Spirit Horse is a spiritual retreat centre in Wales offering meditation retreats, Enlightenment Intensives, ceremonial gatherings and small festivals in wild nature. I had the opportunity to attend Wild Tribe, a festival held on the grounds of Spirit Horse. While I didn't agree with some of the beliefs of the festival organisers, there were too many beautiful things about the festival for that to dampen the…
LaNada is a transdisciplinary community, cultural, and permaculture centre in Mazunte, Mexico. "A community workspace with a comprehensive strategy for dialogue between civil society, government, private groups, and communities to preserve processes in the region." While I was in Mazunte, they were celebrating the fifth anniversary of coming into existence. A beautiful party in a beautiful space with beautiful people!
Butser Ancient Farm is an open-air experimental archaeology museum and active research centre. Their buildings include a Roman villa, Celtic village, Stone Age farm, and Saxon halls - all of which are reconstructed from UK archaeology, and open for the public to explore on weekends and holidays. The story of Butser Ancient Farm began in 1970 with a decision by the Council for British Archaeology to…
Crops not Shops has a mission: "to inspire people towards a more conscious and self-sufficient lifestyle. To transform land, gardens and green spaces everywhere into thriving ecosystems of biodiversity and organic food productivity. To educate and empower people to look after our earth and preserve life to the best of our ability for 7 generations to come; and to co-create a global, fair, free food-sharing network…
Glastonbury has always been a town of pilgrimage. For some, it has also become a place of refuge - at least for a time. Van living has become more popular as house living costs soar, but the infrastructure in the UK for such a lifestyle is not present to support the growing community. This has resulted in a two-sided debate between those who rely on the…
Transformative Roots is a 'space for connecting and conscious growth'. Their description "You are our guests and we only wish to have your presence." well matched the feeling I experienced. This is just the kind of setup we'd like to achieve one day - a home, with vegetable gardens, woodland areas, and grass clearings; a space where like-minded individuals and groups can gather and connect, share…
I was blessed to be invited to the Mugen Taiko dojo's lunar new year celebration. These guys have a special place in my heart and hosted a beautiful gathering with performances, chasing away the demons, burning the broken bachi, and dancing. Thank you to all of you for being you!
At the core of Extinction Rebellion’s philosophy is non-violent civil disobedience:"We are asking people to find their courage and to collectively do what is necessary to bring about change ...We aren’t focussed on traditional systems like petitions or writing to our MPs ... We are promoting mass “above the ground” civil disobedience – in full public view. This means economic disruption to shake the current political…
Today we visited a friend who lives on a canal boat. The similarities between boat and van living are obvious, but the differences seem to fall in favour of boat life; imagine having your fuel delivered to your van, being able to park up for 2 weeks at a time in any pretty spot you find, or only having a car pass you a couple times…
Today's shout out goes to The Orchard Project: a charity dedicated to the creation and restoration of community orchards. Their aim is to 're-fruit' the country, putting power and knowledge back in the hands of the local community and creating a 'better, locally-led food system'. The project started out in London, aiming to re-connect urban communities with their local and little-known orchards. Many urban orchards are now…
During the warm seasons of the year Oneness Jams are held in the parks of London on Sunday afternoons. A gathering for those who want to play music, dance, spin, and connect with people. Usually the music is tribal, with traditional instruments such as drums, rattles, flutes, didgeridoos, etc accompanied by singing. The constant flow and variety of instruments and musicians keep it interesting, and connecting vibration is…
This week we popped by the London Permaculture Festival, attended a few talks and familiarized ourselves with some of the sustainable growing projects around London and the UK. There were beginner's talks on forest gardening and permaculture design; run-throughs of building with straw bales, composting, and fermentation; a brainstorming session around urban permaculture design strategies; and some stalls, including our personal favourite: the bookstall. Anyone with…