Coup de coeur #11: Canarico

(A series of "Pierre, what do they not have" posts)

Here is another Spanish mill that was restored by an English owner. Only mad dogs and Englishman stay on the beach in the full sun, and the same is true for restoring old buildings. This one is done very nicely and sympathetic.

200-year-old, in production till around half 20th century, then abandoned 50 years, then restored as a (beautiful) house.

It is located at the end of a rambla, near it's water source. The source is an aquifer that is tapped about 300 meters from the house, and collected in an olympic size swimming pool, right behind the house. The trapezium shaped aqueduct then channels the water to the mill, where it drops down some 10 meters.

This house does have tap drinking water, but it is right on the edge of the electric power grid. The owners decided that they would use solar panels and batteries instead of connecting up to the grid. I'm an engineer, I like that.

As for the buts: a few things. First of all, you both need to fall in like with a place if you're two people. One of us was not as charmed as the other. That makes it difficult to proceed.

Two: we had hoped the water source that ran the mill in the past would be available to the owner of the mill as well. Not to run the mill as a mill, but for irrigation of the garden, trees, etc. Perhaps to just fill the reservoir and use it as that olympic size swimming pool. Alas. The water still runs through the mill, although it's more a trickle than a stream at the time we visited (January), but the owner of the mill has no rights to the water at all. It's owned by the community. As is the big reservoir. The reservoir is not really maintained, it's just full of reeds. I would have loved to take care of it, but that requires careful communication with the people there. And if you get there as a foreigner it will take a while till they trust you, and know that you will not waste (their) water.

The power situation is okay for daily life. The batteries will allow you to run computers, refrigerator, lights, television etc as you are used to. The only things you need to compromise on are high power devices like boilers, electric ovens, washing machines and the like. You cannot run a big 3kW oven on a battery system, or heat water electrically in a washing machine. You will need a hot-fill washing machine, and use a solar boiler for hot water.

Perhaps the number of solar panels can be increased, and the number of batteries, although that requires a new converter too, here.

No garage. Can be built, but an existing one would have been nice.

We planned to get back here for a second viewing, but an "off" prawn prevented that, and we were already leaning towards the house we now have.

The mill is still for sale, here. Do pick it up, it is a beautiful place. I don't know why they stress the "B&B", it's simply a great house for a family. And located in the Cabo de Gata nature reserve.

Coup de coeur #10: Finca Leonardo

(A series of "Pierre, what do they not have" posts)

End of 2014 we had some doubts about winter in France again, and diverted our attention to the Canary Islands. We know Gran Canaria, Lanzarote, La Gomera, but had not been to Tenerife.

And on Tenerife we found this place, a finca with not little land, and irrigation water. Edge of town, quite high up, above Arafo: Finca Leonardo.

The colour is not what we would prefer ourselves, but seeing other houses, white paint is available on Tenerife.

This finca was listed on quite a few estate agent web sites, with wildly varying prices. Apparently it had been for sale quite a while, seeing early adverts with date, about two years ago. And we found the house on a house swap website as well. Oh, that is still online too, here, but at a much higher price.

Isn't this a holiday snap? And isn't that view gorgeous? Where's the white wine?

This is what you can find with Street View, apparently taken a while before the photo above, where the basin is painted white.

A bit less jolly, maybe because of the grey sky, and the rainy atmosphere. But there is a basin in the roof terrace, that could be a lovely dipping pool!

Alas, a few weeks later, by the time we figured out it might be an interesting place to live, the place appeared to have been long sold. At least 6 months prior. You can still find it online, one and a half years later. Like here, and here. And here!, €70.000 price reduction!! Hm.

So this view will not be ours either. Nor the hundreds of avocado trees.

Coup de coeur #9: Serena

(A series of "Pierre, what do they not have" posts)

The filature was the last house in France we visited, in May 2015, before we decided that we'd look further south, and try the south of Spain. To my surprise that is an area that has very many watermills, even though there are no true rivers, and very little rainfall. The region does have very big "aquifers", underground water reservoirs, that were tapped and used for irrigation, and to run watermills.

Those mills are not the kind you see in France, with a big paddle wheel dipped in a river, happily paddling along. The mills in Spain all have an individual reservoir above a horizontal waterwheel that is slowly filled, and is emptied on the wheel on demand. That reservoir can be filled slowly with an aqueduct, and allows the miller to do his work for about 15-20 minutes.

The picture is the Molino de Serena, not far from Bédar, sitting in a valley of it's own, really private and peaceful and quiet. An irrigation canal supplies the mill with water, as it does to irrigate the citrus field that belongs to this property too.

Lovely view away from the house. Can you hear the birds?

