Sustainable tropical journey
Our tropical farm lot\nWe bought a 2 hectare (approximately 5.5 acres) farm in Luzviminda,\n Puerto Princesa, Palawan\n, Philippines. When I first posted this blog, only the pumphouse was being built, we have since built a large barn and now live in an apartment above it.
\n\n\nOur dream is to be as off the grid and as self sustaining as we possibly can. Dave is using green technology such as solar lighting along with using as many native materials as possible. We have 5 bamboo groves on the property and have been able to selectively harvest enough to use as the siding on the native pump house.
\n\n\nWe are using recycled materials such as broken tiles and bamboo scraps for towel rods and cupboard handles, which the carpenters used to burn! Eventually I want to try my hand at aeropoincs gardening. This should save on water and soil.\n\n\nWe have begun installation harvest rain, recycle grey water, use worms (as in vermiculture) to process household wastes and grow all our own food via organic farming practices using compost made by worms. Oh! And we also drive electric motorcycles, e-trikes and use an electric farm vehicle the we call the electric carabao (water buffalo).
\n\n\nThis blog is how we started with the pump house cottage which was also used as the first shower house and eating area while we planned our next move.\n\n\nBecause we live so far out of town, it\'s difficult sometimes to get supplies delivered here, so the next building was a large barn to store the materials out of the rain. It was so big that we decided too put an apartment upstairs so that when we build the ain house, we will be on premise to monitor the workers.
Sometimes things aren\'t always put where you told then to, like wallks and plumbing!!\n\n\nHand dug water well\nThey hit water at 50 feet\n\n\nJuly 21, 2010 - Before we did anything, we realized we needed running water; our own water source. Our caretaker was walking 1/2 kilometers to a well and carrying buckets back to wash dishes with and to bathe in!\n\n\nThis is drilling for water the hard way. One of the problems of building out so far from the city is skilled labor and hi tech equipment.
One chap from the barangay came by and offered his services, so we went with him. He and I both witched for water using his metal roads and this is one of the two spots we found. There were so many rocks in the way it took them a week to find water, but at 50 feet we finally struck gold as it were.
Our first step in self sufficiency! Not to mention, ever so much easier on our caretaker than walking half a Km to the community water well and lugging installation plastic jugs back!\n\n\nHand pump installed\nwith a 3X3 m cement slab\n\n\nAug. 6, 2010 - This is the first step we took. After inspection, we decided that we would extend the cement slab to 16X16 meters and build a native shack around it.
There is nothing but the caretakers\' cottage on the farm. Nowhere for us to sit in the shade except right next to their hut. We decided to expand the slab so the hut would not only house the water well equipment, but could also offer a private shower area for us and small veranda to sit in out of the sun and away from the caretakers cottage so we could have a little privacy.
\n\n\nOur electric tricycles are parked under the stairs. This blog has gotten out of sequence but how we started with the pumphouse is still here to show the progression. The original pumphouse featured here, far left thatched roof is now 2 years old.
\n\n\nThis deck leads to our apartment built above our converted barn. Dave had an all bamboo playset made for our 4 year old daughter Alysha. It\'s a swing, slide, sandbox and little covered upper deck.
All the bamboo was from our groves.
\nThe native hut on the left is the one that I have featured being built on this page. It\'s now two years old!\n\n\nThe plants grow so fast around here. We have added more solar panels on the main roof (not shown) which runs all of the lighting.
After three years, we had to change the native nipa thatch on the pump house. We have now covered it in netting to keep the chickens from scratching at it.\nCompared to January 2012 the plants in front are so much bigger.
\n\n\nThis is the view from my front steps. Far left is one of the benches on the landing to steps going to our personal apartment and my native office deck. This was a muddy walk to the pump house and animal shelter.
We put in the bamboo couch bench as well as a bamboo roof to protect it. We now have a nice outdoors sitting area.\nWe put in a bamboo raised pathway to get off the mud, and the rains can still drain under it.
No more much going to feed the animals.
\n\n\nThis is where I work from.
This is what the deck looks like inside.
It\'s at tree level so when I look out from my deck, all I see is green. For the sake of expediency, as we were in a hurry to move in, we just wrapped green house netting all around it to keep the bugs metal out! I had them make the traditional slatted bamboo floors so it would stay cool and also, it comforts me with a flood of lovely childhood memories.\n\n\nWe have so many coconuts on the property, we drink a lot of coconut water from the green coconuts, and coconut milk in curries, I decided we might as well try to make our own Virgin Coconut Oil or VCO.
