September 22 - 28, 2008

In an effort to upgrade your user experience, my very good friend Luciano assisted me in embedding Snap Shots, by Snap Technologies, into the the blog. You can take advantage of Snap Shots by mousing-over links to get the most appropriate shot of content for that link without leaving the site. Hopefully this will address the "interesting but needs photos" comments I have received from a few of my, ironically, more tech-saavy friends (hint: Ted Nelson coined the words "hypertext" and "hypermedia" in 1963!).

Luciano was also kind enough to stitch together this panorama of the fazenda using Adobe Photoshop...it nicely conveys a bit of the grandeur of Alfheim.

All of the blog's photos have been taken using my Nikon D80. If you are considering a mid-range dSLR, I highly recommend this camera. A complete review of the Nikon D80 can be found here. As Lone so delicately put it the other day when I e-mailed her a photo of a bird I had taken (and which she liked): "It's amazing you can take such a beautiful picture when you can't even see". Credit the Nikon.

With phase I construction on track to conclude on Tuesday, September 30th, I used a few hours during the latter part of the week to review costs, which I have been tracking since we began construction a little less than 11 weeks ago (once a consultant, always a consultant). While about as glamorous as pouring cement for a water tower -not something I would wish upon my worst enemy- hopefully these figures will prove useful to someone else out there.

• Labor (excluding Johannes, Esben and me..sorry guys!): R$23,980 (€8,900 or $12,9914)
• Materials: R$44,489 (€16,511 or $24,102)
• Other: R$1,500 (€557 or $813)
• Total: R$69,969 (€25,967 or $37,906)
  

As with most other things in life, The devil is in the details. In total, then, we have built/rebuilt three structures totaling 390 square meters or 4,198 square feet. This equates to a unit cost of R$179 per square meter (€67 or $97) or R$17 per square foot (€6 or $9).

You will have to wait until next week's blog to assess whether we received value for money (there's that consultant thing again); the rain has prohibited us from painting all week -even inside.

Finally, the Fazenda Alfheim blog has had visits from readers in 11 countries: Brazil, United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Norway, Denmark, Costa Rica, Canada, Switzerland, New Zealand and Portugal.

September 15 - 21, 2008

I spent a leisurely Monday morning in Paraibuna ordering glass for the storeroom windows. Monday afternoon, by contrast, was spent wrestling 100 meters of 50 mm plastic hose up a stream, where it will be connected to the back end, to increase the water's pressure, of several hundred meters of 25 mm plastic hose that supply the main house with water. Given Monday's turn in the weather (hint: I could have stayed in England), the rocks in the stream were very slippery, and I managed to fall repeatedly, which resulted in a soaked pair of work pants, flooded Wellington boots (aka wellies, topboots, gumboots or rubber boots) and two sprained thumbs. After more than an hour of struggle, Clair and I found a suitable spot in the stream, which we then cleared and covered with small stones that we had carried upstream in 25-liter tins. To prevent debris from entering and blocking the plastic hose, we covered and tied off the end with a pair of pantyhose I purchased at a pharmacy in São Paulo a couple of weeks back. Imagine the clerk's reaction when I asked for a box of vinyl, not latex, surgical gloves (for tarring the foundation, of course) and a pair of pantyhose (to use as a filter for a plastic hose, of course). While very courteous, I have little doubt that she was quite happy to see me leave.

Tuesday was spent in São Luiz do Paraitinga ordering the elusive 'final' list of construction material. Kind of reminds me of Groundhog Day, starring Bill Murray. While there, I also purchase three more hens. When I got home, I put the new hens in for the night so that they could get accustomed to the henhouse. The next day the three new hens made happy together, pecking and scratching the ground and bathing in the dirt. Unfortunately only two of the new hens returned to the henhouse that evening -along with the casal or couple, who basically never leave their love shack. The third new hen spent her first two nights alone outside; impressively -and thankfully- she survived her odyssey. Order has at last been established and William H. Macey, our rooster, and his four hens spent Friday night safe and sound in the henhouse.

