We came to live in the Cévennes to embark on an adventure closer to the land. Rachel with a passion for building things and Laura with an obsession for growing anything edible and dragging it back to the kitchen.

We wanted to live somewhere with a different way of life; a place that would inspire us and give us the space to work, live and learn on the land; to grow, not only our own food, but ourselves.  We found it here at Mas du Diable and knew it the minute we set foot on the mountain. The name means the Devil’s Farmhouse, but there is nothing devilish about the old stone farmstead and its long history. It has been tough and exciting and now it feels like we’ve always lived here, we are part of this land and it would be difficult to imagine living anywhere else. Everyday is different as we make our contribution to the future of this land by maintaining its ancient character and its purpose and by putting our little bit of energy into it, like the many generations of people who lived here before us.

Rachel and Laura on the track to Mas du Diable

Why spend time posting stuff on the internet?

Well, I try not to spend too much time but I wanted a way of documenting all that we were learning about living on the land.  I felt that anything we learn here, about growing seasonal food and preserving the seeds of edible crops, might be useful to other people.

Being able to grow food and save the seeds for next years’ crop is fundamental to our human existence. Growing food is a knowledge that should be in the hands of every individual and the seeds of food need to be shared not ‘owned’ by corporations. To me it is important that we all know how to grow food, even if we don’t do very much of it, and equally that we all know how to preserve the seeds of edible and useful plants for the future.

To be a good gardener all you need is patience and the ability to observe. For me I also think it is important to record what works and why – how and what I did to get good or bad results – and always in relation to the seasons, weather, the land and whatever else nature throws up.

I did try and write things down on paper, but bits of paper go astray, scribbles in notebooks get lost and I could never find that essential nugget I was looking for.  So this site is really just a way of organising a messy notebook one I can refer back-to and hope that other people might find useful too. I started writing it in May 2006 but we had to take the site down in December 2009 because it was costing too much to host, so this wordpress site is really a new beginning and it will take me some time to transfer and re-write the content I think is worth keeping from the old site.