The Heart of the Matter

A few weeks ago I was alerted to this article.

Much of what they say rings very true to our current situation. Our diet is poor and we are a bizarre mix of healthy and fit; while fueling our bodies with endless baguettes and digestive biscuits.  Arguably we also quit the 9 - 5 in search of adventure. Our photos perhaps don't show the entire story (as I write this I am holed up inside sheltering from the endless downpour that has saturated Lake Orta in North Italy for the past two days; no photos have been taken of this). And yes, we've scrubbed a few toilets along the way to ensure we are fed.

However, what irked me about that piece, and where we differ from them, I think, is that I am happy scrubbing toilets.

We are also using workaway to get us back to New Zealand, taking the very long road. It's a fantastic website where you can connect with people all around the world and offer your services in exchange for board and food. The work is varied; as are the expectations. But the exchange is worth far more than just a warm meal each evening. And that's where their blog annoyed me. They made it sound like it's when they are on the road, jumping from one place to another that they are most happy, begrudgingly having to stop every now and again to clean some toilets or polish some glasses so they can get a proper meal or two. Whereas in fact, I would argue, it's in those moments when you have stopped to scrub some toilets that you learn the most; and in turn, gain the most from your travels. It's in those moments that you finally stop to feel the beat of a town, to finally figure out what the locals say as their greeting, to take a step back from the train timetables and the church opening hours to figure out what it is that makes a place.

At the moment, we are doing that in the north of Italy overlooking Lake Orta. We are at a conference centre, which hosts many different groups from yoga, to family constilations to a group who yelled for two weeks straight. The work is solid - we even have a roster - the food is delicious, the company is abundant and the location is second to none. No complaints from me; even as I stand in the dishwashing room scrubbing all the dishes from a 60-person two course dinner. We are here for another week - three weeks have already raced by - before we head to the south of Italy; back into the sunshine. And off to learn a little bit more.

Holes

After six days of playing the city tourist again - it takes a while to get back in that mode, and never feels natural for us - we are back in comfortable territory. For us this means being in the middle of nowhere at someone else's house, who we did not know, and had no idea where they were taking us to when they picked us up from the bus station at 1pm. This is our way of travelling.

In this case it was a lovely Dutch couple who were taking us to their cave house in the south east of Spain, about an hour and a half away from Granada.

It is our second workaway for this trip. We are helping them convert some caves into a home. Sounds bizarre, but is a common type of housing in this neck of the woods. In fact, when I asked one woman if she lived in a cave house she simply replied "of course". The massive benefit; they stay relatively cool in summer, and relatively warm in winter. An interesting concept though; instead of adding on to the  landscape, as a 'normal' house would, this is taking away from the landscape. In a reasonably unimposing way. Brilliant. Those cave men (and women) sure knew a thing or two.

Our days mainly consist of painting, with David every now and again asked to bash away some more at a space. It turns out I really love painting, and am happily spending hours of my day in front of a door or window, turning it lavender, or blue. The hardware store in the tiny village only stocks white, grey or blue paint, so options are limited. Ide, the man who lives here, rather creatively made a lavender colour. He's currently in the process of trying to make a blue/green/grey colour. All he's discovered so far is that adding cement to paint doesn't add that colour, it just turns it to glue.

Another five days here, then we are off to Barcelona and then onwards to Nice where we are meeting David's family.

- Hana

The Rest is Noise

Spending time in Spain is teaching me to slow down and appreciate the rhythm of daily life. Because that's the thing with Spain; it has a rhythm, and once you start to hear it, you begin to dance along to it.

There's rhythm in the daily siesta when the entire town shuts down for a good four hours mid afternoon. There's rythmn when it comes back to life at 10pm at night. There's the beat of families standing at the base of their almond trees, shaking them free of their yearly harvest. And the gentle hum of families as they sit around with a cerveza in one hand, and good food in the other. There's the music of the shepherd who spends each day moving his flock around in search of food, only returning late at night. Bells adorn the necks of many in the herd, their discordant tune bouncing around the hillsides.

