Harmony Gardens is Off Grid!
It is a beautiful autumn here in the Hawkes Bay, and the changing colours of the trees and orchards are stunning. Here at Harmony Gardens and Grub Ltd, we have been blessed with a permanent spot to live and build our gardens, and we have been extra-blessed with a transition into off-grid living!.
Off grid living can mean many different things for people, and it doesn’t have to be totally off grid all at once. There are many ways to incorporate off-grid principles into your lifestyle, no matter where you live. A friend who lived in town, created her own fresh-water rain tank for her garden, and her she-shed, using the shed roof rain water run off - this is a great way to have a bit of off-grid style in town! It doesn’t have to be full blown off grid in the middle of nowhere with no facilities, it can be a step at a time, whatever you can manage.
You could start with a solar panel on your shed, or try camping in a self-contained van to get the off-grid lifestyle ( if it gets too much, you can rent a powered site and hook up to the campground power box! ). Try making rainbutts to collect your fresh rain water, and try cooking on fires outdoors. If you want to make a big change, consider heating your home with a wood burner, which has a wetback attached - this is an incredibly efficient way to heat your home, keep it dry and heat your water, all at the same time. Imagine the savings on power bills! It is also much healthier than heat pumps.
For us it means living tiny and mobile, being powered by solar panels, using gas and wood burning fire for cooking, and using water from the creek and the rain. We have been super-blessed with the most amazing landlords on the planet, who have not only planned and organised the transition, but have also done the heavy lifting, fitting and fixing! 🙏
The Hawkes Bay is a great place for solar, as it gets a lot of sunlight, even during winter season. It will be a learning curve to run the system, and learn how it copes with various appliances, especially as we go into winter. However, it is also very liberating, and very empowering (😜) to be generating power. It can be a bit scary and daunting to make such a change, but it is definitely worth it
It has been an amazing project, and we are so grateful to have this opportunity to live the off grid, self sufficient dream. The kitchen is now producing roast chicken cooked in a crockpot on the wood burner (this is made into a Green Fairy dish by using cbd-leaf-infused solid coconut oil for cooking), and highly nutritious chicken bone broth, also slow cooked on the wood burner. This is a great addition to our diet, and fantastic for immune support, especially during seasonal change and colder weather. Slow cooking is way better for nutritional value in food than fast cooking, and it is also much tastier.
Here at Harmony Gardens and Grub, we are always learning and transitioning. I often am inspired by people who live off grid full time, and do it comfortably and efficiently, and I have to remember that it takes time and a lot of learning to achieve this. We are all going at our own pace, but it is amazing how much off-grid-ness you can incorporate into your life.
If you have favourite off-grid stories that you would like to share, please forward them to:
🌻🌅☘️
