This was our day in our lives over the weekend. I was going to write it as a blog post, and Alan blooming well beat me too it. So here you go, I'll share it with you. Treasure your central heating, carpets and lights that go on and off at the flick of a switch, but we'll think of you in the summer!
Enjoy!
Alan Parks and Lorna Penfold live off grid, with only solar
panels for electricity, so if the weather is a little cloudy for a few days the
electricity is limited. Here is a
rundown of a fairly normal day, off grid for Alan and Lorna.
8.30am Look out of the window to see it starting to get
light. Clouds again, and the electricity is off for now, who knows when it will
come back on.
8.35am Dogs wake up and start mooching about. Alan gets up
to let ‘the boys’ out. Geri is sound asleep. Back to bed for a quick snooze.
8.40am Hear movement. Lorna gets up to find Geri mooching
about having pooed on the move all over the floor and weed as well. Geri gets
thrown out. Might as well get up.
8.45am Electricity still not on, and the weather is
threatening rain, but the dogs are excited as it is walk time. The two big
Spanish mastiffs are first up (with five dogs we have to do two shifts). Alan
has Blue and Lorna has Arthur. Keep an eye out for stray dogs or fresh horse
poo, just in case we are pulled this way and that.
9.15am Return and swap dogs. This time it is Geri (our 14
year old Collie crosss from England), Carlos (a stray who found us) and Miliko
(thrown over our fence as a puppy, with a dislocated hip and broken jaw from
being hit by a car). Wait for Miliko to calm down, and stop running in circles.
9.45am Return from walk, and have to drag Miliko past the
alpacas, who have been here since here arrived, as he will not walk past them.
Electricity still not on. Have some
breakfast, porridge to warm up, as there is no central heating and no carpets
on the floor. Cold.
10.30am Still cloudy, but electricity comes on for a while.
Try to turn on laptop, to make sure all is ok in the world and with the family.
Alan goes out to feed alpacas and let the chickens out of their house. Chickens
are already out of there house having had the door blown open by the wind. Two
are in the hay barn, and two are outside the fence desperately trying to find a
gap to scramble back in. Alan goes out to round them up, two cars go past just
as chicken makes a mug of Alan and evades capture.
11am Alan returns with clothes covered in mud, but no solar
electricity to do any washing and no sun to dry anything so keeps muddy clothes
on.
11.30am Electricity goes off again, as sun still has not
made an appearance. Spain in the winter can be cold and horrible.
12 midday With no electric we resort to manual tasks,
cleaning, digging, gardening, maybe writing using an old fashioned pen and
paper.
2pm Dogs barking madly. Chickens are out again. Go out in to
the rain to round them up. Two sit down waiting to be mounted by a cockerel (me
I guess), but the other two run away. Corner them eventually and grab hold of
them, throwing them unceremoniously over the fence. Turn to walk back to the
house to find two old Spanish farmers parked in their car laughing at me. Nod
acknowledgement and retreat in to the house, post haste.
6pm After an afternoon of intermittent electricity, we
decide to use the generator for the evening (costs too much in petrol to run
all day), and allow ourselves a bit of television. Watch the news to find the
UK has ground to a halt because of a few flurries of snow, and laugh at the
irony.
10.30pm Go out into the rain, to turn of generator, and
using a torch negotiate way past the evenings dog poos, and turn of generator
and go to bed. Dogs are settled.
1.30am Something disturbs Arthur who is on guard at the
front of the house. All the other dogs hear Arthur and decide something is up.
After five minutes of shouting at the dogs to ‘Shut up’ in all sorts of language,
they settle down again.
1.37am Ok there must be something up, Arthur is going
mental, so Alan gets up, grabs a torch, puts on three layers of clothes and
goes to investigate. After looking thoroughly around the property, Alan decides
it must be that the alpacas strayed too close to Arthur’s area and he was
telling us. Nothing else untoward going on. Shut Arthur in kitchen which means
he is ‘off duty’ and settles down. Wide awake now, Alan lays in the darkness,
unable to read or to go to sleep.
3.30am Having drifted off for a while both Lorna and Alan
are awoken by the sound of a dog vomiting. Both grab torches and jump out of
bed in the vain hope that they might be able to get to it before it happens and
throw dog out. Get there to find dog standing staring at vomit on sofa,
considering re-eating it. Shout, wave arms about and throw dogs out. Geri is
oblivious. Remove cushion and cover, and throw cushion cover out. Wash hands
and go back to bed with the smell of dog vomit in the nose. Lay awake for a few
more hours.
8.30am Hear Geri jump down from sofa, jump out of bed to
find more poos, spread about the room, but manage to throw her out before she
wees. Go back to bed.
8.45am Alarm goes off, here we go again. Clouds in the sky,
no electric. Bring on the summer and the unbearable heat. Please.
To hear more about Lorna and Alan’s life in Andalucia, check
out www.whats-an-alpaca.com or
download the book, Seriously Mum, What’s an Alpaca? By Alan Parks.
Sad looking Santa, in the rain!
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