Chickens, Mules and Two Old Fools

In Chickens, Mules and Two Old Fools by Victoria Twead and Joe, her husband, move from the UK to a small village called El Hoyo in Spain. They want to move to a warmer climate and enjoy their retirement years at a slower pace, so they agree to try it for five years before making it a permanent arrangement.They realize that their new place is a real fixer-upper, but they dive in, do it and even sell parts of the property to other tenants. They enjoy the beauty and peace of Spain while having great and nurturing neighbors in Paco and Carmen-Bethina. They enjoy the annual fiestas, wine-making events, and even house chickens that provide fresh eggs for the villagers. They have many exciting adventures from a car stuck in the beach sand, to a host of memorable people coming to their home as visitors, working crew members or pleasant locals. There is never a dull moment in this descriptive and well-written memoir of their days in Spain and Victoria Twead ends each chapter with a delicious Spanish recipe!

I think a more appropriate title for "Chickens, Mules and Two Old Fools" would be "The Adventures of Two Really Nice People." Of course, the book wouldn't have sold as many copies, without the cute title.The book is funny and heartwarming, like its protagonists. Anyone who can work up affection for chickens is truly, awesomely kind. Based on my reading, I get a very different impression of chickens. Take Sherwood Anderson's "The Egg":"They (his parents) rented ten acres...and launched into chicken farming. I grew into boyhood on the place and got my first impressions of life there. From the beginning they were impressions of disaster. and if, in my turn, I am a gloomy man inclined to see the darker side of life, I attribute it to the fact that what should have been for me the happy joyous days of childhood were spent on a chicken farm.One unversed in such matters can have no notion of the many and tragic things that can happen to a chicken. It is born out of an egg, lives for a few weeks as a tiny fluffy thing such as you will see pictured on Easter cards, then becomes hideously naked, eats quantities of corn and meal bought by the sweat of your father's brow. gets diseases called pip, cholera, and other names, stands looking with stupid eyes at the sun, becomes sick and dies. ....Most philosophers must have been raised on chicken farms. One hopes for so much from a chicken, and is so dreadfully disillusioned. Small chickens, just setting out on the journey of life look so bright and alert, and they are in fact so dreadfully stupid....If disease does not kill them, they wait until your expectations are thoroughly aroused and then walk under the wheels of a wagon - to go squashed and dead back to their maker. Vermin infest their youth, and fortunes must be spent for curative powders.....After ten years of worry with incubators that did not hatch, and with tiny - and in their own way lovely - balls f fluff that passed on into semi-naked pullethood, and from that into dead henhood, we threw all aside." The Egg, by Sherwood Anderson.Or wonderful Betty MacDonald:"Chickens are so dumb. Any other living thing that you fed 365 days in the year would would get to know and perhaps to love you. Not the chicken. Every time I opened the chicken house door, SQUAWK, SQUAWK, SQUAAAAWK! And the dumbbells would fly up into the air and bang into each other......Gathering eggs would be like one continual Easter morning if the hens would just be obliging and get off their nests. Cooperation, however, is not a chickenly characteristic, and so at egg-gathering time every nest was overflowing with hen, feet planted, and a shoot-if-you-must-this-old-gray-head look in her eye.....The rooster, now, is something else again. He doesn't give a damn if you take every egg in the place and pay handball." The Egg and I, by Betty MacDonaldAnyway, I'm glad that the book is a best-seller, and that the Tweads are having such a great life. Party on, Vicky and Joe!

This is a charming entertaining funny book about a British couple's life in a quirky remote little Spanish town. Very enjoyable.

Victoria Twead's memoir, Chickens, Mules and Two Old Fools is a thoroughly raucous and wild ride of a book. But more, it is a testament to enthusiastically embracing life as the beautiful and temporary gift it is. The author shares this lesson by example as she and her husband jump in with both feet and live their "one wild and precious life" by uprooting all they've known in comfortable England and moving to a small village in Andalusia Spain.With humor and humility, Victoria and her husband discover that people are people wherever you go, and that those from southern Spain are generous and loving beyond measure. The author's descriptions of the landscape, people, critters, and culinary delights (with included recipes!) make this memoir a delightful page turner.Chickens, Mules and Two Old Fools leaves this reader feeling as if she's made a new friend and has an open invitation to El Hoyo. May we all feel invited to call this world our home!

This book was an absolute delight to read, the adventures experienced moving to a new country were hilarious, heart warming and made me wish I was there with them. The story was well written, the descriptions of the village, mountains of Spain and local characters were wonderful. As the story unfolded I became totally in love with this couple and their life with chickens, eccentric villagers and the beautiful landscape. I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a fun adventure beautiful story.