\nIt took 10 coconuts to make the 2 bottles in the photo. I now know why it\'s so expensive! However, with the waste products we make orchid holders from the husks, bowls and lamp shades from the hard shells, the water that separates from the milk can be fermented into vinegar and the grated and pressed coconut meat is used as a soil conditioner and feed for our chickens who love it.\n\n\nWe live on an island, as such, it has limited capacity for trash.
With the hundreds of thousands of tourists arriving to metal see the \nUnderground River\n, the sale of water in plastic bottles has escalated. We are trying to recycle as much as we can. The use of plastic bottles as hanging planters was an idea I got off Facebook and felt it was a good use of the bottles.
Plus the local school has become interested in teaching the children to do this and has become a school project as well.\n\n\nNipa roofing being used by our carpenters with rattan twine.\n\n\nBamboo poles\nfor siding\nAre from our own bamboo groves.
They are making them into strips for the siding for the pump house. One problem with bamboo if it isn\'t treated for termites, it that is eaten fast! One way to preserve the bamboo is to soak it in sea water for a month. We might have to build a trough to soak them in salt water since we don\'t have beachfront property where we could keep an eye out on the bamboo while they soak.
\n\n\nAka arundinacea giant thorny bamboo. It turns out our bamboo grove is called thorny bamboo. Some of the best bamboo around for building.
Talk about sustainable.
The shoots are edible, the walls are thick and planted as a fence are impenetrable because of the thorny stalks. The leaves are emetic for worms and the thorny stems are used to make paper! The bamboo stalks can grow to 150 feet tall.\nIf we are careful, our 5 groves will continue to give us wood to build our huts with.
During the rainy season, I have literally watched the new sprouts grow over a foot a day!\n\n\nCoconut water\nor Buko juice from our own coconut trees\n\n\nCoconut water, or locally known as Buko juice, is the purest liquid second only to water itself. It is chock full of electrolytes, calcium, potassium, magnesium; everything that is good for you.\n\n\nSept. 15, 2010 - The wood is all local and the bamboo for the siding is from our own groves.
Dave put up the solar panels so there would be lighting inside the hut at night. There are two 12 volt, energy efficient bulbs, they run all night and run off batteries Dave recycled. He found out that car and motorcycle batterries put out quite enough energy from the solar panels do to that job! So don\'t be throwing away those car batteries folks Use them to light your own areas with solar.
That\'s a big savings in upfront cost right there!\n\n\nTwo more to go...Made with the bamboo from our own groves.\n\n\nAfter we put in the well and had water with a hand pump, we wanted to attach an electrical motor and water tank, but with the ability to switch back to hand pump in a brown out. Then since we had to put up a building over the motor, we decided to expand it to accommodate an enclosed shower area the well is exposed to the street.
This way we could clean up at the end of the day, in privacy and a dry place to change clothes in.\nWe also didn\'t have a place away from the caretakers cottage so we expanded the building to the back so we could have a veranda to relax at in the shade.\n\n\nThe shower stall just needs the bamboo sprayed with anti termite stuff and then lacquered so the water doesn\'t water it so fast.
\n\n\nI put the sink outside the shower room so someone could brush their teeth or wash hands while someone else was taking a shower. The whole pump house is lit by solar lighting.\n\n\nJune - 2012 -We found these new solar LED light bulbs in town.
They are rated at 5 watts.
When we installed them and turned them on one night, they turned out to be brighter than our energy saving electric bulbs! We have now installed about 6 of them all over the property. They use so little of our battery storage that I can run one over my desk all day now instead of the electric powered bulb! Yay!\n\n\nPump house is now 3/4 complete! Yahoo...interior windows, wall and doors next!\n\n\nJust a few last touches and it\'s ready for us to hang out in soon!\n\n\nOct.
9- 2010 -Finally done! Mostly! The cement floor was just stained with red cement dye. We recycled some broken tiles and used them on the sink and the shower room. The bamboo siding was hand cut from our grove by the local carpenters and placed using my design.
Window leads to the shower area.
In the background are solar path lights leading to the caretaker\'s cottage. This is pretty much done now. Only thing lacking are the cabinet doors for under the sink.\nThere is now a covered couch bench on the side of the pump house and a bamboo walkway.
