Guide to retreat on our land

Sometimes we leave the land for long periods of time and we'd like to make it available for people to do meditation retreat there while we're away. It's really difficult to find places that are comfortable to live but have practically no distractions. This article is intended to become a guide for living at our place since it's off-grid and has various aspects that will be unfamiliar to those used to normal residential living.

Groceries

• Every month or so
• The path to Vaca Velha
• Storing vegetables and fruit
• an average shopping list

Water

• we use river or rain water for washing, well or spring for drinking
• using the well
• maneco's spring
• the rain water is probly ok to drink if other sources are unavailable - maybe clean out the tank first and ensure the roof is clean
• in absolute emergency (e.g. no rain, well dry and maneco's spring not working) you can use the river water, but you should boil it first
• to boil water, use the fire not gas as you should do a whole 20L bottle. Best to use one that's already got at least a couple of litres in it so that the newly added boiling water mixes with cold water to avoid boiling water affecting the plastic. Use the cast iron kettle for boiling water on the fire, the blue kettle is for gas. The cast iron kettle should be washed first as rust builds up inside it.
• collecting rain water for the plants in dry season

Toilet

• pee in the garden, either water down and pour on veges, or just pee around the ferns, but do in a different place each time to avoid odour
• dry toilet empty in one composter until full, then empty the other to start using that one
• when emptying a full compost compartment, use for the fruit trees not the vege patch
• the best material for the dry toilet is dried grass clippings from cutting the shorter grass around the house, rake into wide low piles and let them dry for a couple of sunny days, then collect into sacks
• ensure the sacks have wood on top so that mice don't make nests in them
• it's good to leave the toilet door open during the day to avoid mould accumulating on the walls

Power

• you need to be sensible with power usage, about 200 watt-hours per day is average. In summer you can use twice this, but sometimes in winter you have weeks where all days are

quite dark and you will likely have to ration power sometimes. In emergencies there is the petrol generator. You can also charge computer and phone in Maneco's barn if you need to.

• there are two connection schemes for the panels one for dark days and one for light days. On dark days it's better that the panels are arranged to give 30v output instead of 20v because when it's a dark day they'll drop to about 60% voltage which is too low for a PWM type controller to be able to charge a 12v battery. See our power project for more
• to learn the general components

Internet

• remember to switch the router off - has a light to remind that it's on
• if problems, check the signal and connection to the router at 192.168.1.1
• connection is usually too slow for youtube etc - this is usually due to Vivo not the signal
• only 4GB per month, then cuts down to 128Kbps