Thoroughly enjoyed reading this delightful book. An easy read about a British couple who retire to Spain. Their adventures with new community and friends is humorous and heartwarming.

I found this to be a great summer read. The descriptions of the people and the scenery made me feel like I was there as a next door neighbor enjoying every moment of the often raucous village life. The chickens were my favorite part and Victoria describes their ways perfectly. Not everyone knows the truth about chickens -- you can't make it up! I often chuckled at the recipes' placement right in the middle of a dramatic turn in the action of the story — that really struck my funny bone during these tumultuous days on Earth. I believe we all have to keep laughing and I will be counting on the other books in this series to help me keep on doing just that!

I loved reading this book - there many laugh out loud moments and the book gives a great insight into the trials and tribulations of emigrating to another country. I found it totally fascinating to read of how Vicky & Joe navigated their Five Year Plan. The book has a lot of detail but none of it is ever dull - the author is exceptionally gifted at drawing the reader in and holding them "in the moment" as she vividly describes with the most wonderful writing style the adventures, characters and places. I'm so pleased there are sequels and look forward to the next one.

I absolutely loved this book. It's packed with humour and 'feel good' factor, and if you have ever undertaken moving house to a foreign country this will ring true on so many levels.Vicky decided that she and her husband, Joe, would move house and live in Spain because she was fed up of the grey days and rain of England. After a little persuasion, Joe agreed to a five year plan of living in Spain with a clause to return to England if they didn't settle for any reason at the end of the agreed term. This book is the first of a series of six (so far) and covers the move from their Sussex home to a tiny village of just five permanent residents in the mountains behind Almeria, to five years later when they have to decide whether to return to the grey skies of England or stay in the home they've made and with the chickens they love.We meet their lovely neighbours and makers of home made wine, Carmen and Paco, who through a language misunderstanding called Carmen 'Bethina' for several months. We live through the Fiestas, the dancing, the heaviest snowfall since records began, fallen trees across the one treacherous mountain road into the village, and the antics of the 'Gin Twins'. And the chickens – oh, such fun these caused as well as income from their dozens of eggs each week.Between each chapter is a recipe for typical tasty Spanish tapas, salad, stew etc., complete with instructions of how to make the recipes. This really is an amazing little book and if you go to their website at victoriatwead.com there is a free section with photographs to compliment this book.

Wow! What an entertaining read. A daring move to up sticks and try out a new and different life in sunny rural Spain on a 5 year hiatus turns out to be a dream lifestyle for Victoria and Joe. Settling in to a property that most people would shudder from the workload involved to get it ship shape and livable our brave and resilient twosome take it on with calm and practical skills. Getting quickly involved with friendly Spanish neighbours an eccentric Brit and her mother as the experienced helpful nearest English speaking friends and the culture a mountain village town brings with it. Chickens are their first attempt at living a rural life. It's a laugh a minute so well described and so very interesting that I can't wait to read her follow on part 2 of this captivating series. Olè Victoria I am ready for the ride and I can see me reading all 6 parts of this remarkable series in sequence. I wonder if I'll get to find out what happened in Queensland with your first house swap and I have noted all your tasty recipes some of which I have tried already. A great idea slipping in Spanish quisine between the fun narrative ready for more.

Sorry this did not make me laugh. I was rather surprised that the author did not see anything amiss with her two gin swilling friends playing a ghetto blaster at full volume on the roof terrace of their house, thus disturbing the peace of the resident villagers. The English abroad I guess. I also thought it a shame to bulldoze the orchard that had been there from time immemorial and smashing through the underground reservoir in order to build more houses. I was not surprised that 'Sancho' did not want to witness the destruction.The Spanish themselves come across as delightful, patient and generous people.I shall not be reading further volumes, just not my sort of travel book.

Victoria and Joe Twead leave their busy lives in southern England behind, to live in the quiet mountain village of El Hoyo in southern Spain. Rather than sell up completely they create a five year plan where they will renovate an old house, build two new homes on the adjoining orchard then take stock of their new lives and decide whether to remain in Spain or return to the UK.We are introduced to the characters of the village, including Paco and Carmen from next door, ex pat Judith and her mum who care for a large collection of cats and dogs...Victoria regales the reader with numerous tales of their adventures among this endearing cast of characters, as they become carers for an increasing collection of chickens, which produce an abundance of eggs which the villagers fight over!I thoroughly enjoyed this memoir and plan to continue reading the other books in the series. I also loved the rich assortment of Spanish recipes included at the end of each chapter.