June 24

Next few days will be very busy for us. The season is really picking up now. We did our first honey harvest yesterday, in the torrid heat. It was exciting to gather the first tangible rewards from the months of work we had put in before yesterday. I did my morning garden work of watering before we all packed up into the quatre-quatre (4-by-4 truck) and headed to the apiary. It’s finally warming up, a strange Spring it has been with on-and-off showers, thunderstorms and cold temperatures. But yesterday felt like Summer. The winding drive through the Gorge de Daluis, which reminds me of the Grand Canyon with its breathtaking views and the Var river flowing below, was so gratifying as we drove with the windows down, nodding our heads along to the music of an old, sometimes-screechy Santana tape. I took it all in. The wind blew against my face as the sun kissed me. I was reminded of how much I love the wondrous nature we are so lucky to live in and experience. With every turn, every tunnel, I observed the new flowers in bloom, while remembering the ones that were once there a few weeks ago.

Winding roads through the Gorges De Daluis.

See the river below? It's the Var and goes into the Mediterranean Sea.

Wondrous rock formations of the Gorges De Daluis.

This landscape is always changing. And when we leave the hard work of our mountain home behind for a day to do hard work with our bees off the farm, she reminds me of all the beauties yet to come. Because, ironically, sometimes we have the most wide perspective living where we do, on top of a mountain. We see everything. And yet, sometimes it can also feel as narrow as below the canyon of the Gorges de Daluis. We live where we work and that can be dulling sometimes, at least for me. I am a person who seeks a continuous rhythm yes, but I am also one who feeds off the varying energy of others and who seeks those personal connections. That’s why I love having wwoofers, other visitors from near and far away places, who want to be a part of our lives for a few weeks, lending their hands to our work, exchanging culture, ideas and dreams. It gives me a sense of connection to the bigger world during the times it does feel isolating here.

At the moment, we have our wwoofer Katie from Canada who is currently a university student in New York on Summer holiday. Katie has been a breath of fresh air for us. She’s brought with her bright energy and endless enthusiasm for all the everyday things we do. She’s been with us for a little over a week, and I’ve enjoyed so much talking, gardening and cooking with her. Her thankfulness, which she always expresses, for all we share and teach is so wonderful, reminding me of how wwoofing can be an outlet of inspiration, for both parties. Katie has worked extremely hard, and helped so much during her short time with us, and always with a smile.

Apiary of Daluis by the river, where thyme and mountain honey is produced.

Jorris explaining to Katie how to stack hives in the truck.

Me starting the smoker. (Photo:Katie)

As we suited up and began with harvesting at the Apiary in Daluis, I was filled with such excitement. I started the smoker, envisioning the frames of sweet liquid gold we were about to see. After opening a few hives, Jorris noticed a pattern of honey being ready on one side of the frame and honey not yet completely congealed and capped on the other side. This was disappointing.  And what was even more disheartening was when Jorris explained after a closer inspection of the harvested frames when we got back to the farm, that the thyme honey which we had smelled during our previous check-ups, had been eaten by the bees! Naturally, they eat their honey, and especially when it’s cold, which it had been last week.

Of course there is still gorgeous Mountain Honey, a taste of all the wild flowers of the mountains, but the thyme is one of our rare honeys, one we were hoping to find, one which many customers and market-goers are waiting for. I felt a little discouraged, sweating in my sauna of a bee suit, giving a little smoke when Jorris needed, covering the half-super of honey frames he would pass to me so bees wouldn’t get in, and then carrying the heavy box up a hill to the truck. And all for what?

Working so hard and perhaps not profiting? We'll see when we extract today. It's so interesting, working so close with nature. We are dependent on the sun and rain and bees and when something is off, we live with those consequences, good or bad. That's the risk of agriculture. Farmers face the same weather challenges. Jorris suspects that last Spring we had less hives and more honey, where as this year we have more hives and less honey. I got stung, just on my finger this time, but I write to you with a fat right hand as the swelling always spreads from the source of the actual sting. It's uncomfortable; itchy, plus the swelling also made it somewhat difficult to hold the small coffee spoon to fill up the espresso filter basket this morning. 