In terms of construction, this week was highly productive, in particular given the miserable weather on Monday and Tuesday: we wired the main house and storerooms, finished off the graywater recycling system, installed the granite kitchen counter top and sink (specially built for people taller than 190 cm), connected the toilets to the sceptic tank, poured concrete for the water tower pillars and laid back-of-house, concrete drainage. On Thursday, the glaziers arrived as promised, cut the glass and fitted the windows.

Also, Clair is making stupendous progress fencing the area soon to become Lone's vegetable garden. When complete, the fence will comprise approx. 700 bamboo stalks. Somewhere out there a Giant Panda is salivating.

Finally, I painted the main house...just a test...a prologue to its final look and feel. When complete, the house's coloring should resemble that of a typical house in Skagen, which Lone and I visited in June of 2007 while celebrating our 21st wedding anniversary.

Beginning on Monday, there are only three days left until the household appliances arrive, seven workdays until phase I construction is complete and, most importantly, 11 days until Lone arrives.

September 8 - 14, 2008

I returned to Alfheim on Tuesday afternoon after spending an extended weekend in São Paulo. On the way home, I stopped in São Luiz do Paraitinga and purchased a rooster and a hen, a casal or couple. When I arrived at Alfheim, I asked Clair to cut some fresh bedding, which we placed on the floor of the henhouse. We then introduced Alfheim's newest residents to their digs and proceeded to secure any remaining construction vulnerabilities. Once inside, the chickens immediately perched themselves on the bamboo roosting pins.

Thus far, the chickens have not ventured out much, choosing instead to spend almost all of their time in their house. Initially I wanted to chalk this up to my brilliant design and construction skills; however, after locking them out for a couple of hours twice this week and watching them plant themselves, respectively, under a table and in the rubble of the empty fruit tree containers, I have since concluded that it is more likely a combination of the weather, unseasonably hot, and their getting used to their new environs. I hope to add three-four more hens to the mix soon.

On Wednesday morning we again dug out the two leafcutter ant colonies and applied the Macex. We applied the Macex both inside the underground chambers, in the nurseries and along the paths where they travel. It is too early to conclude anything definitive (ants dominate most ecosystems, and form 15–20% of the terrestrial animal biomass), but it does seem to have helped; I have not seen any of the leafcutter ants on one of the main paths since we applied the remedy.

The rest of Wednesday and significant parts of both Thursday and Friday were spent applying the first coat of tar to the foundation of the main house. Beyond the esthetic impact, the tar will seal the foundation against moisture. Because of the very poor state of the foundation, we were advised early on by two architects to raze the main house and start from scratch. Instead we chose to apply two greener principles to our restoration project: 1) If it ain't broke, don't fix it and 2) If it is broke, try to fix it...or use it somewhere else. By applying this latter principle, in particular, we have been able to reuse/recycle almost everything from the existing structures. This manifested itself most comically when a delivery man from Paraibuna expressed the hope that he could pagar algums dos seus pecados or pay off some of his sins by donating a piece of the house's discarded furniture to his local church, where it would be auctioned off. More concretely, the original roof on the main house, which was leaking in a few spots and whose tiles are no longer manufactured and therefore nearly impossible to find and/or prohibitively expensive, have been reused to roof the casa do caseiro, which previously had an Eternit roof. The joists from the main house were reused to the same end. All of the cinder block and brick rubble from the construction site has been reused to pave the kilometer plus of road which runs from the main house to the front gate of the property...to facilitate access during the rainy season. We are also transforming the old septic tank into a graywater recycling system by adding first sand and then the concrete rubble, which we could not place on the road because it contains razor-sharp steel threads, and diverting our dish washing, laundry and bathing water through it. Needless to say a great deal of the discarded lumber has been used by the construction crew for everything from scaffolding to forms for the many concrete pillars to every manner of make-shift tool. Whatever wood is ultimately left over will be used to fuel many a good churrasco or barbecue. Even the Eternit panels which we removed from the casa do caseiro, an open-air storage shed and the corral will be reused by one of the local residents to roof his corral.

