Rain, rain, and more rain! That was basically the first 18 months after purchasing the piece of land that we named Khemeia Valley. The rain washed away bridges, our new dam (three times), access ways, and caused all kinds of muddy chaos and long delays as we tried to make a home on an ex-beef farm that had nothing more than an old leaky shack. For quite a large chunk of this time we also couldn’t make the three hour trip north to Khemeia Valley due to ‘borders’ which was rather frustrating, especially as our move date loomed and we had nothing more than a tent, a long drop with fairy lights, and some big ideas waiting for us.
Luckily, as life tends to do, things all came together (along with a shit tonne of hard work and many weekends camping in the pouring rain) in the last moments and two years on (March 2023) we moved up to Khemeia Valley and was able to call it home. We have since upgraded from the tent, to a caravan, and now progressed to a small sleeping cabin next to a shed which has all the amenities while we are waiting for our new rammed earth home to be built early next year.
Since we have been on this whenua we have started a food forest, put in a massive free range chicken run, planted thousands of native trees, put in and implemented pest management plans, built a fully off-grid shed, sleeping cabins and a home school room, started putting in all the infrastructure for our future plans, and are about ready to launch our business so we can continue manifesting our dreams into this reality.
We have learnt a huge amount over the last two years and we are sure that this will continue as we follow our vision, push out of our comfort zones, and follow our intuition while co-creating with this land. Thanks to everyone that has been a part of this journey so far and we can’t wait to see where it takes us and all the amazing people that we are yet to meet.
Alchemy definitely awaits!