Today, we will extract the honey we harvested, plus we just received an order of 200 jars of honey to fill and 200 lavender sachets to make, and we are going for a 3rd transhumance (moving bee hives to next flowering spot) tonight. These large transportations can only be done at night when the bees are home. We do everything by hand. We close up the entrance of the hives with these sponge-like things, lift hives and position them with equal balance on the trailer, then drive through the night to the next place. We’ll be moving hives from Daluis, by the Var river, to Braux, where the chestnut flowers will soon bloom for our bees to make chestnut honey.

Timing, timing is so important. Philippe, in his experience and wisdom, told me over dishes the other night that if you miss the timing of flowering, you could risk losing thousands of euros. The challenge is that everything seems to happen all at once, or more like in spurts, suddenly we get this honey and sachet order, and we have to finish extracting so we have more frames and hives for Braux, and we are working tonight late into the night to move the hives...maybe even camping over in Braux. I feel tired. And it's only the beginning. 

On Monday night we have the big transhumance, our 4^th of this season, where we will be moving our hives from Roua to Provence which is Jorris' and my favorite place to go, where all the lavender flowers are!! It’s a romantic landscape of rolling hills and greenery, plus when in bloom, purple fields of lavender beyond the eye-can-see. But, it's a lonnnng drive from our mountain home, like 6 hours and we drive all night because you can only move the bees when they are all home at night and when you get to your destination after driving all night, you have to unload, position them where you want and then open the entrances so they can fly out. We stop on the side of the road to take naps, since it's only natural for Jorris to feel sleepy. I try to stay up with him when he's driving, for moral support/make sure he stays awake and then when we pull over, I try to sleep too. We try to squeeze in some fun and relaxation. Perhaps the next day in Provence we can go swimming at the near-by lake and perhaps have a lunch date somewhere, half-sleepy and smelly, but we’ll see where the day takes us before we make our way home.

The garden is brimming with food!!

Strawberries every day from the Garden. (Photo: Katie)

On top of all the bee work is the garden work of our farm house, which I am the manager of. The garden is also taking off. We have healthy tomatoes, squash, corn germinating, lettuce, pepper plants, cabbage, onions, leeks, strawberries...I’ll write another post about the garden soon, I hope. And, since gardening and cooking are my favorite things and go hand-in-hand, I usually take care of our lunch and dinner meals, though I love how I get help sometimes and how Jorris will also take time out of his busy bee schedule to help make meals.

My homemade lavender lip balms with our beeswax!

I've also been successfully making lip balms with our beeswax and essential oils. These are part of my line of natural personal care products, which I am developing, in addition to my soaps!! My scents with essential oils so far are: lavender, geranium and rosemary, of which, the lavender and rosemary we produce using traditional distillation methods and distiller. I have also created a honey and plain one which has the subtle sweet smell of beeswax. We’ve ordered peppermint essential oil, so I can make a peppermint one too! We’ve already left some to be sold online through a program in Nice, the closest big city to us. We'll see how it goes. The good news is they feel great on your lips and stand the hot car test as yesterday after working in the heat, Katie showed me hers was not melted or gooey!! I'm so happy because I've been testing in the kitchen and have a good formula now. I've had much enthusiasm about them from our farm friends too, who want to buy local but for now order Burt's Bees! So, there's a possible niche here, since there's no big lip balm brand like Burt’s Bees here in France.

And, as for my blog, I am overdue for a post, but always feel so tired at the end of the day, so I just read and fall asleep, but this morning, with everyone still asleep, I grasp a few moments of quiet, waking up early to write to you, to reflect on life.

Jorris & Kan taking a moment to enjoy the view.

Katie & I on a hike to Le Lavigné with Jorris, Pat & Kan. ( Photo: Jorris)

Reflecting back to my question at the beginning of this post, “And for what?” What is all this work for? For enough money to live? For the challenge of it all? For the lifestyle? “For the soul,” Katie says, as we improvised a stellar veggie lasagna together last night, pondering over our day and the outcome of it. I like Katie’s answer.

*photos by Tiffanie Ma unless otherwise stated.