How different it looks now only three years later!\n\n\nHanging door decoration made from recycled tetra packs. Made by our bamboo worker\'s wife from the bags of chip snacks they eat and seeds they find on their property. I am going to have her teach others in the village, buy them from her and sell them.
Already have orders for them!\n\n\nBamboo shower door from our own grove\nInside door to shower. I wanted the materials to come from our own land, so this took longer than just buying a ready made door. Turned out nicely eh? The siding is pre made and sold most everyhwhere, but also from locally grown materials, and then made in Puerto Princesa, Palawan.
The floor is just cement with red cement dye.\n\n\nWe used recycled broken tiles for the shower stall. I gave the workers my ideas and they executed it.
There is no grout yet though.
Tile cost was about 6.
52 USD for all the tiles for the shower and sink area with leftovers for something else too. Bought from the local hardware store.\n\n\nThis is the one area I couldn\'t wait for to be done. We finally have a little spot in the shade to contemplate our next move and someplace to wash our face and hands at the end of the day.
We have little portable butane cookers to set on the counter so now we can make hot coffee or tea or even make a meal. Inside the hut is the shower area so we can clean off after getting dirty all day and not have to wait to go home to clean up.\nSince we couldn\'t just go out and buy cabinet doors that looked like these, they had to make all the pieces from scratch out of bamboo poles from our grove! Same with the siding on three of the sides facing the street.
The back wall where the sink is, faces the back of the property, so we just had pre-made siding put up there to expedite things a bit!\n\n\nFront view of cupboards\nThe local carpenters made the cupboard handles from bamboo scraps after I showed them how to. The floor was left cement with terracotta colored dye added to it. This is just a closer up view of the recycled tile sink and cupboards.
\n\n\nBamboo hut from Westside\nThe door to the hut done!\nsink in on the other side of patio. Can\'t wait to hang out on the little patio area and plan the next building. Solar lights line the path to the caretakers hut.
\n\n\nThe pump house has changed so much.
It now has bamboo tables and the plants! I can\'t even believe how much they have grown in 6 monhs! We have since built a barm, which was so tall and wide, we dedicded to build a loft apartment above it and added a native deck made of cogon thatch.\n\n\nWe built a barn to house the supplies, which aren\'t always easy to come by, to protect them from the rain. We overbuilt it so much that we have also added a loft apartment above the workshop.
Dowstairs there is now an enclosed kithen, shower and commode.\nWe added a kitchen down in the workshop area, a commode, and kithchen initially so we would be comfortable on day trips. But after building those, we saw the potential to build an apartment above the work area.
\n\n\nThis is the front porch now.
We added some finishing touches like putting backs on the steps to the benched landing on staircase. This was so our shoes wouldn\'t keep falling down to the ground when we took them off and some decorative bamboo fascia on the benches.\nThe original pump house in in back on the left.
So much has grown in less than two years as far as plants go!\n\n\nSeasonal creek at the farm in Luzviminda, Puerto Princessa, Palawan, Philippines\n\n\nDec- 2012 -We do get relatively quite a few electrical brownouts here. This was taken during one of those times. We hardly feel it. Our place uses LED light bulbs and LED strip/rope lights as well.
\n\n\nOur own bananas\nSaba cooking bananas\nThese will be ready soon..yummy. I was pleased to see that we already had a small crop of cooking bananas on the farm. I have watched these grow with great anticipation.
They are good caramalized with mascovado natural sugar! Or rolled in lumpia wrappers and fried, then coated with caramalized sugar. All bananas are a good source of natural potassium.\n\n\nWell we did put in a small tilipia fish pond.
We can now enjoy fresh fish any time.
We want to hook this up to an aeroponics system one of these days if we could even get anyone to help us out with it.\nIn the meantime, we get fresh fish when we want it without having to buy from the fishermen or wet market.\nDecember 2012\n\n\nOkra grown on our farm.
\nWhen we bought the farm, the caretakers had a lot of okra planted which they had to leave for us. We have had okra every which way you can, including raw in salads. Good thing I love okra so much.\n\n\nHome grown chili peppers with clams\nThere is a clam vendor on the way to the farm.
