Neigbours wanted at Eco Living Portugal - life & work in the mountains

Join us at eco living Portugal

Rural living Portugal at Quinta Rural

Co-Creating the Future of Living

Eco Living Portugal Pioneers wanted for start up small scale ecological living community with established glamping / B&B accommodations in the mountains of North Portugal.

We are looking for passionate, practical and fun dreamers and diggers. People who are ready to ´move to the country´ and create a new life for themselves and maybe even their family. People who want to be less of a mindless consumer 😉 People who need and love nature, need outdoor time, enjoy creating, building, making their hands dirty. People who don´t want to be locked down in the office all day, doing what you´re told to do. People full of ideas and with the energy, skills and resilience to make them real and successful. People with a desire to live a life like ours: in North Portugal, up in the mountains, harsh, pure, lovely, rough, hard, rewarding and free!

By the way: we are not looking to create some kind of spiritual community, nor will we spend hours on talking about our emotions. Any hard feelings occur on the road? Great, let´s pick up a shovel or build a shed together and it will all work out. I guess we´re looking for social loners, and not for lonely socializers 😉 Plain, practical and simple.

Eco Living Portugal is not an eco village

Having a ´holiday farm and nature retreat´ incorporated in our Eco Living Portugal project instead of your average eco village has a huge advantage. Even though we are just small scale and family run, we have a small economy already in place for you to join. Assuming you have the passion and the skills of course. For many people, the dreamed change of lifestyle, escaping the rat race or simply leading a more sustainable, healthy life seems far out of reach. After all, they don´t have a big bag of money lying around to buy a rural property. Let alone investing in some kind of business that hopefully, will cover your basic needs and then some. Let´s face it: you can grow as much vegetables as you want, you will still need some income to get a new pair of shoes! (Or a shovel for that matter!)

We do, however, have a strong focus on sustainability and earth regeneration. We hope that our pioneers share that same love for nature and want to participate in communal projects.

Neighbours wanted

During the build-up of our touristic accommodation, we’ve often thought about the advantages of sharing ‘this place’ and life style with other alike people. It was a plan that had to develop with time (and experience, and knowledge). We can now proudly offer you the possibility of joining a start-up small living community and living your life in the midst of nature.

Kleinschalige vakantie boerderij voor een wandel en natuurvakantie in Noord Portugal

Quinta Rural

Neighbouring ‘Quinta Rural‘ and her accommodations and facilities offer you extra community and workspace, contacts and clients for your self-employments. It also makes it possible for you to do some ‘trial living’ if you wish. Strongly reduced prices for longer term stay in one of the Farmers Tents (back to basic glamping), the Strawbale house (eco lodge), the FarmHouse or the round log mountain cabins (2018).

stoere kindvriendelijke natuur camping en glamping in Noord Portugal Gere

Kids & Family Time

Rural life guarantees a lot of family time & a high quality of life for your child(ren). We very much look forward to having dynamic families as our neighbours.

Animals welcome

Animals are already a big part of life at Quinta Rural and we welcome more variety. There are some rules of course: they should be able to live a natural life as much as possible, without ‘messing with our business’ (once the goat has messed up the veggie garden for the 5th time, you’ll agree with that last part 🙂 )

Investment

Joining a start up yet existing eco village, community or even a tourism accommodation (=mini economy) is the best way to lower your risks. And thus to avoid having to do it all yourself, figuring it all out, starting from scratch, investing a lot of time and money, paying for your mistakes, getting physically and emotional drained. That´s a big win. But you have to realize that you still have to invest in your new life. As they say, the bills need to be paid, and in a pioneering stage there is no room for freebies. Same if you want to join Eco Living Portugal. After all, you can´t expect someone else to pay for your house, your garden or your business.

Languages spoken

From origin Dutch, we speak ‘Nederlands’. You may have noticed from the little errors that English is not our native language, but we manage fine. Same with Portuguese, German (Deutsch) and French (Francais) although learning Portuguese has kind of ‘wrecked’ our capability to speak French (understanding still in tact).

Location

Situated on the slopes of the Serra da Cabreira mountains in North Portugal, at 865 meters of altitude, with marveling views on the Tamega valley. Part of rural settlement Juguelhe, granite stone medieval settlement with only 12 inhabitants (including us). Shopping, market and schools at 8 kms in Cabeceiras de Basto. Access to highway 12 kms. Airport O Porto at 97 kms, 1 hours’ drive. Historical cities such as Porto, Guimaraes, Braga, Guimaraes and Barcelos all within an hours drive.

