucket and a rope to pull loads of tiles to the balcony and carry them to where they would be needed. Once that was done we had a cup of coffee and moved to th gardens. After showing me the slopes he wanted raked and where to gather sod and brush he went to work on the roof doing the final cement work around the front windows and gabel. I spent most of the day pulling up small trees and gathering them in a large pot and working to make the center hill even and free of vines and rocks. I still needed to get to a printer to get a copy of my insurance policy so around four I cleaned up and made my way to the village of Avoca where there was a tourist information center which I could pay for internet access and printing. I got into the village only a few minutes past five to find out the office had closed at four before I even left. Since I traveled that far and had missed my lunch I decided to take an hour and get some traditional fish and chips at a small diner on the river. The meal was quite good and hot, filling me for the two mile walk back to the meetings. I was dissapointed that I still didn't get done what I needed, but still had a few days to work something out. Feargal and I had a late night chatting and listening to music to clear my head, which I am sure he stayed up even longer than I did, knowing we would be up early for a buisy day Friday.
I woke up early Friday and went right to work after a bowl of oats to clear the final area and help feargal prepare to take his truck up to Dublin and trade in his other vehical for a new larger truck. When he was gone I helped Frances move old window panes to the garden area where she would like to one day soon start working on some cold frames. This was one job I would have liked to help her with myself If only I had more time to build more boxes and frames. When Feargal returned, after showing off the new truck to Frances, we got to work getting ready to plant bulbs. Mostly we had daffodils and snow drops which had been dug up before the excavation started and would be transplanted on the newly cleared and leveled slope. We worked hard to place all of the plants where they were needed and plant the in the loose top soil. There must have been several hundred clumps of bulbs spread over the fifty foot slope. It was just before dark when we finished and we stood back looking at the new spring garden that would in a year or two cover the bend with colors. Just below that garden is the sea of irish bluebells which has been spread furthur each year now thick with foliage like a grass. These areas will be the first sight as one walks into the forest before the twisting trees and trails lead onto the hillside.
Feargal decided that night to change his plans for the back balcony of the house. He was going to build a wall of granite and cement blocks in the style of a castle tower along the curve visable from the hill and the road. He thought this would look to fabricated and formal on top of the stone walls and ganite inlays taking away the natural balance the rest of the house had. His new idea was to built the same design, but out of large boulders and stones from the hillside and left over rock from the rest of the house. So Saturday we would take all of the blocks off the balcony and clear it off, then get a few ton of stone up to replace them so he could start on that project after I leave. Without someone to load the buckets at the bottom, he would be constantly be going up and down the scaffolding, likely using more than a day just moving the stone and then two or three days designing and building the custom wall. I knew this would be a long day so I went to bed early and got some good rest. This would be my final weekend here and what we got done is all that would be done around the house and garden until another wwoofer arrived.

I got to bed early last night and up early today. Feargal and I started off finishing clearing and leveling an area near the house for a small garden. I picked up rocks, pipes, and an old carpet that would be in the way of the escavator. Brambles had been thriving in the spot and had to be cut down and dug out to prevent thier return. After the area was cleared we had to bring down some good soil from a bit farther up on the hill where he had knocked down a hump above a wall the day before. We thought it would be easier to load the dirt into large rubble bags in the back of his truck and then dump the bags where needed rather than taking the time to run wheelbarrows back and forth. We did about a dozen bags of dirt, each with three large buckets of good dirt and then leveled the dirt over the area. Feargal and I loaded the escavator onto it's trailer and he left to take it back to the hire center in Dublin. I raked the area flat and had it ready to plant with small boxwood cuttings later this evening. Then me and Frances focused on getting what vegetables she had ready to plant in the first raised bed I had built. Frances had bought a few plants from an organic grower in Cork the week before I arrived and has been waiting to have a place to put them. We put in a few clumps of rosemary on one corner of the bed next to a small brussles sprout seedling. In the next section of the raided bed we planted a few pieces of rubarb and finnel. In the center section we planted two varieties of lettuce sprouts and some parsley that had to be seperated out of clumps. Surrounding the lettuce and parsley we planted organic onions and garlic which would help keep out some pests including slugs. Frances will line the different section wih small pices of copper piping to also help keep the slugs away from her greens.I suggested also using egg shells to aid this same issue. Once we finished planting Frances offered to set me up on her bio-ressinance machine which she uses with patients to relive stress and better understand personal issues. It was a very interesting experience and I could definately tell the process was very useful. I  went through a simple frequency test which aquired information about the bodies flow and chakra balance as well as recording the DNA codes so that it can notice any irregularities. Later on I would be able to recieve treatment for any imbalances and give myself some understanding about any stress I am dealing with. Todays test gave a similar result to what I already knew about myself. I am in good health, yet I struggle with anxiety and neurological stress due to hyperactivity and excessive mental blocks. If I have beter control over my emotions and try to not worry over small issues I will easily be a much more balanced person, yet mental issues are always more difficult to solve than physical problems. I always find it hard to not think about the negative things and let my mind be at ease, especially without using some type of vice or meditative device. I can say a change in environment and physically being removed from daily stress gives me a great oppourtunity to find peace of mind even though I am naturally fearful of such a large change, I know experiences like this can only make one stronger.

