Mill Cottage - 2nd Stone Renovation. Phase 1 Property Purchase.

Mill Cottage. Haradiatica. Lefkada.

This is our 2nd project, purchased in November 2019. We discovered, through our friend, a little plot that was conveniently close by to The Goat Bell (our home). The purchase was again very straight forward as the licence to renovate was already in place. There was mains electricity connected but no mains water.

We thought it was a great opportunity to create something in keeping with this quaint village that we have fallen in love with; giving ourselves a year to complete a traditional stone cottage that will be FOR SALE afterwards.

Nestled between two small access tracks in the heart of Haradiatica village with beautiful mountain views, we feel it has great potential as either a pretty second home (lock up and leave) or a Greek forever home, with low maintenance and running costs for a retired couple or someone who simply loves country living on a gorgeous island.

The stone building was originally a local mill, not as we know it with sails or a water wheel, but with a water tower. The natural spring water runs from the mountain above Alatro which ran into the tower for its purpose, but was disused many years ago.

On viewing it was so overgrown it was difficult to actually access the stone mill and the tower was barely visible due to a rampant ivy and fruit tree.

There was no rush to begin work as we were still doing finishing touches to The Goat Bell renovation and we had also planned a winter holiday. So we simply decided to clear the site in preparation, with a view to begin work in the spring.
Our friends at Creo Yacht Brokers kindly filmed the plot using a drone to give us some great aerial views once clearing the site had started.

Once inside we were able to see that the mill had been built into the rock face and there were no foundations just a dirt floor as so many old stone buildings were. We soon realised that this was to be an enormous challenge.