All Change

Metamorphosis

Such a long time since my last blog….. And huge changes for the farm and buildings at Greencliff.

Ably undertaken by our competent and unflappable builders with Ben and Gary in charge we have spent the last two years transforming our farmhouse and barns.

At home we have fixed the damp, farmers wiring, drafty windows, bouncing floors, dripping chimneys and chilly radiators. We laid paving and patio, created a new bootroom, toilet and shower room from the unheated lean-to and painted, tiled and carpeted everywhere. The utility room now has a touch of bright green glamour and our bedroom and ensuite have new vaulted ceilings and fab carpentry. We found an 8m deep inside / outside well which was half in the study and half outside in the driveway, exactly as predicted by Mr Jackman the previous tenant farmer who used to live here in the late seventies. Sadly the well was in a poor state with a rusty iron support and thick concrete lid so we did not excavate and beautify it, we have covered over the inside and installed a hand pump and overflow on the outside. We opened a fireplace in the study and found nooks in the dining room and utility and a small new fireplace in our bedroom. We have opened up a door way from the kitchen to our terrace garden with it’s westerly view to Lundy – so can now toast the sunset.

The transformation of the farmyard has been enormous, it has gone from concrete yard and flappy sheds with cows and slurry pits to a landscaped delight. We (well the builders) tore everything non stone down, moved it all around, and either removed it from site or built it back up.

We started with the careful removal of the asbestos roofs and pulling over a long rickety corrugated shed which only took a small tug to bring it down. A huge timber barn at the centre of the site which we originally thought we would keep was found to be rotten so that went also. The large concrete barn to the North of the site was reinstated as tractor shed and yoga studio which now enjoys fabulous views towards the sea. The two old milking parlours which were very derelict have gone along with the enormous corrugated hay barn which had the best coastal view. This has opened up the vista for our holiday cottage Combes Barn which was a stable, shed and stock pen over the years, here we kept the old roof timbers for character and used the fancy ridge tiles which were in the barn on the roof. The long old stone barn which used to be the ‘teddy’ for keeping potatoes was in a very sorry state, the seaward wall was falling away and the roof about to collapse letting rain water into the think walls blowing them out. A massive amount of rebuilding was completed thanks to Jason’s stonework and pointing. This is now our holiday rental Kingsland Barn with it’s sea view allowed as we had to rebuild the wall and installed large windows. The modern built milking parlour was reinstated with proper insulation and are now our holiday let Barns Boatlake and Three Corners. A huge amount of ground work has been completed, under and over pinning, concrete broken up and removed, walls rescued, roof’s slated, floors poured, ponds dug out, fences down, banks built, rendering, pointing, painting, new electrics, solar power and heat pumps, plumbing, damp proofing, earth movement and my lest favourite aspect drainage, drainage, drainage and drainage……

Here are a few of the before and after highlights of our endeavours:

I insisted we held back on our store room renovation as a pair of swallows chose it for their summer nesting. The parents gallantly swooped in to feed their young past the noisy cement mixers, JCB and builders and I’m pleased to report four swallows fledged late July. Electrical work then took place in the store room and the swallows decided to have a second clutch!! The parents made friends with our electrician Mark who had to fix the electric box despite my efforts to postpone this, and four more swallows fledged. Although the store barn now has a door we have installed cup nests in a covered walk way close by and the swallows have access to our garage for next year.

With the help of Dave the digger we cleared out our stinky silted pond and it filled with all the July rain, this has tempted in the chaser dragonflies, Sam spotted a duck and a little egret also. Frustratingly the pond has since sprung a leak and is now looking like a boggy mess (again), but this in it’s self is a wildlife habitat, although we do plan to recreate the open water delight, and if we win the lottery a swimming pond. Through the whole of Downunder Field we have a series of scrapes or pools running towards the sea from the pond overflow. Theses are full in winter and mostly dry up in the summer, the wildlife love it, we have seen lots of birds and hares visit for a drink and wash. Rosa also enjoys the scrapes:

We have found and been collecting cobbles from all over the farmyard. Every time we move soil for foundations or dig drainage runs cobbles have popped up. They were obviously bought up from the beach and used as paving, walling and ballast by the farmers over the years. It is now illegal to take cobbles from the beach and we have done our best to save them all from being taken off site or buried. Some of the smaller ones I have used to lay 3 cobbled patterns in our kitchen courtyard and the larger ones have been used for the path edging and eroded banks around the pond. The builders also made good use of the old sleepers which were around the timber and concrete barns. They have been placed as walls to divide up the courtyards and garden boundaries and we think look really rustic and in keeping with the farmyard, plus are storm proof as proven by Darragh which was gusting at about 80mph here and lead to a pretty sleepless night.

With the building work mainly completed in May 2024 we had the gardens turfed and wild flower seeds sown ready for our first holiday guests. (In fact because of the very wet spring we were not able to complete the turf laying until the night before the first guests arrived!).