http://www.wds-global.com/info/bio-resonance.aspx

After we chatted a bit about my results, I went for a walk in the forest and enjoyed a bit of self considerations out in the open mountain air. When I got back, Feargal had returned and Frances had left to visit Dublin for the night. Feargal and I began doing some landscaping with the areas we had cleared and some shrubs we needed to move. We transplanted a few evergreen shrubs from the upper hill near the bee hives down to the new gateway that had been indtalled and rearanged some trees in the lower garden to give a good balance with the new additions. As each hole was dug for a tree we would fill the hole wihth water to sofen the ground and then water the roots thuroughly as it was put in place. I added some more water to the vegetables I had put in earlier that day and then moved to plant the boxwood cuttings out of the potting shed and create a hedge in the area near the house we had worked out that morning. We arranged and planted over a hundred and fifty boxwoods along the wall for about an hour past dark with a large sitting log placed in the center.
Tomorrow I will fix some other areas to be prepared for planting some oak sapplings and start on the poly tunnel frame. I will also take time to go to the local tourist information center and use and international phone to make an appointment with the Kildare Immigration Office and prepare transport arrangements to my next host this coming Monday. I am down to the last four days at Knockanode and theres no way to get eveything done that we have started, but I do plan to return later this Spring when more Wwoofers are around to get even more work done and hopefully see more progress with the gardens and the house. It will be amazing to see all the trees and grounds in bloom during the long warm days. This has been a very buisy and eventful week, but I do see progress and any sress is quickly becoming nothing more important that the labor. Its a beautiful place and I have had an amazing time for my first month in Ireland.


Feargals cuttings

The Hedge garden

Bee Hives

 Progress on the poly tunnel area

 Feargal working on the Gates

February 28

Yesterday every one was up and moving getting ready for various tasks of the day. Feargal was taking the shreader back up to Dublin and trading it for a small ton and a half escavator to redesign some shapes on the hillside and level out the area where we will build the poly tunnel. Frances and I were getting prepared to do some errands in the surrounding towns and go to the immigration office in Wicklow to finalize my visa. When I got to the Gaurdia Station I had to wait for the immigration officer to walk over from his house. He looked through my passport and immigration documents, questioning every detail about my stay and activities here in Ireland. He had never heard of Wwoof, nor the insurance agency affiliated with them. I had to leave the office while he called the National Embassy and the numbers provided for my different associations, then wait while he walked back home and got lunch to "mull it over". When he talked to me again he asked for more details about my insurance coverage and said he doupted the policy would be valid in Ireland. This ofcourse isn't so and I am covered through two agencies American and European which offers pleanty of coverage for a volunteer in my posistion. I had to contact the companies and get documents with my specific policy number and details as well as contacting the Wwoof and volunteer agencies to let them know the situation then return today to talk with the officer again.
When we got back to knockanode, Feargal had already started with the digger and was working on leveling out the hillside across from where the polytunnel would be. He would fill a few wheel barrows with the better dirt and I would push it down to the raised beds to start filling them. We worked past dark and filled the first bed along with half of the second. I was exhausted and out of breath from pushing and pulling the wheelbarrows for several hours, but we had gotten a lot done and would be ready to start sowing seeds any day. I spent some time at the pub instead of starting dinner so I could contact the insurance companies and get some extra documentaion together for the immigration officer. Feargal and I stayed up late talking about work and general topics while we watched some movies and drank a good amount of wine to destress. Time passed to quickly and it was past midnight by the time we made food, which Feargal made some amazing fish and chips cooked in lager. After eating I treated him to some Jameson, which he normally dosnt have, fixed with fresh cut strawberries. He wanted to wake up as early as possible to get back to work and  get as many jobs done wih the excavator that we could while we had it. Ofcourse niether of us got up before nine and missed a few good hours of the cool morning sun. I spent the first few hours filling the remainder of the beds with dirt, struggling because I had little energy and had skipped a breakfast. Frances had gone up to Dublin and did not return until the afternoon so I could not make it back to Wicklow to see the Immigration Officer. He would only be in the office for four hours today and would then be taking the rest of the week off. When I called him to let him know I had no ride, he assured me I could wait until I leave to go to Kildare for my next host and get everything sorted on the last day of my current visa. Im afraid it will be very stressful working out the situation, even though I have been approved by the National Embassy and all my documents are in line I will be sitting at the station in a town I've never been to before wieghed down with all of my belongings waiting for an appointment. The local officer told me everything was fine and I should not worry about my visa expiring, saying he should have just stamped me off the day before when I was there. I will also be a bit stranded once I get my visa approved until I get a hold of my next host and let them know I am ready to be picked up, since I won't know a specific time given waiting for an officer to look through my documents again and approve me could take a few hours or a few minutes.
This whole ordeal had been the first bit of stress I've had since I have been here. Nonetheless, I am sure everything will work out fine.
I had some food and got back to work moving limbs and rocks out of the way so Feargal could clear areas for other beds and gardens including the area where I will soon be tilling for potatoes. At one point, a track on the escavator came off when he was trying to move a boulder up a hillside. He called for me since I have some experience with those types of machines and we looked over how to get it back on. I wasn't sure at first because it wasn't the same brand 'kabota' I had been around which would tighten or loosen the track tension which the push of a lever. Feargal got a hold of the company he had rented the machine from to get details of how it went on, and I understood what the man was telling him. There was a pressure fixture pushing the front tack wheel in place, powered by grease which we would had to release to fit the track back on. I removed the grease fixture but the grease inside would not come out so I manually scraped it all out with some sticks, making a complete mess on my hands. We got it together and refilled the pressure bracket with a grease gun. Once that was worked out we spent the last few hours of light leveling some other areas and clearing out some old fencing to make room for additional raised beds. At dark I cleaned up and did some house work cleaning the kitchen and main room of my space. I am headed to the pub to work more details out about my immigration situation and try o get in touch with some friends. Tomorrow Feargal and I will try to get in two hours or so of last minute work with the digger before he returns it and I will travel to a local tourest information center to use a printer and an international phone, hopefully easing my mind about next Monday.

Polytunnels

Yesterday and today we worked to mulch wood scraps gathered over the past five years on the edge of a field where Feargal and Frances would like to build a poly tunnel. There were severeal piles of wood of differen types including oak, cedar, hawthorn, and pine. We rented the shreader on friday and spent the first evening clearing the lower gateway where Feargal would be indstalling two large doors and then moved the machine up onto the hill to start early saturday morning for the area which we would build the polytunnel. I left my work on the raised beds behind, unfinished and needing reajustments to take on this new task in the final week of my stay here at Knockanode. Starting yeserday morning I woke around nine when the sun was up and joined Feargal for a cup of tea before I started mulching and he started arranging the doors, hinges, and bolts for the large gateway doors. It was a long day of feeding sticks and brush into the sheader only getting a break to help hold and measure the doors with Feargal, as he relied on my not so useful strength to help lift each of the very heavy frames onto thier hinges. By dusk we could see grea progress in the piles of yard rubbish and the doors hanging perfectly in place. We were both happy to see the straight lines and level of the doors, able to swing out without hitting the horizoltal tree in the drive way. As one would stand back looking at the gate, both circular attics of the house are visable through the curve of the gate only hinting to the beauty and balance of the property. It was the first evening since last saturday night that I felt my tiredness creaping up on me. The past two Fridays I have met up with a very interesting couple down in the local pub who have thier own piece of property equipt with gardens, ponds and poly tunnels, enjoying the chat of organic and sustainable issues between Ireland and America. They invited me to come see thier land and discuss some future crops and arrangements over dinner, which I will likely take them up on in the last days here in the area. In the evening I went to the pub to listen to some local music, but was dissapointed in the man singing. Every song seemed to sound similar to the previous, and did not seem too traditional considering he was covering artists such as Johnny Cash, and not very well at that. I chatted with a local gal which I have talked with many nights at the pub, but had left her waiting the night before since I was talking with the couple mentioned previous when I had offered her game of billards and drinks. I find myself some nights pulled between who I can talk with, every one having thier own interests and personalities, and me only being at the bar for a short time each evening. One day I might meet an Irish girl too interesting to keep myself from paying attenting to, but for now I am very focused on my work and experience rather than socializing.
Again this morning I got uo early and made my way up on the hill, starting where I had left off the night before. It was a good nine hour day, only taking time to eat some quick biscuits and drink a bit as Feargal wanted to get the most out of the machine before we returned it Monday morning. Mulching is not difficult work, but ver monontanous. I would hull a pile near the machine, directed to pile the mulch near the area for the tunnel, then spending hours putting wood, piece by piece into the large funnel. Most of the wood mulched easily, for the exeption of thick twisting vines and hawthorn branches. The hawthorn especailly would cause troubles. Full of large sharp thorns and resistant to breaking when being shaken by the cutter which all the other woods would quickly crack and be eaten. I ended ep buiding a pile of hawthorn alone, which I would worry about last with the last amount of petrol oil. If at any time I would try to shread a hawthorn branch or accidentally get one gathered in a bundle, I would end uo spending five to ten minutes forcing it through or pulling it back out. Nonetheless, come half past five or so, all the piles has been shreaded and many piles of mulch were ready to be spread and leveled for adding dirt and building frames. For the next week we have planned a lot of work including renting aa escavator and a rotavator to get both the potatoe field and the poly tunnels prepared for planting in march once I move on to another host. Tomorrow, Feargal will return the mulcher and request a digger for delivery as soon as possible. Until the  next machine arrives I will do my best to get the third raised bed put in place and ready to be filled. Once it arrives we will spend a long hard day between digging and moving the soil to the polytunnel site from a few areas where muck has been piled around the property. On Wednesday Feargal is needed in England for a funeral and I will likely spend the day rotavating and preparing an area for panting a stone of organic seed potatoes Frances has ordered. Thursday and Friday will be spent constructing the frame and beds for the polytunnel. Frances has found a design for a weather resistant poly tunnel which we all agree would be best, using available materials left over from rennovating the house, leaving only the plastic to be bought and installed next weekend.
