Marcia and I paid a visit to a local producer of essentials oils recently. The couple, Marju and Marco run a business called Naturalness Essential Oils.
They live, and have their distillation production right next to the beautiful river Ocreza, just below the Gardunha mountains outside the village of Torre. It took us only about 20mins to get there from Mount of Oaks through beautiful landscape.
Marju showed us inside the old mill where the machines are set up to distill the plants and extract the essential oils. They have been refurbishing the building, step by step, while maintaining the character of the place…..
We were really impressed with the stills and the work that the couple had already done to produce and sell local 100% organic oils!
Since we are in the season of the blooming Rock Rose (Cistus ladaniferus var. maculatus) they will soon begin production again. One of the things we really appreciated was that the couple sought to re-use whatever they could from the plants. Even when they had extracted the essential oil from the rock rose, they used the plant material to burn and heat the distilling chambers! No waste at this farm!
What is amazing about this local business and this couple is their wonderful resilience – the fire that ripped through the Gardunha mountian area in August came extremely close to their home. The organic material that they had been harvesting for production of essential oils burnt in the fire.
From the picture it is difficult to really understand the devastation caused by the fire to the mountain behind. But this family will not be discouraged and soon they will offer a workshop.
Sunday, 29th April, they will be opening for folks interested in learning about the process of distillation of rock rose. It starts at 9am, collecting the plants, and finishes at 1pm.
The places are limited to 10, so drop an email to naturalness.cistus@icloud.
It will cost 20E and you will go home with some essential oil and hydrosol MADE on the DAY!