So a big thank you to all the trades people who helped us get to where we are today including our architect Rebecca and Ben, Gary, Jamie, Andrew, Harrison, Keaton, Andy, Joel, Adam, Little Ben, Mick, Vernon, Rob, Mikey, Jason, Ben, Jez, Ryan, Darren, James, Luke, Mark, Gregg, Steve, Joe, George, Bill, Haydon, Dave, Twinkle, Kevin, Aaron, Brian, and everyone else who I’ve missed…..

We are so delighted with the holiday barns, their design works really well and we’ve tried to make them super comfortable and fun. We have have been busy with guests since we opened and have held yoga classes in our gorgeous new yoga studio. We would like to use the whole site to provide yoga/wellbeing retreats in the future. You can have a look at our barns on the holiday cottages website here:

https://www.holidaycottages.co.uk/cottage/oc-28820-greencliff-farm-kingsland-barn

https://www.holidaycottages.co.uk/cottage/oc-28823-greencliff-farm-combes-barn

https://www.holidaycottages.co.uk/cottage/oc-28821-greencliff-farm-boatlake-barn

https://www.holidaycottages.co.uk/cottage/oc-28822-greencliff-farm-three-corners-barn

Yoga classes are on offer to our holiday guests and I’m starting classes in the new year, come and join? Here’s the studio:

I completed a little building work of my own of two low dry stone walls at the entrance of the carpark. I thought I did a decent job, but the experts on the drystone walling Facebook page were not so generous with their praise. (“What the AF” was one comment!!)….

The Wildlife!

My insect houses are popular with the solitary bees and they are fascinating, I’ve bought a new house and made two of my own with sawn bamboo (which is very easy -just check there are no splinters to snag their wings on). The bees are fabulous, hard working and beautiful. Sadly no minor bees were temped to try my home made cob house so I’m going to drill some holes to tempt them in….. (yea, that did not work either!)

Timothy Robin who lives in the Scout’s Wood continued to come and feed to my whistle all last winter, he loved sunflower seeds, eating 7 at a time if really hungry. This Spring he was super busy with family life, feeding seeds to Mrs Timothy and I have to say looking a little tired compared to his smart red breast in the winter. Now Autumn has arrived again he has not come for food so sadly I think he may have had his time here, I am hopeful to meet Timothy’s fledglings and leave seeds on his post.

This Autumn early evening I stumbled across five leverets in Ley Field who were so friendly I think they must have just ventured out of their individual scrapes or forms. They appeared on the cut paths and hopped along greeting each other and checking me out. I quietly watched them as they waited for Mum for their daily evening feed. She arrived just as it was getting dark and was very cautious, and only approached when she was sure the coast was clear. All the leverets were super excited to see her, jumbling over each other. Hare milk is very high in fat and nutrients, so baby hares only need to be fed once a day. Suckling just took minutes – and Mum left as quietly as she arrived and the leverets bounded off into the longer grass. For two weeks following this lucky encounter I went out to watch them, the weather was good, but as the evenings were losing light earlier each day they became more tricky to observe in the darkness. Very soon there were only four leverets gathering and they were becoming timid, and after about a month only two leverets were waiting for Mum. Although adult hares are the fastest land animals reaching speeds of 35 mph young hares (up to about 4 weeks old) do not run away from danger, but tend to freeze and so are easy pickings for foxes and birds of prey. Luckily on our farm we have lots of scrubby habitat for hiding in, but we also have the predators, quite often while watching the hares I would see a barn owl check them out – also I know we have foxes although seldom see them which is a dilemma as I love the barn owls and fox too! About 2 months later I saw the female adult and one of the leverets running though Meadow Field so at least one has made it though it’s early life.

As well as our hare encounter this Autumn I was super thrilled to find we had a hedgehog in the garden…. We were out early evening with Rosa when she stood still watching the hedgehog trying to work out what it was. She is a very gentle dog and did not get too close. I started to leave food out (hogs like kitten biscuits and soft cat food) and bought several hedgehog houses and placed them around the garden. One evening we found two hogs at our food bowl and think we may have 3 in total…. This has been a delightful distraction and I’ve started volunteering at the local Hedgehog sanctuary in Bideford call Hedwigs Hotel where they take in injured, poorly or underweight hogs, help them get better and return them to the wild. They do a great job and are really busy with about 30 hedgehogs being cared for at the moment, and I can tell you 30 hedgehogs create a lot of hedgehog mess.

Looking Forward

We would love to hold retreats here in the future, hire the whole site out and invite groups to come and enjoy the nature with some yoga (which I can teach), mindfulness and coaching (Sam’s area of expertise), walks, bird watching and sea swimming. We have a separate games room and relaxing lounge with incredible views of Bideford Bay. So we are looking out for a marketing and logistics person to help us get started if anyone knows anyone….

Here’s an idea of what we have to offer: