Acosta Centro Badajoz

My time with Becky and Martin is slowly coming to a close. Its been a great time. Good food, good laughs, satisfying work. Martin is able to develop a vision of how a piece of land should look, and then he´s able to make it happen. Our biggest accomplishment of my stay was a rock wall and stairs built on a rough patch of land behind the house. It looks pretty damn good if I do say so myself.

In an attempt to sum up my experience here, I´ve written a Lonely Planet style ...

I´m happy with my experiences through WWOOFing thus far. With three hosts in Japan last year, and now two in Europe, I feel like I´m getting an idea what its all about. Each host is so completely different, that its hard to build expectations. I´ve all but given up on the idea that I´ll find a farm that has me milking goats and gathering eggs in the morning, followed by a quick harvest from a varied garden, and concluded with a ...

With no internet on the farm, Corrine and I are always keen to spend some time in front of a computer, checking emails and making plans. Martin was kind enough to bring us along to Albuquerque, where they have a second house still being finished. While he worked away, we surfed the net.

Once business was taken care of, Martin was keen to show us around the little town of Albuquerque. A beautiful old castle at the top of the hill was our to wander through, no ...

... layer upon layer of distant hills.

At 2:00 Corrine and I got a ride with Becky into the nearest city of Badajoz. Our wander started with walk through a garden and old fortress ruins. Welcome to small town Spain. Anywhere else in the country and this would have been teaming with tourists, but we were the only ones there. The fortress was composed of numerous dark alleys and tunnels that required a torch, which we didn´t have. A place like this in Vancouver would have been a ...

... fig, citrus, quince, and a lone pomegranate tree that produces the sweetest pomegranates in Spain. There´s a nice little vineyard, that likely keeps them self sufficient when it comes to wine consumption. It is basically the end of the gardening season here, but cabbages and greens are still being planted. Cape Gooseberries grow like a weed here, its amusing, considering they cost an arm and a leg for a small carton back home.

The entrance to the house is guarded by 3 ...

... was occupied - by the grossly overweight owner, his grossly overweight wife and grossly overweight daughter. They sat without a word between them, arms folded across their chests, staring into the middle distance. The peaceful scene was suddenly pierced by the scream followed by wailing of a small child. Enter overweight child (granddaughter) and overweight mother (older daughter). Child had fallen over and grazed her knee. Still screaming she was swept into the very full ...

... every door that we could find trying to get into the church to see the Miracle and we were not going to leave until we got in. We were denied by the sisters but then went back to them and begged again telling them that we needed to see it and we could not wait till the morning because our train was leaving at 10 pm that night. Eventually a little French women told us she ...

... así: Jaione: Puff! Me tumbo un segundín ¿vale? Silencio.... Segundos después Edurne está tumbada boca abajo y SOPAZAS perdida... y Jaione... pues en el 5º sueño... XD Con este planazo (y aunque parezca mentira porque tengo una fama de SOPAZAS que no me la merezco:-D), me cojo mi libro y me salgo a la puerta de la casa... Totalmente integrado en el pueblo, como una viejilla más en la puerta, empieza a pasar la gente, a hablar... y me pongo al día de mil cosas. Esto es lo más ...

... cuantas galletas María, es la dieta que seguimos hoy para mantener nuestro "tipazo". Tenemos la cena preparada pero necesitamos de un lugar muy acogedor donde poder disfrutarla, si encima fuese en buena compañía y con un buen fondo musical, mejor que mejor. Un montoncito de piedras que los trabajadores de Renfe nos dejaron estratégicamente colocadas sirven para asentar nuestras posaderas... Las vías a dos metros, son las preciosas vistas que tenemos ...

... going to head back to Merida when Lucy said that in Albuquerque, there was an old fort on top of a hill and as it was only 40 K's away, and at the speed you drive at, we should be there in 15 minutes !!! Sold. Now the story is that Albuquerque sits on top of an older Moorish version, so first good reason to come, and second, it overlooks Portugal, and has been the scene of many a battle. They actually did control it for a few ...