Which brings me to this story. A couple of days ago we were taken to a local stream at the end of a gravel road (a road we would then walk back up to return to the workaway we are at at the moment).  When we arrived, there was an incredible amount of action going on on the other side of the stream. Two shepherds had arrived with their herd of sheep and goats, on the daily move around the area. Only, the day prior a tree had fallen down and blocked the bridge across the stream and the sheep were not interested in crossing the knee-deep water. So everyone got involved - David included - in trying to move the hundred or so animals across a body of water they were constantly trying to escape. One would eventually fall in the water, another would run free of the herd, then another, and before long the entire herd was running in the opposite direction. So out come the waving arms of the ten people who were just hoping to cool down in the water. Back to the stream's edge the sheep are again moved, for the same scenario to play out again and again. Four poor sheep were physically dragged across the stream. 45 minutes went by, before eventually the tree blocking the bridge was smashed down. Initial hesitation by the already frazzled animals quickly turned into a stampede as they all ran across the bridge (some falling off the bridge and into the water). And then it was all over. The Sheppard's had their sheep on this side of the water, and off they travelled. Swimmers went back to swimming, streams went back to flowing. The rhythm went back to normal.
Only it wasn't all over. Five minutes later one of the Sheppard's returned, with a bleating goat in his arms. A gift for those who helped get his herd home. A live goat.
Only in Spain; where every now and again the rhythm slightly changes beat, and a family is left with a goat to foster.

Player of Games

Ever since we arrived in Europe Spain has been on top of our travel list, so it is something of an achievement that we have visited 14 other countries before finally getting here. Our port of entry to Spain was Madrid, burrowing straight into the heart of the city via the subway, we emerging bleary eyed, yet eager to explore, right in the centre of the old town.

Expectations were high. Madrid was cleaner, quieter and more expensive than I expected. It has many beautiful old buildings that would have blown us away two years ago. It has narrow winding lanes lined with small shops and cafes that would have had our cameras flashing and our jaws on the floor two years ago. I guess this is an inherent problem with travelling. We become used to such sights and need bigger and more beautiful buildings to keep us excited. It's like a drug and your tolerance keeps increasing. While Madrid was both beautiful and interesting I can never shake the feeling of being part of an endless tour. Even when we go it alone I feel a bit like a puppet on strings; buy this, go here, photograph this. Or, if we try to do things off the tourist trail I just end up feeling a bit confused, an outsider who doesn't know the rules of the game.

I think this is why I love doing workaways. It brings back meaning to our travels - meeting people, learning new skills,  seeing new ways of living, eating and cooperating. Getting an insight into the culture of a place. A lot of people might wonder why would you work for free while stuck in on place but what you get out of it is worth so much more than what you put in. We are currently doing our fourth workaway near the village of La Codosera right next to the Spanish/Portuguese border. The house sits on a hill overlooking a rolling landscape dotted with olive and cork trees. Today the horizon is obscured by smoke from a large forest fire 150km away. We are seeing climate change first hand here with July experiencing a new record average temperature. Although the smoke actually made for a cooler start to the day which we took advantage of by cycling to La Codosera for supplies (essentially chips for Hana and chocolate for me).

 Our hosts have been at a dance festival for a week so we are essentially house sitting for them.

 We wake up as the sun rises over the hill to make the most of the cooler mornings; feeding the animals (3 dogs, 5 cats and 10 hens), watering the plants and getting in some work before breakfast at 10am.

 Hana has perfected her Spanish omelette. All of the ingredients are grown here. While our hosts are vegan they do eat eggs from their own hens.

 It's starting to warm up by breakfast time which we eat our on the patio beneath the grape vines. We've been having freshly squeezed orange juice most days as the season is coming to an end.

After breakfast we do another hour or two of work before it reaches 30 °c at which time we might play a boardgame, read or go to the resovoir in Portugal for a swim before lunch. We have discovered a German boardgame called Carcassonne, which Hana keeps beating me at, so we play that a lot.

Around 3 o'clock we have a siesta for a couple of hours (along with the animals). After that we feed the animals, take them for a walk, water the vegetables (this takes around an hour, you need a lot of water in summer) and prepare dinner. We are both really enjoying living without dairy or meat. While I wouldn't call myself vegetarian I don't find that I am missing these things or craving them in any way. We eat dinner and chat while the sun sets. It just feels right.

