I didn’t come to Spain for the sun. Not in the way people picture it—sandals, sangría, life through an Instagram filter. I came because I was worn out. Properly, not just tired. Tired you can sleep off. This was the kind that follows you around, taps you on the shoulder when you’re brushing your teeth and says, “Hey—this isn’t working anymore, is it?”
I was fried from work. Too many years behind a laptop screen, juggling too many things at once, always connected, never grounded. There were days I’d open the fridge and forget what I’d gone in for. I’d lie awake at night with that looping to-do list in my head, knowing I wouldn’t remember any of it in the morning. I don’t think I was depressed, not quite. Just disconnected. From everything.
The idea of moving to Spain wasn’t some sudden dream. My partner and I had talked about it off and on for years. We even brought our teenage son down one summer to “see how it felt.” He hated it. Said it smelled funny and the Wi-Fi was slow. But the seed was planted. It grew in the background while we kept going with our lives in the UK, patching up leaks, checking gas bills, surviving winter with wet socks and takeaways.
Eventually, something cracked. There wasn’t a dramatic moment. Just a quiet conversation on the edge of exhaustion. “Shall we just do it?” “Do what?” “All of it. The move. The big one.” And then we did.
We bought a half-finished house just outside a small inland town in Valencia. Not the postcard Spain. No beach, no expats sipping beer at 10 a.m. Just olive trees, dry riverbeds, neighbours with goats, and a property listing that used the word “potential” far too generously. We drove down in a second-hand van loaded with mismatched furniture, too many books, and three broken garden chairs we swore we’d fix.
The first month was chaos. We didn’t have internet for two weeks. The kitchen tap fell off. A storm ripped part of the roof off before we’d unpacked. The town hall wanted documents we didn’t know existed. The postman didn’t seem to believe our address was real. Every day was a new surprise—usually involving electricity or plumbing. But slowly, painfully, we began to find a rhythm. Sort of.
That’s where this blog comes in.
Greentie.org wasn’t part of the plan. I started writing just to keep myself sane. To document what was going wrong, what was going right, and what was somewhere in between. I didn’t know if anyone would read it. I still don’t, really. But writing helps. It slows things down. Helps me notice the small stuff.
I’m not a climate scientist or a permaculture wizard. I’m just someone who got fed up with living a life that didn’t feel like mine. I care about the planet, sure. But I also care about finding a way to live that doesn’t make me feel like I’m sprinting through wet cement all the time.
We’re trying to live more sustainably here. That doesn’t mean we’ve got it all figured out. We mess up constantly. I’ve killed more tomato plants than I’ve grown. We still buy milk in plastic bottles sometimes. I still curse at the solar system when it trips the inverter and shuts the fridge off mid-heatwave. But we’re trying.
Some posts here will be practical: how we set up our off-grid water system using scavenged parts and guesswork. How we cook without gas half the week. What we learned from installing a second-hand solar setup off Wallapop. There’ll be experiments—composting toilets, natural insulation, greywater systems.
Others will be more reflective. What it’s like raising a teenager in a place where nothing works the way they’re used to. How my partner and I navigate the stress of doing everything ourselves. What it feels like when the news is full of climate collapse and you’re trying to build something hopeful anyway.
There’s also guilt. We didn’t move here poor. We sold up in the UK and brought enough to get started. That gave us a cushion. I don’t pretend we’re living hand-to-mouth. But we’re careful. We’re not building a villa. We’re fixing a place that had been half-abandoned and learning, slowly, to need less. To make do. To find satisfaction in a good meal, a repaired gutter, a lemon tree that didn’t die this winter.
The name Greentie came from a weird little in-joke that stuck. My old office had “casual Friday” and there was this one guy who always wore a green tie like it was a rebellion. We used to laugh, but I remember thinking: that’s a small act of resistance, isn’t it? Wearing something just because it makes you feel a bit more human. Greentie became a kind of code for that feeling—doing something small, personal, a bit silly maybe, but rooted in care.
So that’s what this is. Not a manual. Not a lifestyle blog. Not a guide to quitting your job and moving to the country (although good luck if you do). Just a messy, ongoing record of trying to live differently in a world that keeps rushing the other way. Trying to be more useful, more aware, more in tune—with nature, with myself, with the people I love.
Sometimes I’ll rant. Sometimes I’ll ramble. Sometimes I’ll write something that probably only makes sense to me. But if any of it helps you feel less alone in your own journey, that’s enough for me.
This isn’t finished. Neither is the house. But it’s something. And in a world of too much nothing, I’ll take that.