Living the Dream... Portugal

Bouça, the story so far...

We bought Bouça da Figueira in late April 2006 it, and our move to Portugal was the realisation of our dream, we bought the house through Bosch Real Estate, Jon and Sam were fantastic and made it all so easy for us, so if you are looking for property in central portugal check out www.boschrealestate.co.uk
The house and outbuildings were in need of complete renovation, there was no electricity, running water or plumbing and sewage. But it was so beautiful! And of course there is our stunning view. Bouça faces south, and looks out over a gorgeous lush and wooded valley and then far away to the hills beyond, not another house in sight.
We have made great progress in remodelling the house, all the time trying to keep as much original as possible as some parts of Bouça are over 200 years old. We know this as the previous owner has told us that he can trace his family in this house back over all that time and more.
During the hot summer of 2006 while adjusting to the heat we remodelled the old smoke house and reattached it to the main house to create what will be the new kitchen and dining room. That enabled us to knockdown the old upstairs lean-to and rebuild and slightly enlarge it to create a new lounge, complete with beautiful double doors leading out onto out roof terrace. The small adjoining bedroom became the bathroom.
Living full time in an ongoing project has been (and still is) tricky at times and can be very hard work with so much still do. But along with all the buildings work we've achieved so much more, we've picked and pruned our own grapes, plus planted 50 new vines for the future. Picked our own olives and now are using our own olive oil, we eat all our own home-grown produce from the garden and drink cool pure water from our well, the sun shines and we really are "Living the Dream"...

August 2007 | July 2008