Move to Bulgaria: Weeks 39 & 40

Hello. It has been a while since my last post again, but this is because it has been quiet here and I was waiting until I had a few interesting things to write about!

Keeping warm!

The snow stayed with us for a few more days. It didn't actually snow any more but it was still cold and everything got very wet as it slowly started to melt, so we spent the week hiding out and keeping warm. All big projects for this year involve being outside, so it is really a waiting game to get started with work again.

Horrible day

Lots of this happening

Bilko is chilllled!

We went out for a few walks - one of which was to a lake near our village that we hadn't yet visited. It is a very pretty lake and because it is behind a hill and doesn't get much sun at this time of year, it was almost completely frozen over, which was pretty cool! We were throwing big rocks and it wouldn't break - although we didn't dare walk over it.

Slowly melting snow

Frozen lake

There is one deep patch in the middle that is not frozen

The trees are showing the usual water line

By Friday the snow was melted enough that we could go to the market - the first time in 3 weeks! There are about half the amount of stalls now as there were in summer, but still a huge variety of winter veg to pick from. When we got back from the market I unpacked the shopping, which reminded me to finally look up something crafty to do with all the plastic bags we have. (We do take our own shopping bags to the market but the stall holders almost insist of wrapping every item individually in it's own plastic bag, so sadly we still end up bringing home several plastic bags every week.) I found an easy project to make a basket/bowl with plastic bags and spent the next two days making it. It used up all the bags, - I didn't count them but there must have been AT LEAST 100 odd - it looks pretty good and kept me entertained for a while! Another day I made a bloody delicious lemon drizzle cake and we ate the whole thing within a couple of hours.

All these bags...

...turn to this!

Also this week our boiler broke - disaster! :( As far as we could tell there was electricity and water going to it, so there was nothing we could try and fix ourselves. It is of course has a guarantee but we have heard these mean almost nothing in Bulgaria and usually involve you taking the broken thing to the shop and them 'looking at it' for at least a month before fixing it - if you're lucky! This obviously didn't sound tempting, especially as we'd got the boiler in Stara Zagora (an hour away), but we told Hristo (our neighbour) and he kindly rang up the company and found out there was a shop that could service the boiler in Chirpan. This was great news, although we were still doubtful that it would be so easy, and we decided to wait until we next saw M & D so they could help us get a man out to our house. So for the next few days we washed from a huge pan of boiling water, cooked over the wood burner - which really is luxury compared to our solar shower!

Heating the shower water for free

After several days of good weather the snow in garden had finally melted. As the sun was shining we decided to use the opportunity to get outside and do some work, whilst we could. The first job was to build a cold smoker. Pete has been salting more pork and has also been wanting to build a smoker for ages anyway (we want to make bacon, panchetta, smoked cheese, smoked paprika etc - the options are endless really!!) We had an old wood burner that came with the house and we'd bought a flue, so the last job was to knock up a wooden box with a rack, where the food will sit and get smoky. This didn't take long at all and we used scraps of wood from the barn, so it didn't cost any money whatsoever. The end result it pretty good and works a treat. Lots of yummy food on its way!

Tada!

More bacon in already!

The big job to get started on are the raised beds. We have marked them out and originally wanted to build them all with stone, as you may remember. But over the last few days we have been deliberating this and ended up deciding against this idea. We will still build 3 of them with stone but the other 4 square ones we have decided to make from wood. This is for several reasons, the main reason being we don't think we actually have enough good stone to finish them. We also have a big pile of logs sitting in the garden from when we made the scaffolding for the roof - so why re-use them instead! Annoyingly the good weather only lasted long enough to get two built, but at least it is a good start, and we are very pleased with them indeed! :)

The first, and smallest, bed we decided to with upright logs. This looks fantastic but involved digging down quite deep to make them sturdy, and also was not the most economic use of the wood, so there will only be one like this. We are also quite concerned about the wood rotting, so we filled the gap in the ground around the wood with stone (French drain style), as well as putting plastic on the inside to avoid the earth touching the wood as much as possible. Hopefully this will last a few years - and it should be relatively easy and cheap to replace if/when we need to.

All cut to size

Stones going in.

One side done

Filling it in

One bed done!

For the second bed we used the wood horizontally. This is much quicker and more efficient to build so we will do the rest in the same way. It also looks nice as well! Actually the hardest part was shoveling the earth into the bed - but we are finally starting to make a dent in the pile of soil that has come out the septic tank, so we are on our way to having a tidier garden.

Chopping to length

4 sides ready to go in

Filling the trench with stone

Plastic in

And another one finished (not quite full yet)

Celebratory beer in the sun

During this short bout of working we had another Friday morning at the market, where we stopped in a local café for some lovely, warming soup.

And then the weather turned. We had a day of solid rain and then the next day we awoke to this again... so changeable.

This time with the snow storm came a power cut and we had a WHOLE DAY with no electricity! First thing we got the fire going so we could boil water for a cuppa, then we had a morning game of scrabble and carried on the day in much the same way. At first we kept switching on the lights when we went in a room, opening the laptop to go on the internet and saying things like 'we'll just listen to music..' or 'I'm going to make some toast' - you don't realize how much you rely on electricity for everything! But in the end it was actually fine and thankfully the power came back just as it was getting dark. (Unlike other areas of Bulgaria that apparently have had 2 meters of snow and days on end with no power, so I think we got off lightly.)

Fire and candles lit for the day

The snow we had a few weeks ago obviously settled, but it was really powdery and blew around everywhere. This time the snow had stuck to everything - even the washing line - so looked much more like a winter wonderland. Once the blizzard outside had stopped we got in our snow gear and went out for a walk around the village.

Our land!

Out in the village

The snow has even stuck to the rosehips

Everything is frozen!

Since then it hasn't snowed again, but the weather this week is set to hover around 0 in the days and get as low as -15 by night, so it may take a while to thaw. Yesterday we saw M & D who called a guy to come and look at the boiler - and miraculously fixed it within an hour, all for free under the guarantee! Result - we have hot water again!!! We also went with M & D to SZ to apply for our Bulgarian resident cards, so - fingers crossed - when I next update we will be official Bulgarian residents at last.

I've also done a few odd bits and bobs around the house in an attempt to keep myself busy and feeling productive. There were a some patches around that needed repainting - like where the wood burner had leaked a few months ago - as well as filling in some cracks and linseed-oiling the yellow room doors - which now look fab!