Another Saturday, another drive up to Avalon. This time with a friend of mine in the van along with Merlin. Bit of a tight squeeze to be honest and not sure anyone enjoyed this trip. But we were productive. Planted a Rowan tree I’d bought as a bit of a ‘new owner’ marker, used my new axe to at least get a decent sized log off the ground and onto my makeshift wood pile, moved a pair of nice treestumps to the stone outcropping, pulled some more wire from the pond and most importantly I spoke to the local builder who’s going to come back with an estimate for doing the driveway access with parking for a car and caravan, extending and dredging the pond and tidying up the stream. We’re aiming to get this all done by spring.

We took a break before the builder arrived, planning to head to Gula Huset for their excellent buffet lunch, but they’re closed Saturday lunchtimes. So we went into Brålanda without much sucsess. The pizza place isn’t dog friendly, the Thai place looked closed. So we ended up with roastbeef & potato salad sandwiches from ICA on a park bench.

I’ve been reading a lot online and using ChatGPT for planning, scoping and understanding the land, but this also marked the start of my more detailed reading into Permaculture. It’s going to be a long time before I’m in a state to start growing in a thoughtful way, but already I can see raspberry plants growing in the newly opened areas, I’ve got at least two apple trees and there are a few other berries and if the AI too I’ve used is right, there’s even Hazel so I may have some nuts. I’ve started simply with “Permaculture Gardening for the Absolute Beginner” and “Building Natural Ponds” The first to give me at least a kindergarden understanding of plants which I’m currently lacking and the second because I’ve already committed to doubling the size of my pond so I should make an effort to make it a nice pond rather than a stagnant body of water!

Having met the builder, it’s looking promising to have a cleared up, cleaned out stream with larger catchment pond at its end as well as properly clearing out the existing pond of its sludge and barbed wire and doubling its size. If i can get the balance right, it will be a lovely feature piece. Finally he’s going to build the road access and parking for a van and caravan stopping before we hit the rise. We need the council to respond to my request for information to confirm the currently approved location for the access road and then he’ll have it done before spring, giving me time to get a tow-bar added to my van and find a good condition, cheap caravan to use as a base for working on Avalon.