I always buy a few kilos to share with guests and the workers. This day I sautéd onions, garlic, ginger and chili pepper volunteers from the wild garden then tossed in the clams. The master broth at the end of cooking the clams was so tasty with rice!\n\n\nThis heart-shaped, orange-yellow summer fruit is said to be one of the best sources of vitamin A.
Eating tiessa is like eating boiled kamote (sweet potatoes), given its fibrous, sticky texture and thick flesh. It\'s very sweet, even sweeter than the local camote or sweet potato\n\n\nWe had a space beside the first building, the pump house which wasn\'t being used. Since we don\'t really have a comfortable area to sit outside, I had our carpenters build me a covered bench area.
It is near the animal house we constructed next to the pump house so I can listen to the myna bird sing and talk all day,\nThe window in back of couch is the window to the original pump house which has been recently converted to a laundry room and still has the original broken tile floor which is Dave\'s shower room.\nTo the right is the add on to the original pump house with the bamboo bench table in front of the animal house.\n\n\nMy mom gave me this hen and 4 chicks.
There was a little chicken coop left over by the previous tenants so it seemed logical to put them in there. Unfortunately, a snake came along and ate the 2 day old chicks in front of this hen. She was so traumatized that when she laid her eggs again, she laid them in back of the caretakers chacoal cooker She has since hatched them and takes them about the farm during the day, but at night she wants back in the native hut!\n\n\nIt showed up over a month ago with a broken foot.
We could never catch it to fix the foot.
Now it won\'t leave the property and unfotunately the foot has healed in the backward position. Poor thing. It doesn\'t seem in pain anymore but it knows it\'s safe on our farm.\n\n\nJune 2010- We took the \neTrike\n to the farm this day.
The Mangingisda pier is just a few minutes from the farm in Luzviminda. In June it was so hot we drove drive down to the dock to cool off. Although there are bangka\'s plying the place, the water was crystal clear emerald green with white sand below.
We have been told there is a white beach near by as well but we haven\'t had a chance to discover it.\nThere are motorized pump boats that take passengers to Puerto Princesa Baywalk pier every hour on the hour from this dock.\n\n\nFor convenience, I separated the shower, commode and sink into three parts.
This way since it\'s a shared space, someone could go potty, wash hands and shower without bothering or waiting for any one. You can\'t see the shower room but it\'s next door to the commode area.\n\n\nSince we are in the discovery period, please send us links or make helpful
\n\n\nOur dream is to be as off the grid and as self sustaining as we possibly can. Dave is using green technology such as solar lighting along with using as many native materials as possible. We have 5 bamboo groves on the property and have been able to selectively harvest enough to use as the siding on the native pump house.
\n\n\nWe are using recycled materials such as broken tiles and bamboo scraps for towel rods and cupboard handles, which the carpenters used to burn! Eventually I want to try my hand at aeropoincs gardening. This should save on water and soil.\n\n\nWe have begun installation harvest rain, recycle grey water, use worms (as in vermiculture) to process household wastes and grow all our own food via organic farming practices using compost made by worms. Oh! And we also drive electric motorcycles, e-trikes and use an electric farm vehicle the we call the electric carabao (water buffalo).
\n\n\nThis blog is how we started with the pump house cottage which was also used as the first shower house and eating area while we planned our next move.\n\n\nBecause we live so far out of town, it\'s difficult sometimes to get supplies delivered here, so the next building was a large barn to store the materials out of the rain. It was so big that we decided too put an apartment upstairs so that when we build the ain house, we will be on premise to monitor the workers.
Sometimes things aren\'t always put where you told then to, like wallks and plumbing!!\n\n\nHand dug water well\nThey hit water at 50 feet\n\n\nJuly 21, 2010 - Before we did anything, we realized we needed running water; our own water source. Our caretaker was walking 1/2 kilometers to a well and carrying buckets back to wash dishes with and to bathe in!\n\n\nThis is drilling for water the hard way. One of the problems of building out so far from the city is skilled labor and hi tech equipment.
One chap from the barangay came by and offered his services, so we went with him. He and I both witched for water using his metal roads and this is one of the two spots we found. There were so many rocks in the way it took them a week to find water, but at 50 feet we finally struck gold as it were.
Our first step in self sufficiency! Not to mention, ever so much easier on our caretaker than walking half a Km to the community water well and lugging installation plastic jugs back!\n\n\nHand pump installed\nwith a 3X3 m cement slab\n\n\nAug. 6, 2010 - This is the first step we took. After inspection, we decided that we would extend the cement slab to 16X16 meters and build a native shack around it.
