Four Elements House » Travel http://www.fourelementshouse.com a Journey from Living On the Grid to Living Off the Grid in Chenogne Sun, 13 Jun 2010 15:32:00 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 Anglo-Saxons and Vikings – part four http://www.fourelementshouse.com/2006/10/anglo-saxons-and-vikings-part-four/ http://www.fourelementshouse.com/2006/10/anglo-saxons-and-vikings-part-four/#comments Thu, 05 Oct 2006 06:14:47 +0000 Dude http://ourearthship.com/?p=46 I really wanted only a two part piece on this, but apparently that’s not happening. So, I’d better get on with it.
George performed extremely well during the drives through the field and through the wee forest at Henrik’s Grandfather place. But, indeed, now has no rear mud flaps.

We did do some work on George, or rather, Henrik did some work on George. Maybe not as much as we would have liked to have done, but still… He fixed the passenger door. Being 21 years of age this door has had a hard life and the metal bits in it are almost completely gone, it practically hung on one hinge and would be falling off soon if nothing was to be done. Henrik fixed it. A bit of grinding, welding, riveting and being generally pleased with himself the door shuts and fits better then ever.

Another highlight was our visit to the summerhouse of Henriks stepfathers’ mother, or Henriks step grandmother. Anyway, it was quite a drive up there, not in distance, but in beauty. The roads we drove got smaller and smaller, starting with a regular 2 lane country road and ending up with a grass covered track. The house itself was small with a kitchen the size of a.., well.., small kitchen. A small table was in it and enough room to turn around. A very big, cast iron stove took up a quarter of the kitchen and was as ancient as the lake not 200 feet away.

The living room was not much larger then the kitchen and held two beds and a couple of chairs and upstairs, merely a large attic, held a small storage area and a smaller room with another two beds in it, that’s where we slept.
 
The whole house was cozily decorated the way old ladies tend do and was generally comfortable. The lady of the house by the way comes out here very regularly and does everything on her own, including walking butt naked to the lake for a swim, where she also happens to fish, albeit fully clothed . Not bad when you’re 75 years of age…
We did have a very relaxing time here in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by nature and very, very dark and very, very quiet at night.

We only met one challenge whilst staying there. The outhouse. Well, not really a challenge, it was just something new, but strangely comfortable when used to it. Sitting there with the door open, doing your business on a big wooden box, with a nice sandpapered edge mind you, is quite refreshing. And you could share the experience with a loved one, or anyone else for that matter, since there were two holes, snugly next to each other, in the same space. We didn’t try that one out though, I don’t think our relationship is that mature.., yet…

The summerhouse will be sorely missed by the both of us.

Back on the road only one other bit fell off George while on the way back home.., the last 15 cm of his exhaust came off. We did here a “clong”, or “clang” I don’t remember which, and figured we either ran over something or something fell off. And being in the Netherlands where the roads are pretty clean we figured something must have fallen of. Luckily for us, it was only the exhaust and caused no further problems. George performed beautifully and we start to enjoy, and respect him more and more.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, or at least just end it. We had a marvelous time in Sweden and will definitely come back next year.

]]> http://www.fourelementshouse.com/2006/10/anglo-saxons-and-vikings-part-four/feed/ 0 58.4294472 15.9670830 Anglo-Saxons and Vikings – part three http://www.fourelementshouse.com/2006/10/anglo-saxons-and-vikings-part-three/ http://www.fourelementshouse.com/2006/10/anglo-saxons-and-vikings-part-three/#comments Wed, 04 Oct 2006 14:25:18 +0000 Dude http://ourearthship.com/?p=45 The weather we were having was very good and, being on a farm, advantage had to be taken. It was a great opportunity to get the hay sorted and the seeds planted before the rain could ruin it all. Therefore, Henrik was still working long days, as was everyone else on the farm, and we offered our services. Off course we couldn’t do much as a lot of jobs require driving very large machines, but they did find a job for us.

Quite a lot of hay roles, or roles of hay if you will, had to be rolled inside to stay dry and to be used as floor cover, or dung catcher, during the winter when the cows will be inside.
These roles are almost 6 feet in diameter and I don’t know how heavy they are, but believe me, they are. It got me sweating, and that’s a rare thing. We did have fun though…
I also helped Henrik with covering huge stacks of hay in the fields. This entailed being lifted up with a scoop of a tractor on top of the 14 feet hay stack and cover the top with a tarp which is attached with ropes to steel rods poked in the side of the stack, did you get that?
This was also good for a mornings work with a good lunch at Henrik’s mom as a reward.

Off course we did some relaxing and we saw all the slides Henrik shot on their trip through Africa. And for those of you who think slides are boring.., you should get the right subject and the right stories. This slideshow was everything but boring.
Their journey was phenomenal and took them all the way from Sweden to South Africa.., on motorcycles…
Yep.., that’s right, they did it on a bike..,well two actually, but still, quite impressive.

What else did we do.., ehhh…, o yeah, we visited Stockholm for a day. Beautiful city.

Ah.., yeah, I remember, we did take George off-roading, or rather, greenlaning. Obviously we didn’t destroy him but some parts did fell of.
In Almere (the Netherlands) I went off the road with my friend André and nearly destroyed a tire when my mud flap (or the steel it was attached to) was bended against the tire. After bending it back the problem was solved, but it has been a nuisance ever since.