The week's other major accomplishment was a quick visit on Thursday to Ubatuba, where I purchased all of the household appliances: two refrigerators, two gas stoves and one washing machine, at the local Casas Bahia. Delivery is scheduled for September 25th.

Finally, in a nod to a comment to last week's blog entry from my very good friend, Tony Matan, here are a few 'facts' about Fazenda Alfheim:

• Fazenda Alfheim is 131.86 alqueires paulistas or 319.12 hectares (788.56 acres).
• It is located in Vale do Paraíba, approx. three and one-quarter hours from Sao Paulo and just over an hour from Ubatuba, a city located on the southeast coast, in the state of São Paulo, which boasts 74 different beaches.
• Our plans for developing the property are still very much a work in progress, but current areas of research include pigs (Duroc and Piau), sheep (Dorper), cattle (Brahma and Chianina) and medicinal herbs (Lone's domain).
• We are fortunate to have abundant, clean water in the form of streams, brooks, springs, all of which originate on the property -and even waterfalls. I have had the water tested in Taubaté and am considering commercializing it.
• The property is on-grid; Elektro is our service provider. That said, we hope to install a water wheel sometime in 2009 to begin generating some of our own electricity.
• Poisonous snakes (or a really, really hungry onca or jaguar), rather than Malaria or Chagas disease, are probably the biggest health risk we face. As soon as Lone arrives we plan to visit the Butantã Institute Snake Farm in São Paulo.
• No, I do not yet own a gun, but will soon be a candidate for NRA recruiters as I will need to be able to put down seriously injured animals.
  

Hope this helps.

September 1 - 7, 2008

This week got off to a bad start. I returned late Sunday evening from São Paulo, but it was not until Monday morning that I discovered that all 10 of the chicks I recently purchased in São Luiz do Paraitinga had been eaten by the cachorro-do-mata or bush dog. The cachorro-do-mata had clawed its way through the roof of the makeshift henhouse that Johannes, Esben and I had so carefully prepared -or so we thought at the time.

It was also on Monday morning that I discovered that the two ant colonies in our recently-planted fruit orchard were full of leafcutter ants. According to Wikipedia, 'They feed on special structures called gongylidia produced by a specialized fungus that grows only in the underground chambers of the ants' nest...The ants actively cultivate their fungus, feeding it with freshly-cut plant material'. In a word, with the leaves from our fruit trees. I thus spent the morning fervently digging out the two ant colonies, not an altogether easy task. Thankfully, I had the help of our caseiro or foreman, Clair, a mythical character who can best be described as a cross between Paul Bunyon and John Henry, and his trusted enchadão or hoe. Nonetheless, it took us a couple of hours to reach the underground chambers, after which all I could do was look on in wonder as millions of ants (a mature leafcutter colony can contain more than 8 million ants) continued about their business...largely undisturbed. Fortunately, Lone quickly researched and identified a biodynamic ant pesticide, Macex, which I purchased and will apply next week when it arrives by mail.

The ant episode diverted us from planting the remainder of the 90+ fruit trees I recently purchased. We thus spent Tuesday planting another 27 fruit trees near the casa do caseiro. We have now planted a grand total of 78 fruit trees. Planting so many trees is physically demanding but spiritually rewarding.

Most of Wednesday was spent at Deposit Cursino in São Luiz do Paraitinga ordering/purchasing the remaining materials to complete phase I construction.

On Thursday I built a henhouse using the scrap wood from the various houses/buildings currently under construction. My highest priority, not surprisingly, was safety...belts and suspenders all the way! The end result was the nuclear bunker of henhouses, an impenetrable structure that took four men to move from the side of the main house to the fruit orchard. In all, I estimate it to weigh somewhere in the neighborhood of 200 kg, give or less-likely take 50 kg.

The week wrapped up as always with a frantic rush to complete as much construction work as possible, a quick trip to Ubatuba to withdraw cash to pay the construction workers and (window) shop for household appliances, and finally unload the Wednesday's order of construction materials, including 100 treated fence posts for the first of many pig pens, which, uncharacteristically arrived at approx. 17:00. This was followed by a little cleaning, a quick dinner of canned tuna, canned corn and almonds followed by canned peaches for desert.