Traveling through the mountains and farming

Chapter 132 Camellia

When Luo Fang heard this, he put down his backpack and went over to help pick camellia flowers, not forgetting to remind:

"Then pick more and try more. When you are done, remember to give me some and I will help you pick camellias."

"No, this half basket is enough for me. Fresh flowers are needed to make facial water. Once I succeed in the experiment, we can come over and pick more." Lin Wan declined with a smile.

Luo Fang did not hesitate and turned around to continue picking camellia fruits. She saw that the two siblings next to her had already picked up half of the basket together.

With the wild fruits they picked on the road taking up some space, their two backpacks would soon be full.

Lin Wanze was picking flowers and thinking about how to make a tool to distill floral water.

I bought a very simple glass distillation pot at home before, which is the easiest to replicate, but there is no ice here, so less floral dew can be collected.

She didn't dare to consider the complicated traditional distiller as she had no conditions to make one. All she could think of now was to go back and make a ceramic distillation pot. The only thing she could do was to make the distillation time longer and replace the ice with cold water more frequently.

After having a preliminary idea, Lin Wan quickened the pace of picking flowers. It was getting late, so she had to go back as soon as possible.

After they filled all the backpacks, everyone packed up their things and set off on their journey home.

Although he had encountered a giant python and had a life-and-death escape, he also ran into a camellia forest, which was a blessing in disguise.

Li Chongwu was still leading the way, and everyone followed silently behind, each carrying a heavy backpack with pheasants and rabbits tied with vines and carried in their hands.

Along the way, Lin Wan was still thinking about how to make the distillation pot more convenient to use.

The two siblings did not forget the several traps they had set up before, and kept reminding Li Chongwu not to forget to take them to check them out.

Every trap they set yielded a reward, and Lin Wan couldn't help but sigh again that the resources deep in the mountains were even more abundant.

How could she not be rich? Today she saw the giant python that she had only heard of.

They returned safely to the secluded cave before the sun set.

Lin Wan and her two siblings placed the items they had received in the main room, and then they went into the kitchen to cook dinner.

Lin Wan followed him into the kitchen and was about to enter the backyard when she saw Li Ke holding a wooden steamer and preparing to cook, which gave her an idea.

She remembered a video she had seen before about the ancient method of making perfume. The blogger made a wooden barrel that could be used to steam flower petals. There was a bamboo tube on the barrel to drain the steam, and a sky pot was placed on the barrel as a cooling tool. In this way, pure dew could be obtained by steaming the flowers.

She still remembered the copy that said: If you collect rose flowers and make steam into water, then by repeatedly collecting and steaming it, it will accumulate and become fragrant.

But right now, there is no extra iron pot at home that can be used as a daily pot. If she wants to use it for a long time, it is not convenient for her to always borrow it from others.

Lin Wan immediately thought that she could make a clay pot.

She walked over excitedly and examined the wooden steamer again and again. She thought that if she made a hole in the steamer and used a bamboo tube to collect the distilled pure water, it would become the distillation barrel she had seen before.

Li Ke, who was standing nearby, saw her sister-in-law take the wooden steamer from her hand, look at it carefully and grin, then give it back to her and run away.

Lin Wan ran out and went straight to Old Man Wang's house, and explained in detail the distillation barrel she wanted. After Old Man Wang said that there was no problem in making it, she agreed that she could come and pick it up at noon tomorrow.

She quickly went home to prepare to make the pottery pot. She moved the necessary materials such as wood boards and water to the backyard, lit a few candles for lighting, crushed the clay that she had dug up and placed in the backyard, added water and mud, and kneaded it until the clay became soft and fine.

Then I started to shape it. Considering the success rate of firing, I prepared to make a total of three ceramic pot blanks. In addition, I also planned to make a few more ceramic bottles to hold camellia pure water. Although I already had some at home, the more the better.

In the middle of the process, he was called by the two siblings to have dinner, and then he buried his head in his work again. He was busy until late at night, and finally finished making all the clay pots and bowls.

Lin Wan looked at the results in front of her and breathed a sigh of relief.

Thinking that the blogger was making rose perfume at the time, she planned to try making some camellia perfume.

I also thought that I could pick more flowers in the mountains to make various hydrosols and perfumes in the future.

This suddenly added a new goal to the rest of my life.

On the second day, Lin Wan got up early and went to the backyard to check on the drying of the blanks.

After drying overnight, the blank has become slightly harder and can be fired around noon.

While waiting, Lin Wan was not idle. She took the two siblings to sort out the camellia flowers and camellia fruits they had picked.

She remembered that her friend's father told her that the picked tea fruits should be piled up indoors for six or seven days to ferment in order to increase the oil content.

Then spread them out and dry them in the sun for three or four days, most of the camellia fruits will crack naturally, and those that fail to crack will be peeled manually later.

The obtained tea seeds can be dried and stored for oil extraction.

According to this method, they piled the camellia fruits in the corner of the main room and prepared to ferment them for six or seven days.

Then move some of the camellia flowers to the side of the spring pool, wash them clean, and dry them with a winnowing basket. These are prepared to be made into dried flowers for drinking tea, and keep some of the camellia flowers to make pure dew.

After finishing all these, I found that several other families living in the caves were preparing to set out to pick camellia fruits.

Luo Fang came specifically to ask Lin Wan if she wanted to join them. She planned to pick some camellia flowers to dry today, and also asked Lin Wan to help make the camellia pure water she mentioned.

Lin Wan calculated the time and decided that she could indeed go pick some camellia fruits and camellia flowers in the morning and then come back in the afternoon to fire the blanks.

He took his two siblings and Luo Fang and joined the picking team.

Everyone was busy in the camellia forest all morning. Lin Wan picked half a basket of camellia flowers and two baskets of camellia fruits.

Li Ke and he were still picking half a basket of chrysanthemums in the fields near the camellia forest. Luo Fang saw this and also picked half a basket.

Knowing that drinking dried amaranth in water can reduce internal heat, Luo Fang said that she would dry more of it and give it to her mother-in-law to make water to drink. Her mother-in-law often got sores in her mouth due to internal heat, and it was uncomfortable for her to eat.

Near noon, everyone returned to the secluded cave with a lot of harvest.

After Lin Wan returned home, she went to the backyard to check on the pottery blanks. Finding that they were dry enough to be fired, she called on the two brothers and sisters to help carry them in a winnowing basket to the earthen kiln that had been built on the gentle slope.

Lin Wan placed two pottery pots into the earthen kiln, sealed the kiln mouth, and lit the firewood.

Li Ke was still the one watching the fire. This kid now had a much better grasp of the temperature in the earthen kiln than Lin Wan.

Lin Wan took Li Chongle home. She was responsible for making lunch, while Li Chongle was responsible for washing and drying the freshly picked camellia and chrysanthemums.