- David

Great Expectations

It is no coincidence that our first blog was titled 'Great Expectations' and my last, as I prepare to leave London, is of the same name.

I couldn't tell you exactly why we left New Zealand over two years ago. A mixture - as it always is - of running away, fulfilling that desire to explore, and coming up with some answers. I could pretend it was a difficult decision, but it wasn't. One day David and I were sitting in a restaurant waiting for our friends to join us when the talk of London came up. In that moment our minds were made, tickets were booked not long after, and farewells were bid not long after that.

I had been in a well paid job in New Zealand, doing all the right things to get further into my career as a journalist. But at the core of it, something just didn't sit right. I was doing things I never thought I would be capable of; things that I think even David doesn't know the full extent of. I'm sure had I continued on my career path it wouldn't have taken long to get out of those positions (standing in the background for the funeral of a mother who was killed, to then pounce on the family as the hearse drove away comes to mind) but I couldn't wait that long. And I couldn't go to another funeral. So I ran.

All the way to London. I came here thinking I'd be able to clear my head and come up with some answers as to my life plan (a reasonably heavy weight to place on a city in which taking a moment to breath is sometimes difficult). Two years on, I'm not sure I've got those answers. But I have learnt an incredible amount about myself.  And I have explored; all with the amazing support, friendship and love of David at my side. The pleasures have been vast; standing on a hilltop in rural Morocco while the call to prayer bounces off the mountain sides. Swimming with elephants in northern Thailand. Cycling down the canal paths of Amsterdam. Making a fire out of wood we had gathered while camping in Sweden. Sitting on the back of a scooter as we zoomed through the chaos of Vietnam. The list is endless. And for that, I am grateful. Beyond words.

I thought I'd leave London with some clear answers. But the only answer I've got, is that there is no clarity. At least for me. I had it all planned in my head; I'd come to London, slog it out here, and return to New Zealand fully able to settle and get stuck into whatever it was I'd decided would be my life plan. Only I leave London in two days and I still don't have a life plan.  But I'm more than OK with that.

So did I have 'great expectations' when we left two years ago? Yes (though I never admitted it, and I certainly never wrote them down).  And maybe my expectations weren't met. But then again, maybe they were; and some.

- Hana

Running Wild

 Ireland; green, rugged, diverse, friendly.
A lot like New Zealand, one might say.
But with better pubs.

Belfast

Just after the storm rolled out.

Walking to the Giant's Causeway.  A 9 pound entrance fee - per person - was baulked at by us; instead we walked for 16km to access the causeway via the free path.  Sounds bonkers - and it vaguely was - but totally worth it.

Along the path.

And the Giant's Causeway itself.  Just as the rain decided to come down. Again.

Hence the splatters of rain drops on the lens.  Makes you feel like you were there, maybe.

Driving off the main road often landed us in beautiful areas.  This was one of Hana's many spectacular photos.

It was hard to capture this place with our wide angle lens.  It wasn't until a few days later that we realised this was the image used on the cover of Ireland's Lonely Planet.  Again, it was just along a random back road we decided to turn down. Pretty at every corner.

The Diamond Track in Conemarra National Park.

Another path off the beaten track - that track you can see in the bottom mid-right is the road we were driving down.

A folly Castle or Abbey built by a wealthy man. Another large tourist attraction we deemed above our budget.

The vaguely moonlike surface of The Burren.

Spot the shoes.

Finally got my moment to take a photo sitting on the edge of a rock. This was as terrifying as it looks - 212 metres down.

David had the courage to sit.  I could only crawl up to it and lie down.

Stone walls and rolling fields.

Fog. Lots of fog.

An abandoned monastery just off the Ring of Kerry.

Some assassin's creed action.

The summit of Pricklesinhand Mountain.

A beautiful abandoned monastery south of Dublin. It was peaceful and quiet as the sun went down behind the surrounding hills.

Our camera has finally crapped itself. Two years after we thought it was probably going to die.  Not bad really. So we have no photos of Dublin I'm afraid.  Not missing much really - apart from a few shots of us with Guinness.
The photo above is the last photo it took. You can see it's eye slowly fogging over as it heaves its final breath. A fitting scene in a way. May it Rest In Peace (as it recycled into new things).