The tunnel design we are considering is made of scaffolding boards and plastic water pipes. Old scaffolding piles will be used as steaks, deep in the ground and resistant to movement by wind and over bearing wight. Five foot scaffolding pipes are required to give a three foor straight sided tunnel, leaving room at each side for plant growth and working in the soil. Two steaks would be needed for every five foot of tunnel which we are looking at a near twenty five foot in length needing ten to fourteen steaks on both sides for the structure. Old eight foot scaffolding pipes are available on the property which can be cut to the needed five to sox foot lengths, us needing an extra amount of length because the top portion being mostly loose compost. The base of the frame will be reinforced with old floorboards and scaffoldiong boards which will hold back and hold in the soil on the sloped hill. On each side of the frame, platic water pipes will be attached and bent to create the rounded top of the tunnel. Two by four inch wooden planks will be screwed to the pipe at five points, bottom middle and center or the piping to provide support for the plastic covering. For secure fittings we will file down any difference and bolt the pipe tighly to the steaks to resits wind or snow weight in heavy storms. Since the most pertenant time of year for these tunnels will be winter when the other beds are frozen, crops will need to be proected from possible heavy snow, rains and fierce winds which would normally turn a greenhous structure to rubble. Come the final days we will focus on building doorways and attaching the plastic cover, having a tunnel nearly ready for planting. we will build beds slightly raised on boh sides of a central path, which will likley be lowered as the wood materials below them decompose. Each end of the tunnel will have a small door, about six foot in heigth with an outward opening vent above the doorways. two paths will lead to either door, but only one may be left open, the other will have a table blocking it for use of potting and such within the tunnel. An extra amount of scaffoding will be added to the outside of the frame holding the soil and the steaks in place, likely building up the dirt around the tunnel so the ground will be lower on one side than he other on the slope. Once the beds have been buil within the fram and the tunnel completed wih plastic, trellises and small plants will be installed for the summer, mostly consiting of root cultured crops until cold weather sets back in. Vegetables such as onions, turnips and carrots may be the best option for starting in the fresh mulch of this tunnel. Later these crops will be replaced with summer crops grown in the fall sun, mostly growing herbs, tomatoes, peppers, and cucumber type crops needing protection from frost while other areas are used for lettuce and kale type crops.
Poly tunnels are often used for extending grow seasons in colder climates. Fruit and berries work well in most situaions but more common food crops lik cool weather brassicas and potatoes would do well here in Ireland. In the off season, when crops are not being produced, the tunnels can be used to over winter samll animals or wood cuttings. Since Knockanode would like to have an amount of chickens, the tunnels would be a perfect place for gathering poultry manure over a few months wile winter wheats are produced elsewhere and the other beds are inhabitable.
We are looking at a long hard week to get everything in place and I will likely be working many eight to ten hour days until I leave. This will not be undeserved at all, being a welcoming place for shelter and food at any ime I spend in Ireland. Tomorrow will be yet another early morning wih lots to do, but tongiht will end early given the past few nights we have celebrated good work and stayed up later than we should. I will be updating progress on the beds and polytunbel each day between the ecasvation and frame work until the work is completed a week from now.