Field Trip to the western Seirra foot hills

 Road Trip to pottery land-

Mr. Danny Vitali and i recently took a trip to a part of california i fell in love with- the western Seirra Foot hills, near Angels Camp/Jackson/San Andreas. we went to visit a friend Maya who i took RDNA with last year,  and her sculptures she has been working on. Maya has been staying with an awesome guy, Kern. these photos are of his pottery studio, homestead and property. it is beautiful country there, really cool community, beautiful sugar pine, ponderosa, manzenita and rolling golden foot hills out near gold country. his gardens are beautiful, and danny and i work traded and did a little other work for Kern while hanging with his awesome community he is building. some what of a renaissance man, he has built his mother a rad rammed earth house, a sauna, a beautiful pottery studio with solar hot water heat, a house, and a really rad seed bank that he shares with his community. land is available and cheap. Maya has been looking around and tempting me with prospects. 

My ideal scene would be to find some land up there, spend my time here at RDI on the coast for a few years while i visit and slowly improve the land over time turning it into a permie heaven. it was a area of California i had not even imagined to exist, and cant wait to go back and visit. Kern is wanting to install a food forest/orchard this coming winter so if i am not doing that here at RDI and have a moment, i will try and visit again. i was hooked. 

Pottery studio

Maya and her nail sculpture

Kerns Kiln

the gardens

More Gardens

A small shed/greenhouse space off Kerns awesome Terrace garden.

Kerns Pottery studio with solar hot water panels

the amazing farm next door to Kerns place

the house, moving the drum set to prepare for a party

in other news, just a few weeks ago Olivia and i took a walk up the wish creek watershed here on the land and took a magical mystery tour through the two head waters. it was fern covered, oaked and bay tree heaven. here are some photos of the upper water shed here at RDI, as well as the top ridge that we made it up to looking west towards the ocean. Enjoy!

up in the thick of it

beautiful bay

fern gully

looking down the west ridge towards the beach

looking down the valley, this is commonweal- the trees are hiding the property! way off on the horizon is just south of SF city.

OAEC and Venus Transit

main gardens we were drooling over!

 This week with the June PDC here at RDI, we got to travel up to occidental CA, in Sonoma. There we got to Visit the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center, or OAEC. Previously the Farallons Institute, it was founded by a core of people who call them selves the sowing circle,  who took the 82 acres and turned it into a permaculture, sustainable farming, water shed restoration, and all around garden paradise. complete with nurseries, guest houses, several amazing examples of earth buildings, wild lands tended, and spectacular gardens and orchards. IF you haven't heard of OAEC before, check them out. web site below as well as some words from their own website.  doing some great stuff in conjunction with the whole Northern California Permie scene.

near the residents houses, a herb and mixed perennial garden up a path

lots of cutting flowers and poppies, some beautiful plants

food production and mixed nursery beds for test plants, herbs and flowers.

From the OAEC web site-  "OAEC is a nonprofit organizing and education center and organic farm in Northern California’s Sonoma County. OAEC was founded in 1994 by a group of biologists, horticulturists, educators, activists, and artists seeking innovative and practical approaches to the pressing environmental and economic crises of our day. Much of the Center’s work addresses the challenges of creating democratic communities that are ecologically, economically and culturally sustainable in an increasingly privatized and corporatized economy and culture. OAEC's programs combine research, demonstration, education, and organizing to develop collaborative, community-based strategies for positive social change and effective environmental stewardship.





OAEC is located in western Sonoma County, 65 miles north of San Francisco, on 80 acres that encompass wildlands of meadows and mixed oak, fir and redwood forests. The Center’s bio-intensive organic gardens and orchards have been a source of inspiration and training for thousands of gardeners, farmers and landscapers for over 35 years, first as the Farallones Institute (1974-1990), then as the Center for Seven Generations (1990-1993), and since 1994 as OAEC. In a typical year, the Center receives over 3,000 visitors. Many attend one of our courses, others come to site tours or to volunteer in the garden. Bay Area social justice and environmental organizations use the OAEC facility for strategy retreats and workshops for their staff and boards. Many thousands more benefit from our organizing campaigns, public presentations, heirloom seed swaps, and consulting services." http://www.oaec.org/

more of the food and mixed gardens.

What a place! Brock Dolman was our tour guide as well as the Director of OAEC's water institute www.oaecwater.org
Brock has been the Co- instructor with Penny here at RDI for the June PDC. Big thanks to him and all of OAEC for showing us around, and being so awesome.

on a Final note, yesterday we all witnessed the Venus transit across the sun... a very surreal site of a small dot drifting across the sun... just another planet. thanks mayans for knowing what you did... what a year.  

Aquaponics lab

The Aquaponics Lab @ RDI

This is Orin, and his final design project which was to install the next phase of the green house design- a fish farm lab that is a closed system filtered by plant beds. the water is sent to hydroponics set ups (three examples that are designed into it) that feeds the plants and sends the clean water back to the fish tank. 

all this is accomplished via Nitrite build up by fish waste- this is sent through the different runs of hydroponics and beneficial bacteria break it down into Nitrates; which are then used to feed the plants. add a little sun and you have a fully supported hyrodponic and fish aquaculture system! or: Aquaponics!

we will be raising fish and crustaceans in the tank that can be harvested for food and used entirely to their fullest on site. 

this is the finished product to the right! don't you love what i call the cooling tower? that is filled with hydroponic medium, a puffed clay pellet. the water is pumped through that tower, and plants grown vertical! the water returns to the tank via gravity and clean. 

The Solar Showers

 In these photos there is the ultimate enclave for the bathing experience:
the Regenerative Design Institute solar showers.

Since moving in to RDI, i have only been taking solar showers in the late afternoon in the shadow of the west ridge. luckily the past few weeks since iv been here have been beautiful, and the water is HOT. surrounding the showers are wild climbing cucumbers, and the soft gurgling and echo of the water pipe for the spring overflow rain garden, and robins in song with the jays and house finch.

 These showers use copper tubing that run through a black painted box with a glass top. the water is heated and stored in a run of the mill house hold water heater. the thermal flow of cold and hot water- cold sinks and heat rises up through the pipes as the cold water finds lower ground through the copper piping to reheat. simple, yet really wonderfully crafted.
even a partially sunny day will give you some warm water.

looking out through the reed screens you can see south down the property and a little of the coast and ocean on a real fog-less day. Bolinas and this sea shore is truly beautiful along with this sacred land that has been created here at RDI. nothing better then the water from the land that you live heated by the sun, and poured over flesh to be clean. wonderful.