House and Orchard. 20 acres of the property are excluded from the Covenant allowing a house to be built and orchards to be established.
These works were conducted by earlier owners in about 2000. The Covenant Plan shows the layout of the Protected Land and the Domestic Area. The House The late Victorian house was transported from St Kilda and securely located in its new setting in the early 2000s. (You can just see the bushfire bunker on the left). It has five bedrooms. There is a fifth comfortably furnished bedroom for the use of guests. From the verandahs around the house, you can see a remarkable old sugar gum. You can watch beautiful sunsets and even the occasional moonrise. The house is off-grid. The Orchards When established about 15 years ago, the orchards included rows of fruit trees, a vineyard and an olive grove. In the same year the olive grove produced a rich harvest for the owners and for donations to worthy enterprises. We have not had a harvest every year. I was a thrifty Yankee with a big crush on the American West.
Once upon a time — 20 years ago, that is — seven friends bought a cheap piece of land in western Colorado, 80 acres between the redrock deserts of the Colorado Plateau and the foothills of the Rocky Mountains.
Like most people who do such things, they were young, idealistic, and generally overjoyed by their ability to survive on almost nothing at all. The land was cheap for good reasons: it was high on a mesa, thick with rocks, and spiked with scraggly juniper trees. Worse, it was uphill from the irrigation ditch, the broad artery that drew water from the river and directed it toward orchards and farms. To locals, all land was defined by its position above or below the ditch, and land above was useless, too dry for growing anything but a few cows. People who invested in it were desperate, or fools. But the friends saw something different in the land. So they haggled, pooled their savings, paid up and moved in. Those first years should have been hard, and at times they were. LemonDrops.mobi #5 Matavenero. The abandoned beauty of Italy's 20,000 ghost towns.
Forget the grandeur of Rome, Florence or Venice.
Italy has nearly 20,000 ghost towns that are totally or partly abandoned, the locals having fled due to a mix of factors. Harsh living conditions, including lack of running water and electricity, pirate raids, natural calamities such as quakes and floods, bombings and massive emigration flows triggered by the appeal of a better life in larger cities and in the Americas, have all contributed to the abandoned villages. But these crumbling ruins are secret gems stuck in a moment in time the rest of the world has long forgotten. Yet it isn't just the curious tourists exploring Italy's ghost towns. Scroll down for video Beautiful: Italy's landscape is dotted with ghost towns like this one, Civita di Bagnoreggio, known as the 'Dying City' Falling:Towns like Santo Stefano Sextantio have been abandoned slowly, as people went to look for jobs elsewhere.
Matavenero village transformed by Spanish hippies into eco-friendly idyll. A village which lay abandoned for two decades has been transformed into a fairytale-like commune where people eschew the trappings of modern life in favour of creating an eco-idyll in the middle of the mountains.
Matavenero was once like thousands of villages across Europe, abandoned by people who left in search of work or an easier life in the towns and cities. Left to crumble for 20 years, it seemed unlikely anyone would ever make their home in this little corner of north-west Spain again. Yet it is now home to a community of 60 people, who have grasped the opportunity to build a village which is in harmony with nature, a three-hour walk away from the hustle and pollution of 21st century living. Fairytale: This building can be seen from everywhere in Matavenero, and is the hub of the village which just 25 years ago was abandoned. Eco-Village Intentional Community. Intentional Community Links: * to MAGPIE HOUSE * * Etherion Eco-Village Minutes & Newsletter * * Community Membership Guidelines * * Communities Directory Listing * * "Ning" listing, with an Etherion Blog * * Kin's Domain listing * * Weebly Website, with the Etherion Forum, join now!
* * Eco-Villages Portal, Highly Recommended Browsing! * * Past Wholistic Cinema Events * Other Past Events (psychic, workshops, etc) Links on this page: ETHERION INTENTIONAL COMMUNITY PROPOSAL Etherion Vision Statement Article * "Eco-Villages and Anastasia's "Truth" about rising seas" SHARE A PIECE OF PARADISE 2007 Community Invocation Community Guidelines Letter to Virgin Corporate / Richard Branson Drugs & Alcohol Debate Animals, Pets, Slaughter, Meat Consumption Debate UNITS TO JOIN THIS INTENTIONAL COMMUNITY NOW BEING OFFERED Please contact George Neo at Magpie House on 03 9752 5838 or send email * Top of Page * * to MAGPIE HOUSE * Homestead in May......
& a magnificent autumn sunset. Many permanent waterholes. Round the Bend » Home. Co-operative Living Info - Communities - Vic.