There is nothing but the caretakers\' cottage on the farm. Nowhere for us to sit in the shade except right next to their hut. We decided to expand the slab so the hut would not only house the water well equipment, but could also offer a private shower area for us and small veranda to sit in out of the sun and away from the caretakers cottage so we could have a little privacy.
\n\n\nOur electric tricycles are parked under the stairs. This blog has gotten out of sequence but how we started with the pumphouse is still here to show the progression. The original pumphouse featured here, far left thatched roof is now 2 years old.
\n\n\nThis deck leads to our apartment built above our converted barn. Dave had an all bamboo playset made for our 4 year old daughter Alysha. It\'s a swing, slide, sandbox and little covered upper deck.
All the bamboo was from our groves.
\nThe native hut on the left is the one that I have featured being built on this page. It\'s now two years old!\n\n\nThe plants grow so fast around here. We have added more solar panels on the main roof (not shown) which runs all of the lighting.
After three years, we had to change the native nipa thatch on the pump house. We have now covered it in netting to keep the chickens from scratching at it.\nCompared to January 2012 the plants in front are so much bigger.
\n\n\nThis is the view from my front steps. Far left is one of the benches on the landing to steps going to our personal apartment and my native office deck. This was a muddy walk to the pump house and animal shelter.
We put in the bamboo couch bench as well as a bamboo roof to protect it. We now have a nice outdoors sitting area.\nWe put in a bamboo raised pathway to get off the mud, and the rains can still drain under it.
No more much going to feed the animals.
\n\n\nThis is where I work from.
This is what the deck looks like inside.
It\'s at tree level so when I look out from my deck, all I see is green. For the sake of expediency, as we were in a hurry to move in, we just wrapped green house netting all around it to keep the bugs metal out! I had them make the traditional slatted bamboo floors so it would stay cool and also, it comforts me with a flood of lovely childhood memories.\n\n\nWe have so many coconuts on the property, we drink a lot of coconut water from the green coconuts, and coconut milk in curries, I decided we might as well try to make our own Virgin Coconut Oil or VCO.
\nIt took 10 coconuts to make the 2 bottles in the photo. I now know why it\'s so expensive! However, with the waste products we make orchid holders from the husks, bowls and lamp shades from the hard shells, the water that separates from the milk can be fermented into vinegar and the grated and pressed coconut meat is used as a soil conditioner and feed for our chickens who love it.\n\n\nWe live on an island, as such, it has limited capacity for trash.
With the hundreds of thousands of tourists arriving to metal see the \nUnderground River\n, the sale of water in plastic bottles has escalated. We are trying to recycle as much as we can. The use of plastic bottles as hanging planters was an idea I got off Facebook and felt it was a good use of the bottles.
Plus the local school has become interested in teaching the children to do this and has become a school project as well.\n\n\nNipa roofing being used by our carpenters with rattan twine.\n\n\nBamboo poles\nfor siding\nAre from our own bamboo groves.
They are making them into strips for the siding for the pump house. One problem with bamboo if it isn\'t treated for termites, it that is eaten fast! One way to preserve the bamboo is to soak it in sea water for a month. We might have to build a trough to soak them in salt water since we don\'t have beachfront property where we could keep an eye out on the bamboo while they soak.
\n\n\nAka arundinacea giant thorny bamboo. It turns out our bamboo grove is called thorny bamboo. Some of the best bamboo around for building.
Talk about sustainable.
The shoots are edible, the walls are thick and planted as a fence are impenetrable because of the thorny stalks. The leaves are emetic for worms and the thorny stems are used to make paper! The bamboo stalks can grow to 150 feet tall.\nIf we are careful, our 5 groves will continue to give us wood to build our huts with.
During the rainy season, I have literally watched the new sprouts grow over a foot a day!\n\n\nCoconut water\nor Buko juice from our own coconut trees\n\n\nCoconut water, or locally known as Buko juice, is the purest liquid second only to water itself. It is chock full of electrolytes, calcium, potassium, magnesium; everything that is good for you.\n\n\nSept. 15, 2010 - The wood is all local and the bamboo for the siding is from our own groves.
