Kath Thomas

Thank you for your interest and replies. We intend to make full use of the basement during the winter and in the summer to actually. We dont intend to try and run the RMH from two levels of the house.
We did get details on how to build one from this website and I fully intend to hand this project over to my old man next year. If your interested I'll get him to post photos  when the works are underway, as for me when it comes to "tech" I'm still "banging the rocks together" to quote The Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy.
Thanks again.

Bulgaria, the country has four seasons and a very small population.  Many houses available in villages as younger people want to live in cities. Depending on where you want to live houses with land are very, very affordable. Beware buying in very poor areas you'll get lots for your money but you may end up in a village thats lost its shops .
In short do your homework, look Bulgaria up .
The cost of living here is very affordable with council tax for us both being about £40 a year which includes having our bin emptied  every week and street lighting. This tax in the UK is £100 a month!!
We've a garden which includes fruit and nut trees is more than large enough to feed us both year round once we've settled here full time.
So in short look at Bulgaria.

Thank you Glen I'll try and answer some of your questions.
The basement is partially  underground and the chimney runs up the north wall and is above the roof. Like most Bulgarian  village homes there is no internal staircase and people used to move down and live in their basements during the winter months, however as we're  about 40 kilometres  from the black sea the winters tend to be milder than up in the mountains and ski resorts. But it can be very cold in January,  February  and March.
Anyway back to the basement, the chimney serving this room in the basement runs up to the room above which also has an outlet and flue for a wood burner. Both the basement and the room above have separate little doors to ensure that ashes caught in the chimney can be cleaned out. So the chimney serving these two rooms runs inside the house rather than outside.
Both rooms are not large .
Hope this helps
Kath

Hello me again.
We have a little village house in Bulgaria  the basement living area consisting of a kitchen , a wide corridor  and what my husband like to believe  will eventually  become  his " media" room. Now its constructed of very large stones on the external walls and the north wall has , as customary  in  Bulgaria  has no windows, the internal structure is mainly wattle and daub over the stone work,  the floors are tiled. I was wondering if we could make a rocket mass heater along the north wall of the " media" room and make use of the existing  outlet for a wood burner to send out the emissions?
Any thoughts?

Another thing about Bulgaria, unlike the UK ,jars and lids for canning are available in both the village shops and in all the supermarkets in local towns at this time of the year, ready for the harvest.

Not only that Pearl but here in Bulgaria  people still forage and glean to ensure that theres more on the table. In the UK I'd pick nettles to make soup  seen as odd behaviour there, here that's a common practice,  fruit  and nut trees seem to line the roads in and out of the village which people take full advantage of. Here " make do and mend" isnt a hobby but a way of life. Which suits me.

Not much chance of getting anything here in rural Bulgaria,  nothing and I mean nothing gets thrown.  Empty plastic bottles are cut down to be used as pots to grow seedlings in and the only chance of getting anything is if something is left out in the lane for others to make use of even then if it cannot be used as firewood.

Same here (old fashioned life) if I cannot afford something I either save for it or do without, never owned a credit card in my life and because of this attitude I have a very poor credit rating which is just fine by me, I'll stick with my "make do and mend" life.

Sorry for Tot Boy read Toy Boy, our sons when they first visited us had similar ideas to you but after staying a few days agreed with us that a move into the basement would be preferable also in the winter many people move into and live in their basements to reduce heating bills. Thank you for your suggestions.

I've only just seen this topic but what great ideas projects I'm going to do this nest year meanwhile one of my new years resolutions is to buy no clothes this year as I already have enough to last me a life time. I'm also clearing out my wardrobe and either passing items on,  giving to charity shops or making cleaning cloths. Oh and thanks for the fasting tips  I currently fast around five days a week for about 16 hours at a time and its doing me no harm.