Back in Sweden we took George into a field which was al but flat. A lot of rocks and fallen trees created enough of a challenge.
After driving through a ditch and not getting up the on the other site George again got his rear mud flaps caught. This time, while backing up to get a good run, I heard a load ‘crack’ and the whole bar with both flaps came of. And this time there was no bending back. Now George has a bare rear end…

Go to part four…

]]> http://www.fourelementshouse.com/2006/10/anglo-saxons-and-vikings-part-three/feed/ 0 58.4294472 15.9670830 Anglo-Saxons and Vikings – part two http://www.fourelementshouse.com/2006/10/anglo-saxons-and-vikings-part-two/ http://www.fourelementshouse.com/2006/10/anglo-saxons-and-vikings-part-two/#comments Tue, 03 Oct 2006 06:47:18 +0000 Dude http://ourearthship.com/?p=44 Our mini adventure to Sweden started with a defect in one of George his intercooler hoses. After a bit of an argument on which action to take, go or fix, we called Rob of British4x4 and got a consult. Ducktape the hose and we’ll take a look at it after the holiday.

The problem would be fixed later; George would be due for maintenance anyway.
The only problem would be running out of breath in higher gears going up the hill. Nothing we couldn’t handle.

The first leg of the journey ended in a F1 hotel in Bremen (Germany) where we had Spicy Cheese Nuggets (or something like that) at the Burger King. These are just great, you should get them…
After a bad night in a crappy bed in a crappy room in a crappy hotel (hell, at least it was cheap, or, at least, not too expensive) we left early. We wanted to end up in Malmö, 400 km and 2 countries away.

400 km doesn’t sound bad, but when you drive a (big) box on wheels with a head wind it can get pretty noisy and exhausting. It took us the better part of the day to get to Malmö in an uneventful drive.

The next day we packed up and headed for the Anna and Henriks house. This was the furthest we had to drive, over 500 km, but all of it would be through Sweden and we would end up at our final destination.

This drive too was uneventful; all in all it was a pretty børing drive. Although the scenery through Sweden is great, you don’t get to see much when you’re driving.
It got much better once we shut of the engine at our destination, the silence there was just deafening. Except for a cow or two, there was nothing to be heard.
Now it must be said that Anna and Henrik live in a small house which stands on a farm. This farm stands in the middle of nowhere. Far away from airports or highways or schools or factories or anything else that can make noise.., except for the cows then. It was bliss…

Read on in part three…

]]> http://www.fourelementshouse.com/2006/10/anglo-saxons-and-vikings-part-two/feed/ 0 58.4294472 15.9670830 Anglo-Saxons and Vikings – part one http://www.fourelementshouse.com/2006/09/anglo-saxons-and-vikings-part-one/ http://www.fourelementshouse.com/2006/09/anglo-saxons-and-vikings-part-one/#comments Fri, 29 Sep 2006 17:28:12 +0000 Dude http://ourearthship.com/?p=43 England was a succes. Altough only a weekend was planned on the island, it still was a lot of fun.

Sweden was great and we drove “George” to near destruction in the 3350 km we drove.

The ferry to England was a bit of a claustrofobic experience. Getting to the ship was only an half our drive and checking in went smoothly, it was only when we saw our cabin for the first time we had the thought that spending a bit more money on a cabin with a porthole would have been a good idea. This was confirmed during the night when the noise and vibration of the engines and the lack of fresh air, and maybe the anti-sickness pill, caused quite a restless night.
The drive down to Peterborough the following morning was as exhausting as the previous night had been, so when we, finally, arrived at the showgrounds and met up with Rob and his family it’s safe to say that we were happy to be there.The Land Rover Fest is an annual event at the East of England Showground in Peterborough with a lot of Land Rovers and a lot of stands with stuff to buy. British4x4 has one of those stands and we were invited to camp behind them which also provided us with free entrance.

The show itself was great. Enough was organised to keep everybody busy. Plenty of professional and private stands with everything you always wanted for your Land Rover, well, maybe not everything… I didn’t find some things I was looking for. But, in short, the whole event was good.

The Stewart family, who so graciously provided us with the tickets were also great hosts. During the day there was beer and in the evening we ate at a nearby restaurant.

The drive back to the ferry was better then the one from the ferry. This time we drove nice and comfortable behind Rob which was better. The roads we drove in England were busy and, dare I say it, dangerous. At least we thought so. People drove fast and the entry and exist lanes were so short people had drive onto the road with very low speeds.
The ferry was better to. The expensive all-you-can-eat diner wasn’t worth it but at least this cabin made less noise then the previous one.

We did meet the “Vicar” though. An old friend of the Stewarts who has a buzzcut, smokes, drinks and was in the Bar business for quite a while. But now.., he is an active vicar, or reverend. A very interesting man of a kind the church desperatly needs.., at least I think so…

After exiting the ferry we med up with “the gang” and drove back to Rotterdam where, along the way, we waved goodbye.

Our visit to home was short lived as we were very eager to start the long drive up to our viking friends… you’ll read about that in part 2.

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