More interesting stuff to read about the region

rural life
nature of North Portugal
natural and national parks such as Geres, Alvao, Serra da Cabreira
butterflies, insects and reptiles
North Portugals wild life like wolves and wild boars
hiking in the Serra da Cabreira
outdoor activities

Who for

Pioneer couples/families, open and honest, who love to create, are pro-active, cooperative, emotionally mature, flexible, willing to physically work hard when needed. All in all, people with respect for nature, animals and humans. In this pioneer phase, you either have to have your own income or able to set up your own little ´business´ and be self-employed.

Self-employment

Working for yourself won’t get you rich, certainly not in Portugal. But it can pay for your new lifestyle if you take it seriously. Because of the our own knowledge & experiences, ánd the existence of neighboring small scale farm camp Quinta Rural (www.quintarural.eu), there are many activities to explore. From bee keeping to hiking activities, from website design to SEO and text writing, from selling or building log houses to being a local property broker, from therapeutic workshops to biological farming. From organising 4×4 tours to offering electric buggy tours. We will happily guide you and put you in contact with other tourism accommodations in the area to offer your services.

Social & in(ter)dependend

We look to achieve the social & practical advantages of a living community, yet without the so often consequential dependency, group pressure and social obligations. Mutual respect, openess and honesty required. And a willing and helping attitude towards others.

Unconventional approach

We’re no eco village, no farmers, nor living community, nor holiday park. But some weird kind of 100% sense making combination of all. We hope to share this rich life of freedom, hard work, relaxing time, creativity and fulfillment with other alike families and couples. Thus helping them living ánd working their dream.

Plot(s)

You can either join us on our own plot, another 2 hectares ´valley land´, well protected from the wind and bordering the 2,5 hectares from Quinta Rural. On the long term, we can see a maximum total of 2-3 sustainable bungalows and 1 restored granite barn on a total of 2.5 hectares ‘valley land’ (protected from the wind).

However, if you wish to privately own or rent your own plot, we will be more than happy to help you find the right piece of land or little house.

Earth restoration, the eco part

It´s no obligation but it would be nice if you are a bit of an idealistic nut case like us at times with a deep love and gratitude towards, well, let´s call it mother earth. We feel it is our duty as humans to help restore nature. E.g. by help creating the conditions needed for the earth to restore. Good soil, enough water, fungi, plant relations, wind and sun protection etc. We have been doing so for quite some years at Quinta Rural and the plot. And we hope to keep going for many years. Our aspirations are to extend this to the local area. Within time, we hope to be able to form a group to buy, preserve or restore, pieces of land.

Build your own log cabin – Sustainable housing

If it is small and modestly sized sustainable log cabin bungalows you want, we can help you. With a high quality, isolation value and focus on ecological materials & use. Lots of windows and veranda space for an all-year enjoyment of the surrounding nature.

Rural life

Rural life, as you might be lucky enough to find out, is a slower kind of life. Doesn’t mean it’s boring or lacking interesting adventures, ‘au contraire, my dear friend’. At times, it’s a hard life. Harsh as well. It will lure you out of your comfort zone, in a most confronting way. It will teach you things you didn’t even know you needed learning. And it will reward you in so many ways. A slower, relaxed lifestyle, time for yourself, your partner or family, your creativity. A rich life.

Rustige natuurcamping Noord Portugal met bar en bistro

Tourism facilities

All tourism facilities for Quinta Rural guests are open for your use. Whether it’s to host your workshop or offer your outdoor activities to our guests… we are open to sharing our space so your good ideas can be realized.

Wish List

We’ve already accomplished so much, but are still full of hopes, thoughts and ideas. We hope they are shared by our future new ‘villagers’. Most support our desire for a more sustainable, ecological lifestyle. Others sprout from a need to share, create and dynamics.

Interested in joining Eco Living Portugal?

Selection procedure

You will surely understand that we want to ensure a near to perfect fit. In the end, all depends on that good fit: your, mine, our happiness as a person, our ´business´ success and the amount of good we can do for nature. So please, if you´re interested in joining Eco Living Portugal, please follow all the steps of the selection procedure. Please keep in mind there are reasons why we are not open to surprise visits nor do ´blind dates´.

Read all there is to read about our place, about Quinta Rural, about us, about working and living here, about North Portugal etc. (Most information available in Dutch and English – sorry dear Portuguese people, I just write 10 x slower in Portuguese and with 10 x more errors.)
Fill out this questionnaire, honestly and truthfully. No use in pretending you are something you are not or to bluf about skills. That will just ´bite you in the ass´ eventually. And us.
Wait. It might take us some time to contact you. We live in the real world, not the digital, as much as we can. We also may need some time to let your story sink in to get a clear picture.
We will get back to you eventually and may ask you for additional information as well as respond to all of your questions.
We will ask you to ´pitch´ your ´new life here´ to us
Together we will decide if you will either come for a first quick meet and greet, or set a date to welcome you here for your ´trial period´.

Eco Living Portugal