Dave put up the solar panels so there would be lighting inside the hut at night. There are two 12 volt, energy efficient bulbs, they run all night and run off batteries Dave recycled. He found out that car and motorcycle batterries put out quite enough energy from the solar panels do to that job! So don\'t be throwing away those car batteries folks Use them to light your own areas with solar.
That\'s a big savings in upfront cost right there!\n\n\nTwo more to go...Made with the bamboo from our own groves.\n\n\nAfter we put in the well and had water with a hand pump, we wanted to attach an electrical motor and water tank, but with the ability to switch back to hand pump in a brown out. Then since we had to put up a building over the motor, we decided to expand it to accommodate an enclosed shower area the well is exposed to the street.
This way we could clean up at the end of the day, in privacy and a dry place to change clothes in.\nWe also didn\'t have a place away from the caretakers cottage so we expanded the building to the back so we could have a veranda to relax at in the shade.\n\n\nThe shower stall just needs the bamboo sprayed with anti termite stuff and then lacquered so the water doesn\'t water it so fast.
\n\n\nI put the sink outside the shower room so someone could brush their teeth or wash hands while someone else was taking a shower. The whole pump house is lit by solar lighting.\n\n\nJune - 2012 -We found these new solar LED light bulbs in town.
They are rated at 5 watts.
When we installed them and turned them on one night, they turned out to be brighter than our energy saving electric bulbs! We have now installed about 6 of them all over the property. They use so little of our battery storage that I can run one over my desk all day now instead of the electric powered bulb! Yay!\n\n\nPump house is now 3/4 complete! Yahoo...interior windows, wall and doors next!\n\n\nJust a few last touches and it\'s ready for us to hang out in soon!\n\n\nOct.
9- 2010 -Finally done! Mostly! The cement floor was just stained with red cement dye. We recycled some broken tiles and used them on the sink and the shower room. The bamboo siding was hand cut from our grove by the local carpenters and placed using my design.
Window leads to the shower area.
In the background are solar path lights leading to the caretaker\'s cottage. This is pretty much done now. Only thing lacking are the cabinet doors for under the sink.\nThere is now a covered couch bench on the side of the pump house and a bamboo walkway.
How different it looks now only three years later!\n\n\nHanging door decoration made from recycled tetra packs. Made by our bamboo worker\'s wife from the bags of chip snacks they eat and seeds they find on their property. I am going to have her teach others in the village, buy them from her and sell them.
Already have orders for them!\n\n\nBamboo shower door from our own grove\nInside door to shower. I wanted the materials to come from our own land, so this took longer than just buying a ready made door. Turned out nicely eh? The siding is pre made and sold most everyhwhere, but also from locally grown materials, and then made in Puerto Princesa, Palawan.
The floor is just cement with red cement dye.\n\n\nWe used recycled broken tiles for the shower stall. I gave the workers my ideas and they executed it.
There is no grout yet though.
Tile cost was about 6.
52 USD for all the tiles for the shower and sink area with leftovers for something else too. Bought from the local hardware store.\n\n\nThis is the one area I couldn\'t wait for to be done. We finally have a little spot in the shade to contemplate our next move and someplace to wash our face and hands at the end of the day.
We have little portable butane cookers to set on the counter so now we can make hot coffee or tea or even make a meal. Inside the hut is the shower area so we can clean off after getting dirty all day and not have to wait to go home to clean up.\nSince we couldn\'t just go out and buy cabinet doors that looked like these, they had to make all the pieces from scratch out of bamboo poles from our grove! Same with the siding on three of the sides facing the street.
The back wall where the sink is, faces the back of the property, so we just had pre-made siding put up there to expedite things a bit!\n\n\nFront view of cupboards\nThe local carpenters made the cupboard handles from bamboo scraps after I showed them how to. The floor was left cement with terracotta colored dye added to it. This is just a closer up view of the recycled tile sink and cupboards.
\n\n\nBamboo hut from Westside\nThe door to the hut done!\nsink in on the other side of patio. Can\'t wait to hang out on the little patio area and plan the next building. Solar lights line the path to the caretakers hut.
\n\n\nThe pump house has changed so much.
It now has bamboo tables and the plants! I can\'t even believe how much they have grown in 6 monhs! We have since built a barm, which was so tall and wide, we dedicded to build a loft apartment above it and added a native deck made of cogon thatch.\n\n\nWe built a barn to house the supplies, which aren\'t always easy to come by, to protect them from the rain. We overbuilt it so much that we have also added a loft apartment above the workshop.
