The adventure continues

As my stay here in Canestrello approaches its end I review the time I've spent here. My stay started out lazily - the weather was appaling on Saturday so we couldn't really work outside, and Michael doesn't work or make his lodgers work on Sunday. But gradually I began to learn the ropes as the work got harder throughout the week. Since then I've sorted and carried a lot of wood, sawed logs, pruned trees and bushes, cooked meals, landscaped a slope, built a dry stone wall, mixed concrete and mortar, helped to build a gate and smashed the ice on the surface of a duck pond.

Another workawayer arrived a few days after me; a middle-aged ex-banker/businessman and marine geologist called Philip. Although not a musician like Aron, Jaci and my host, Michael, he knows plenty about garden landscaping/building and adds some good diversity to the conversation. On the subject of playing music I've done plenty of that. Michael and Aron were delighted to have my folk influences mix in with their usual repetoir of soul, jazz and classical and flamenco guitar, and Aron and Jaci had me play some accordion to a couple of their songs.

We've had some fun times cooking meals too, such as round robin soup. By which I mean one person makes an enormous pot of soup, after which there is plenty left over, and then the next day someone else takes the soup and adds their own signature, changing it into a different soup. We've had soups that lasted for three or four meals!

Ultimately it's been a pretty isolated experience though. I've been down to the village a couple of times and had coffee in the little cafe there, but otherwise have spent my time on and around the property here at the top of the hill.

I finally received my camera today, so tomorrow I'll upload some images!