Their adventures in France and Portugal taught 'Growing Greener' how to create an eco-lodge built around nature, sharing and community.
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00:00 It's open up this Ecologe with Elisa. This is my dream.
00:04 Hoping that at least in a couple of years time we'll be settled in an area in a village in Chilento
00:12 where I've built this Ecologe project which will be a space immersed in nature
00:18 where we can accept travellers to come and visit us
00:21 who want to travel and experience the area having a positive effect on the community
00:25 in a more sustainable way and just live a slow life surrounded by people
00:33 who are passionate about the things we are.
00:35 Hi, I'm Elisa.
00:37 And I'm Franciusca.
00:38 And we're working to open up an Ecologe in an area called Chilento in Southern Italy.
00:44 We want this project to take time because we really want to build this project
00:51 with the people from the community, from Prendifumo.
00:55 We don't want just, ok, we buy a land and we build our project.
01:00 No. We want something different.
01:03 Other Ecologe or Bed and Breakfast or a motel.
01:07 We want something really authentic and that can respect the people who live in this place.
01:12 And we want to build with them.
01:15 I met Elisa and we talked about our lives and we wanted to live our lives
01:21 so we decided to go and travel and to learn how to live more sustainably.
01:28 And we travelled around Europe.
01:30 Our first stop was in Portugal.
01:32 We went to stay for two months on an eco-retreat farm in a place called Algezur.
01:38 It's in the mountains, far away from any other kind of civilization in a way.
01:43 Living completely off-grid.
01:45 We slept in a tent for two months.
01:47 It was an awesome experience.
01:49 Yeah, one extreme to the other.
01:50 We went from being in a crazy city like Naples to being in the middle of the forest.
01:54 Then our next stop was France.
01:58 We stayed for two months as well on, I guess you'd call it like an organic farm.
02:04 We learnt a lot, so much about agriculture and how to grow vegetables.
02:11 We helped plant a food forest.
02:14 We planted over 150 trees in the time that we were there.
02:17 We also spent two months working on an organic vineyard in France.
02:22 It's been a crazy year, I guess, of travelling since we left our lives behind in Naples.
02:28 We've learnt a lot and had a lot of fun while we were doing it.
02:32 It's something completely new and foreign.
02:34 For a video editor and an English teacher, living in a city, going to the middle of nature.
02:40 During travels, I realised the importance of creating community.
02:45 Listening and trusting in the community that you have around you.
02:49 What we're doing right now, we are working towards beginning some events in 2024.
02:56 Something on the lines of some permaculture workshops, maybe some yoga classes.
03:02 Maybe some hiking in the local area.
03:05 That's something really exciting that's coming.
03:07 It's the first big step that Rory Greener is creating an event.
03:13 We're happy with our project.
03:15 This project will take time, but this is OK, because we need time to build something authentic and meaningful.
03:26 (upbeat music)