For us the location is absolutely lovely, it has much of what we want. Peace and quiet, a lot of space, no direct neighbours, irrigation water, and quite a big house (200m2+).

There are "but"s here, too. The house is big, but the space is divided into a lot of tiny rooms on three levels. There is only one room in the house, on the first floor, that has a decent size. The kitchen on the ground floor is not usable for us, the ceiling is only 2 meters. This is a house that was built year by year, room by room, as more space was needed by the then owners, the available skills, and materials. So there is an eclectic mix of techniques. We've tried very hard so visualize how to better the layout, and even went as far as to ask an architect if the cellar could be converted to a garage, and if some walls could be removed. All in all, we finally decided it was a step too far, even though the location is A++.

It was cheaper than the house we finally bought, but with the work needed to make the house nice(r) we estimated the cost would be the same. And still the house would not be really our taste, as we prefer big open spaces.

It's still for sale as far as I know: http://www.olivehouse-es.com/property_sales/listings/l0806.html

Their fault!

Of course I blame my parents. But, in a caring way.

My parents abandoned me in my early twenties, because they were lucky enough to be able to stop working at 55, and moved to Australia, as you do. (Civil service in those days...) However, I had a good job, something with computers and programming, which was nice. And stayed.

The Netherlands is a really nice country for working, and living while working. But, summers are short, and usually cool and wet. At the same time we enjoy a long winter, that is also cool and wet. I'm not fond of cool and wet.

While on vacation in the Canary Islands, in December, long ago, I realised that when the weather in Holland is nasty, there are always places on Earth where people are in the sun, having cocktails on a sunny terrace, and are dining al fresco. And even late at night it's great outside. I knew I wanted that.

Early in the naughties tv series started like "A Place In The Sun", "Escape to the Continent", "Droomhuis Gezocht" ("Dream house wanted"), "Ik vertrek" ("I'm leaving") where they film a couple wanting to start a new life abroad. Usually without enough money, not speaking the language, and not terribly organised, starting a B&B without knowing how to make a bed, or cook for guests, getting pregnant at the wrong moment, etc etc. Else it is not amusing for the viewers. We want drama. Of course we want drama! As long as the drama concerns other people, obviously.

However, those programs did give us an idea of property prices abroad, and our possibilities. The more south you go, the lower house prices are, if you skip the Provence and the Côte d'Azur and silly places like that. Selling our house leaves enough funds to buy a place down south, AND enough money to bridge the years left before retirement and pension money... Why work till you are 67? Perhaps that nasty mr. Brinkhorst likes to work till he dies, bragging about it, but we don't. There is more in life than work. Well, there can be. My folx are proof of that. (And, we don't plan pregnancies or B&B's.)

We looked at places in France for properties where you have peace and quiet, no airplanes, no motor cycles, no sports planes circling above your head like irritating bluebottles, no neighbours unable to play the piano and with a trampoline in the house. And preferably a bit more self-sustaining energy and food wise. So, heating with own firewood, electricity from solar panels. Or, find an old watermill, restore it's function, and generate our own electricity that way. Being an electrical engineer, I can do that.

Well, France was not kind to us. There are lots of interesting places advertised on the internet, on sites like www.green-acres.com. (I'll show you some houses we were interested in over the years, but later.) However, French estate agents refuse to tell you where a house is, exactly. If they reply to your email at ALL.

We know France in summer. While visiting some places while out of season we found out that we had too positive an opinion on France's climate. In winter it's as wet and cold as back home. The summer season is indeed a bit longer, and there are nice days in winter, too, but overall it's not that great.

So we gave up on France, after a few years.

Canary Islands, after all? Over our budget, often, and the properties are not big and self-sustaining. Though the Lanzarote blog grannyp.blogspot.com drew me towards the Canaries still...
Italy? Too... complicated.
Greece? Nice, but you never know if it will stay with Europe.
Cyprus? Very nice, too. But.
Portugal and Spain mainland only presented themselves when brought up by "pensionado" friends who went there quite often, in winter. Well, we are not exactly Marbella, Torremolinos or even Ibiza people, but we started to realise that if you look inland a few kilometers you may find peace and quiet, a wonderful climate, and a lower price level for both house and living.

We found a house, in the south of Spain, in Almeria. A 200-year-old watermill, with those nice and thick stone walls we always wanted (thank you again grannyp.blogspot.com!). However, without any water to run the mill, but with agricultural water to irrigate the garden.

We are now working on actually moving there, as soon as we can. Probably somewhere Q3 2016. Exactly the same year in life as my parents.

The house also came with a single mum dog, ticks, lice, and six puppies. More on that, and other things, past present and future, later.

And yes, my parents and sister are all still happily living in Australia, 30 years later.