Documentary about man living self sufficiently - Leeds festival

[PrepperJohn]

I have lived in a converted van for over a decade and loved every minute. The van has sadly passed away to the great scrapyard in the sky and we have been forced to be a little more imaginative with our accommodation (I couldn't go back to living in a house). We will be moving into a caravan in the new year once I have made it habitable.

My dream would be to find a small parcel of land off the beaten track and build a low impact round house like the ones built by Tony Wrench or Simon Dale. It would be heated with a Rocket Mass Heater. I would collect my own water and contert all waste into valuable resources. I would grow/forage/hunt/gather my own food, brew my own beer, generate my own energy and generally be less of a burden on others. I would like to engineer my life in such a way that a good percentage of shtf situations would not actually impact on my way of life.

My main concern is healthcare so I may have to earn enough money to to have some sort of health fund or insurance.

If I were to achieve all this the last thing I would do is shout about it to the media

[bigpaul]

(11 November 2012, 20:48)PrepperJohn Wrote: I have lived in a converted van for over a decade and loved every minute. The van has sadly passed away to the great scrapyard in the sky and we have been forced to be a little more imaginative with our accommodation (I couldn't go back to living in a house). We will be moving into a caravan in the new year once I have made it habitable.

My dream would be to find a small parcel of land off the beaten track and build a low impact round house like the ones built by Tony Wrench or Simon Dale. It would be heated with a Rocket Mass Heater. I would collect my own water and contert all waste into valuable resources. I would grow/forage/hunt/gather my own food, brew my own beer, generate my own energy and generally be less of a burden on others. I would like to engineer my life in such a way that a good percentage of shtf situations would not actually impact on my way of life.

My main concern is healthcare so I may have to earn enough money to to have some sort of health fund or insurance.

If I were to achieve all this the last thing I would do is shout about it to the media

this is why most preppers keep away from journo's and so called "film makers", we dont plaster our mugs over the TV for all to see!!

[Bjm]

Hi,
NR is right about what he says about eastern europe. I have a house in Bulgaria, in the country,and lived there for around
14 months, loved it and the life style is simple, hard going but rewarding. we had pigs chickens goats, learnt how to raise slaughter and preserve them,there is no waste in there way of living,snails, nettles on waste land,all fresh water fish, are all good eating. wine made in 45 gallon drums without yeast, rakia distilled by ourselves by the gallon flavoured by barks from differant trees. when i was repairing a barn roof we got permission of the local mayor to cut down some trees from the local village woods to fashon into roof trusses. houses are made of stone for the first floor topped in hand made bricks made from clay/mud,straw and hair and left to bake in the sun for the second floor. you can hunt wild bore, (keeping there young to raise at home) there is so much i learned while i lived there. And when the shtf i hope we can live the same here.
But the villages do have sattilite tv, (for the winter months) cell phones, and internet connection.along with cars. but these things are looked at as luxurys, tv for news, cars are only used for market days and trips to the city. evrey day transport is a horse and cart, they have tractors but why use fuel when a plough can be used with a horse. heating and cooking is wood burning stoves, lighting is oil lamps mainly so to minimise electric bills. sanitation in hand dug pits,soakaways for dark water, to save on water bills (on meters) we all have wells in gardens, along with concreate tanks to store rainwater, hot water for washing is done with solar tanks.
Sorry babbling a lot, but there is an alternitive way for us all to live, the only problem is sheeple and the goverment.

[Tarrel]

I remember visiting Poland to stay with my Grandmother in the early 70's. They lived in a small block of flats (maybe three storeys, two flats on each level). It was surrounded by a garden and people grew stuff and kept chickens. One evening I went into the bathroom, and there's this chicken strutting around in there. It had crapped all over the floor. I asked my Dad about it, and he told me it was tomorrow's dinner.

Sure enough, after breakfast the next day, everybody gathered round for the "execution". My Grandmother (who would have been well into her 70's at the time) performed the deed with a small, sharp kitchen knife. I can still see that knife now in my mind. I couldn't believe it, but it really did twitch all over the place after it's throat was cut. That evening we had boiled chicken and cabbage for tea. To this day, I can't imagine a more effective way of ruining a perfectly good chicken!

[NorthernRaider]

60 years we have been belittling eastern europe and boasting about our material wealth, and all along they were the really wise ones, boy are we going to pay a price. I think in the coming years posh houses in London will no longer be the " In" things to have, instead buying woodland, allotments and small holdings are going to be the real hallmark of luxury.

[Tarrel]

(15 November 2012, 23:25)NorthernRaider Wrote: 60 years we have been belittling eastern europe and boasting about our material wealth, and all along they were the really wise ones, boy are we going to pay a price. I think in the coming years posh houses in London will no longer be the " In" things to have, instead buying woodland, allotments and small holdings are going to be the real hallmark of luxury.

+1. Invest in productive capacity while it's still available. Land, tools, the skills to use them, alternative energy sources.

I converted a modest four-bedroom detached piece of home counties real-estate into a three bedroom cottage plus 60 acres of woodland, together with some funds left over which we're using to make the cottage as grid-independent as possible. I know which I'd prefer to have in the coming descent.

[CovertRunning]

When I was working in the states a couple of years ago we had Romanian lads working the harvest season with us.
Rough and earthy types mostly, Slavic people and a Roma guy.
Most were ok folks and helpful too!
Well anyway two of them had never fly-fished before, but bought rods and tackle on hearing of a lake nearby to the farm we worked at.
After about an hour of fishing in the nearby lake, they'd caught a pair of fish
I was most impressed by their 'drive' on doing something they'd not done before.

As the season was coming to an end I got friendly with one of them who told me he was quitting the harvest work in the US and getting into Bee-Keeping back in Romania!