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The first two months in Spain

And then it was the summer of 2025, the moment we have been saying for some years that we would move to Spain and so we did! On the 18th of august Maaike, Trisa and Riva left by train to move to Spain. Tibor was finishing his job at ANWB and followed on the 5th of September.

leaving from amsterdam cs

 

The first weeks were holiday times. Which for the kids meant spending a lot of time at the yurt, with Mirthe, Rick and Vos, working on an art project with Sanny and swimming in the river. For Maaike it meant making the big house more livable, improving the water supply and arranging stuff like insurance, permits and school stuff.We also received the keys of our rented apartment in Briviesca and we made some trips with the Bakfiets. That was fun, we were quite a show for the Spanish people who saw us cycling. 

 

Trisa with Cynthia, second hand shopping in Burgos, in the yurt, harvesting salt with Carlos, getting water in Castil de Lences, more water pipes for more pressure 

And then after 3 weeks holiday was over and the first day at the new school was a fact. Super exciting of course! The school is bilingual, which is really nice, because therefore Trisa and Riva can already understand quite a lot. And now they have 4 hours of private Spanish classes during school hours. Everybody, teachers, schoolmates and parents are very sweet, everybody wants to help! Although Trisa and Riva miss real contact with schoolmates because their Spanish is not good enough yet, I think the first weeks went much better than expected. 


 

Not surprisingly the press was also present the first 2 months. Two days with documentary makers of Arte, a special for the diario the Burgos about the kids at school, and noticias Cuarto. 


When school started, also working in Spain started for real. Which for Tibor means working remotely for KPN in Briviesca during the school week and in Bárcena during the weekend. For Maaike it means working in Bárcena most of the time and 2 days in Briviesca doing all the administrative stuff that comes with running a company and living abroad.

 

We are not doing this all alone, because Bárcena is not an abandoned village anymore: 

Rick and Mirthe living in the yurt, starting to build their house and having animals and they are going to have the first baby in Bárcena in 60 years. Sanny living in the caravan and building a house with Christophe. They are already growing a lot of organic vegetables that visitors are buying! And Martijn and Charlotte, already starting to build, so that they can come to live in a few years time. And then there are possible new projects: a community center for yoga and dancing we might build with a group of architects and building a tiny house for a possible new inhabitant.


 

People know how to find us: our neighbors for ten years Rox and Theo, former colleagues Marjolein on her way to Portugal and Pieter on a road trip with his family, who even stayed a few days with his family. And of course Maaike’s parents, doing a lot of work. A surprising visit was by a group of 16 women, all around 80 years old, from Madrid, who knew each other from girls scouts in Oña. They were so enthusiastic about our project, that it also made me even more enthusiastic. And we are making friends with nearby family from Arconada: The kids playing together and they showed us how they harvest the honey.  



 








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