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On An Isolated Island, 62-Year-Old Farmer Transforms Refuge Into A Simple And Self-Sufficient Life With Pigs, Watermelons, And Medicinal Herbs.
From a small isolated island in a lake in the mountains, a 62-year-old farmer transformed an abandoned place into a self-sufficient refuge, surrounded by pigs, watermelons, medicinal herbs, and silence that resembles more a documentary than real life.
Amid cornfields, black pigs, watermelons hidden in the plantation, and a simple boat tied to the shore, he lives on an isolated island where he cooks with firewood, harvests what he plants, and crosses the reservoir by boat, while many people only know this lifestyle through the internet. On this isolated island, time seems to move slowly and the routine is guided by the land, water, and animals.
Life On An Isolated Island Where Time Moves Slower
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The Brazilian colonial city that stopped in time and shares territory with a rocket launch base.
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79-year-old woman challenges limits, visits 193 countries in the world after 56 years of planning and reveals the behind-the-scenes of a global journey that few have managed to accomplish.
Up close, however, a detail breaks the idea of abandonment. A simple two-story house, organized plantations, and a small boat show that life there involves routine, work, and choice.
It is on this isolated island that a 62-year-old farmer, with the surname Wu, set up his refuge. He arrives by boat, carries everything he needs on his back, and spends days alone, surrounded by water on all sides.
The isolated island has become his home, farm, and personal world, while the opposite shore of the lake functions almost as another reality, a few minutes of rowing away.
How The Isolated Island Was Transformed Into A Self-Sufficient Refuge
The house on the island was built in 2006, originally intended as part of a village that never came to fruition.
The project fell through, the investor gave up, and the construction remained deserted for years, covered by trees and tall grass. The farmer arrived long after, when the place was already taken over by vegetation and seemed forgotten.
He says he has not been living there for long. When he decided to take over the island, he started by cutting down trees, clearing the land, and recovering the soil for planting.
What was once vacant land has turned into a garden, field, and medicinal herb plot, all maintained almost entirely by him alone.
The isolated island, once just a forgotten point in the reservoir, has become a productive space, with plantings spread between the house, sheds, and cornfield.
Animals, Watermelons, And Medicinal Herbs That Sustain The Isolated Island
The foundation of life on this isolated island is simple and straightforward. The farmer raises three pigs of the black pig breed, fed with corn planted right there and cooked grass.
Around the house, he also keeps ducks, geese, and chickens, some raised by him and others by relatives who share the island in different areas.
In the beds, he plants corn, sweet potatoes, beans of various colors, peppers, and pigweed. In one of the fields, watermelons grow that he himself harvests to eat and offer to rare visitors.
Among the furrows of the earth, medicinal herbs also grow, such as Polygonum multiflorum, asparagus, and Huangbai trees that he intends to expand across the island.
The idea is clear: to transform the isolated island into an increasingly self-sufficient space, where the land provides food, extra income from medicinal herbs, and occupation for old age.
The sweet potato leaves feed both the pig and the kitchen.
The corn is for the animals and the birds. The grass is stored and hung near the wood stove, ready to be used.
Simple Routine Between Firewood, Boat, And Weak Cell Signal
Access to the isolated island is done by a motorless boat, paddled only by hand. The farmer crosses the lake when he needs to return home outside the island, visit family, or resolve some necessity.
Sometimes he spends two or three days without going out. At other times, he stays almost an entire week dedicated to planting, pigs, and medicinal herbs.
The structure is basic. To cook, he uses a wood stove, fed with firewood that is never lacking on the island. Daily energy comes mainly from light and a small solar lamp that can also charge his phone.
At night, when movement on the water ceases and silence takes over, he can even watch videos on his phone and see, on the screen, a life that resembles the one he is already living there.
On the isolated island, the climate is cooler than on the other shore, making the place pleasant in the summer. In the winter, the simple and sheltered shelter, along with the fire from the stove, keeps out the cold.
The sounds are almost always the same: water, insects, birds, the honking of geese, the clucking of chickens, and sometimes the noise of someone swimming or calling from the other shore.
An Isolated Island, Three Islands, And A Life Choice
The reservoir in which the island was formed has decades of history. Previously, the region was dry land, with a stone bridge and a dry path to the market.
After the water rose, what was once part of the land became an island. Today, three islands divide the lake. On one of them, there are reports of snakes and many birds making nests. On another, remnants of old houses that are no longer used remain.
On the largest one, chosen by the farmer, there are more than eight mu of cultivated land, cornfields, sweet potatoes, bamboo, medicinal herbs, and pasture for animals.
He is not there by accident, but by choice, seeking a place where he could work the land at his own pace, away from the hustle and close to what he plants and harvests.
For many, the image of an isolated island evokes escape, abandonment, or loneliness. In his case, it’s almost the opposite.
The island is the place where he finds what many people seek in videos and pictures: silence, simple work, direct contact with nature, and the feeling that almost everything consumed was produced right there.
Life On An Isolated Island That Many People Only Know Through The Internet
The farmer’s children live in larger cities, like Chongqing and Guiyang, while he chooses to spend a good part of his days on this isolated island, planting, harvesting, taking care of pigs, and observing the movement of water in the reservoir.
He talks about continuing to plant medicinal herbs, organizing the land even more, and enjoying old age with something that gives him income and, at the same time, purpose.
The routine on an isolated island consists of small gestures that repeat: cooking on the wood stove, cutting grass, caring for animals, harvesting watermelons, testing new plantings, walking among the corn and bamboo, listening to the chickens in the distance.
Now and then, a visitor arrives by boat or swims across, curious to see what life is like in this place that seems like a movie set.
In the end, the isolated island has become a laboratory for simple living. A place where self-sufficiency is built daily and where “far from everything” transforms into being close to what truly matters to those who chose this lifestyle.
And you, would you be able to swap city life for a life on an isolated island like his, or does this simplicity only exist in your imagination when you see stories like this on the internet?
Eu amo lugares assim mas em terras firme lago só ao lado .tenho um sitio que transformei em terra fértil onde antes só era matos nativos e área hoje tem árvores frutíferas amo está lá .mas ainda mora ba cidade agitada .
SE fosse no Brasil, teria que vender a “produção” de melancia 🍉🍉🍉 toda para pagar “impostos”, principalmente iptu. Ainda iam querer despejar com apoio da “marinha”……
Bem isso, Brasil explora de mais as pessoas…. não tem leveza em situações alguma
Sábado, quase meia noite e meia, deitada em minha cama, tentando dormir ao som alto do vizinho, gritos estericos de bocas não cansadas.
COM CERTEZA ABSOLUTA, largaria essa vida na cidade pra viver nessa ilha!!!