Dowstairs there is now an enclosed kithen, shower and commode.\nWe added a kitchen down in the workshop area, a commode, and kithchen initially so we would be comfortable on day trips. But after building those, we saw the potential to build an apartment above the work area.
\n\n\nThis is the front porch now.
We added some finishing touches like putting backs on the steps to the benched landing on staircase. This was so our shoes wouldn\'t keep falling down to the ground when we took them off and some decorative bamboo fascia on the benches.\nThe original pump house in in back on the left.
So much has grown in less than two years as far as plants go!\n\n\nSeasonal creek at the farm in Luzviminda, Puerto Princessa, Palawan, Philippines\n\n\nDec- 2012 -We do get relatively quite a few electrical brownouts here. This was taken during one of those times. We hardly feel it. Our place uses LED light bulbs and LED strip/rope lights as well.
\n\n\nOur own bananas\nSaba cooking bananas\nThese will be ready soon..yummy. I was pleased to see that we already had a small crop of cooking bananas on the farm. I have watched these grow with great anticipation.
They are good caramalized with mascovado natural sugar! Or rolled in lumpia wrappers and fried, then coated with caramalized sugar. All bananas are a good source of natural potassium.\n\n\nWell we did put in a small tilipia fish pond.
We can now enjoy fresh fish any time.
We want to hook this up to an aeroponics system one of these days if we could even get anyone to help us out with it.\nIn the meantime, we get fresh fish when we want it without having to buy from the fishermen or wet market.\nDecember 2012\n\n\nOkra grown on our farm.
\nWhen we bought the farm, the caretakers had a lot of okra planted which they had to leave for us. We have had okra every which way you can, including raw in salads. Good thing I love okra so much.\n\n\nHome grown chili peppers with clams\nThere is a clam vendor on the way to the farm.
I always buy a few kilos to share with guests and the workers. This day I sautéd onions, garlic, ginger and chili pepper volunteers from the wild garden then tossed in the clams. The master broth at the end of cooking the clams was so tasty with rice!\n\n\nThis heart-shaped, orange-yellow summer fruit is said to be one of the best sources of vitamin A.
Eating tiessa is like eating boiled kamote (sweet potatoes), given its fibrous, sticky texture and thick flesh. It\'s very sweet, even sweeter than the local camote or sweet potato\n\n\nWe had a space beside the first building, the pump house which wasn\'t being used. Since we don\'t really have a comfortable area to sit outside, I had our carpenters build me a covered bench area.
It is near the animal house we constructed next to the pump house so I can listen to the myna bird sing and talk all day,\nThe window in back of couch is the window to the original pump house which has been recently converted to a laundry room and still has the original broken tile floor which is Dave\'s shower room.\nTo the right is the add on to the original pump house with the bamboo bench table in front of the animal house.\n\n\nMy mom gave me this hen and 4 chicks.
There was a little chicken coop left over by the previous tenants so it seemed logical to put them in there. Unfortunately, a snake came along and ate the 2 day old chicks in front of this hen. She was so traumatized that when she laid her eggs again, she laid them in back of the caretakers chacoal cooker She has since hatched them and takes them about the farm during the day, but at night she wants back in the native hut!\n\n\nIt showed up over a month ago with a broken foot.
We could never catch it to fix the foot.
Now it won\'t leave the property and unfotunately the foot has healed in the backward position. Poor thing. It doesn\'t seem in pain anymore but it knows it\'s safe on our farm.\n\n\nJune 2010- We took the \neTrike\n to the farm this day.
The Mangingisda pier is just a few minutes from the farm in Luzviminda. In June it was so hot we drove drive down to the dock to cool off. Although there are bangka\'s plying the place, the water was crystal clear emerald green with white sand below.
We have been told there is a white beach near by as well but we haven\'t had a chance to discover it.\nThere are motorized pump boats that take passengers to Puerto Princesa Baywalk pier every hour on the hour from this dock.\n\n\nFor convenience, I separated the shower, commode and sink into three parts.
This way since it\'s a shared space, someone could go potty, wash hands and shower without bothering or waiting for any one. You can\'t see the shower room but it\'s next door to the commode area.\n\n\nSince we are in the discovery period, please send us links or make helpful
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