Back to the basics

We are staying at a small organic farm in the Piemonte region of Italy, a little ways south of Asti (known for its spumanti and muscat wines).The farmhouse is beautiful, but rustic in some ways. For example, parts of the house get heated water from a wood-fired boiler. If we have no guests staying in the house, we don't start the fire, so we don't get warm showers.

So far, we've trimmed strawberry bushes so that they don't produce fruit until later in the season.We've also worked a lot with tomatoes. We've picked them, sorted them, cleaned them, sliced them, cooked them down, processed and strained them, and bottled them.We've done the entire process except plant and grow them.
We've also stacked wood.The farm is beautiful and the owner is very nice. We are enjoying the experience quite a bit, despite the look of concern on my face in this picture.We are continuing to have difficulties with the Indonesian process, so we are planning on staying here an extra week. As far as we know right now, we should now be starting in Indonesia at the very end of October.