After spending 6 months travelling around the outback of western NSW and returning back to the Gold Coast, we embarked on another mission…moving off grid!  We found our piece of paradise in Northern NSW just south of Grafton just over a year ago.  The property already had a nice 4 bedroom house connected to solar power, solar hot water and gas for cooking, so no drastic changes there. 

Our goal is to learn to live as self sufficiently as possible.  We’ve been on this property over a year now and have learnt a lot through trial and error. Here we will document the lessons learned along the way.  This is all a new experience for us…lets see where it takes us!!!

Welcome to our home!

The biggest lesson we’ve learnt so far is how much of an impact the weather has on you when you’re living on the land.  We moved here March 2018 after a healthy wet summer season.  The property was green, lush and beautiful.  The drought set in during winter (one of the worst droughts ever) and our lush green property went from green to brown and drab pretty quickly.  We had no rain at all for a 6 week period and then when the rain did come, it wasn’t enough to soak the ground.  The experience gave me a whole new appreciation for the farmers whose livelihood depends on the rain. The drought was catastrophic for them…and that’s an understatement!!!  Anyway, here’s the before and after pictures.

Before the drought

The drought