Abundant was its honey

Written to iTunes Live from SoHo by Counting Crows

"Health is the greatest gift, contentment the greatest wealth, faithfulness the best relationship."
- Buddha

As with every year-end, the unfolding of 2011 was memorable for many reasons, but among all of the highlights, our New Year's Eve visit to Picinguaba and Lone's first full-scale honey harvest stood out, infectious in their effervescence.

Lone, Johannes, his friend Gabriel and I, wrapped up 2010 by visiting our friends Jeff and Suzanna in Picinguaba, where we met some of their friends, Nigel and Michelle Noyes, and at last had the pleasure of meeting Emmanuel Cabale's wife, and ever-so-briefly their son and daughter.

Over the years, we have celebrated New Year's Eve on the beaches of Rio de Janeiro and Natal, at Márcio and Heather Magano's wonderful guest house, Capela, and, of course, at Fazenda Alfheim. New Year 2 0 1 1 on the beach in Picinguaba was at once both intimate and grand in an intensely communal way. And as always, Brazilians demonstrated their unique ability to generate and transmit an intensely unstrained and genuine sense of joy.

After the fireworks, Lone and I retired early and, like good farmers, rose early for a quick swim before heading back to the guest house for a simple breakfast, after which we departed for Fazenda Alfheim with Johannes and Gabriel.

Esben and Pelle chose to spend the New Year with friends at Kenny and Sara Geld's fazenda. It deserves mentioning that Carson and Ellen Geld, Kenny's parents, celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary on January 6th, Epiphany, also Pelle's 21st birthday! Our youngest son certainly keeps excellent company, both figuratively and literally.

Back at Fazenda Alfheim, Lone, aided greatly by Johannes, Esben, Pelle and Jemma, and, of course, Rosana, set about harvesting over 70 kg of piercingly golden honey. With Esben and Pelle providing the muscle, Lone put her new centrifuge and honey-making equipment to good use. Needless to say, our doors are again open for anyone who wants to purchase Alfheim's own nectar of the gods.

Finally, we reached an agreement with the Prefeitura de Natividade da Serra and the Promotoria de Justiça de Paraibuna regarding maintenance of the estrada municipal…and not a moment too soon. After celebrating the signature of a compromise agreement comprising four concrete improvements, including replacing the bridge in front of our fazenda with a metal bridge in Q2 2011, Lone returned home just in time to find, ironically, that that self-same bridge had collapsed, perhaps in exasperation, and even our Mitsubishi L200 Triton HPE 3.2 Diesel could not cross it and enter Fazenda Alfheim. After Esben and Pelle carried 10 sacks of corn across the bridge and loaded them onto our Lego tractor, they left the car parked discreetly on the estrada municipal. Unfortunately, some candango chose to vandalize the vehicle, breaking a window and turning the lights on to drain the battery. An unfortunate exclamation point to an otherwise spectacular end and a beginning, but certainly insufficient malevolence to dampen all of the positive energy that the preceding days had generated.

Bem-vindo 2011! And não bem-vindo 'Enviropigs'!