sparr

Intentional Community Tour Days Fourteen through Sixteen

We started the day with a visit to Lost Valley Educational Center (http://lostvalley.org/) in Dexter Oregon which is a permaculture school combined with an intentional community. We saw their class spaces, cabins, and communal kitchen and activity spaces. I had to bow out of the tour early, so I missed their larger outdoor spaces and a chance to meet more of the residents. I expect to be filled in by the others in followup discussions.

After this we made the long drive to Chico, skipping a planned stop along the way. This allowed me to get on a bus to Sacramento to continue the bus repair debacle, while everyone else continued the tour. They spent the night at Valley Oaks Village (http://www.chicocohousing.org/), then visited for a full day, then spent another night. I am eager to hear about this part of the trip. As usual, tales of the bus rescue will be in their own post later.

In my absence, the tour group visited Ananda Village (http://www.anandavillage.org/) in Nevada City California and Southside Park Cohousing (https://www.facebook.com/SouthsideParkCohousing) in Sacramento California. I caught back up with them after a long drive during a visit to Muir Commons (http://www.muircommons.org/) in Davis California. Muir Commons stands out for being part of a much larger development project which included apartments, homes, a school, greenways, etc. The city and developers said “we want something physically and conceptually in between the apartments and the single family homes”, and someone said “cohousing”, so it happened. I didn’t get much time to speak to them, arriving late and being tired, but they were nice folks with a nice common space that we narrowly missed community brunch at the next morning.

Having reunited the bus and the tour group, we spent the night in the bus. The final days of the tour will be in my next post, then the longer followup writings will begin.

Intentional Community Tour Days Twelve and Thirteen

We started the morning with breakfast and a longer tour at Trillium Hollow Cohousing Community (https://trilliumhollow.weebly.com/). I had to sit out most of the tour for work reasons, but everyone else got to see some of the individual units and meet more of the residents.

Next up we took a detour off our planned route to look at the Laurelwood Academy property in Gaston Oregon. This was one of my dream properties in my search to purchase somewhere to build a community three years ago. The buyers then got it for a steal, and don’t appear to have done much of anything with it. I met one of the previous residents and current neighbors and intend to follow up with him and try to track down the buyers to see if they would be interested in selling it.

We proceeded to Labishire Homestead Commons (http://labishire.weebly.com/) in Salem Oregon. Our host there runs a self sufficient homestead frequently populated with wwoofers and other travelers, with an eye toward finding more permanent residents to build a persistent community. We got to see his many garden and animal efforts, and shared a meal. We cooked mostly groceries we brought, and he contributed pasta and sauce and vegetables, fresh and canned from his gardens. He invited us to spend the night, so we did.

The next morning we made our way to CoHo Ecovillage (http://www.cohoecovillage.org/) in Corvallis Oregon for a very quick tour. Unfortunately due to work and school commitments only one of us got to take it, so I hope to learn more from them later.

Our next stop was at Alpha Farm Cooperative (https://www.ic.org/directory/alpha-farm/) in Deadwood Oregon. Their community of currently 10 people grows in the summer and shrinks in the winter as the farm needs dictate. We had a tour of their various private and common buildings and most of their food production spaces. The most surprising aspect here is that the property is owned by the corporation of which the longest term residents are members, controlled by them after the passing of the community’s founder. They vote in new members based on participation and contribution to the community, without a financial buy-in component, which stands out as relatively unique among non-secretive communities. Another interesting feature was their community business which is as a USPS rural route contractor; about half the residents are approved as drivers and take turns to deliver mail across the local towns each day. We got to meet about half of their current residents and had a long conversation with a few. We also saw some samples of their 50 years of recorded-on-paper meeting minutes, providing insight into the history of the community.

We ended up at a hotel in Eugene Oregon for the night, with a stop nearby planned for the morning.

Intentional Community Tour Days Ten and Eleven

Day Ten was a rest day. Flying to Portland put us two days ahead of schedule. Efforts to reschedule and confirm with the last dozen stops on the trip are underway, but this was too short notice to meet anyone on Sunday. We drove east from Portland toward Carson, where our next scheduled stop would be.

We stopped at Multnomah Falls (https://www.fs.usda.gov/recarea/crgnsa/recarea/?recid=30026) for a short steep hike. The view of the falls from the bottom is awe inspiring, the hike is tough but worth it, and the view from the top is even more exciting. Overall a fun quick stop in nature, with fewer people surrounding us the higher we got.

Our relaxing stop for the day and night was at Carson Hot Springs Resort (https://www.carsonresort.com/resort) where we spent a lot of time in the mineral hot pool and relaxing around the fire. There was also a bit of scouting for an adventure tomorrow, more to come on that that.

First thing in the morning we set out to explore a local natural hot spring. An hour of rocky scrambling later we were relaxing in a ~95F pool alongside some raging river rapids. More posts about that will come later, to update various online sources of info that are 3-15 years out of date.

After checking out of the hotel we had lunch nearby then made our way to the Flying Bobcat Honey Ranch (https://www.bee-folk.org/path-to-membership/index.php) for a tour and discussion about their goals. Currently it’s a small community with a few folks staying short term, but they have long term plans to grow and convert to cooperative ownership. They have many small agricultural spaces, from fruits to herbs to vegetables, growing in various styles including hügelkultur mounds, using grey water, etc. Their community operates a meadery as their business (https://www.melchemy.wine/) and we had a small tasting.

Unfortunately our planned stop in Portland proper was canceled due to the scheduling changes, so we headed for Beaverton next where we met some folks at Trillium Hollow Cohousing Community (https://trilliumhollow.weebly.com/) for a short tour and conversation about the history of their community. They built this cohousing community with a single condominium building of dozens of units 27 years ago, using the original and architecturally unique house on the property as their common house. They gave us a guest room in their common house and a kitchen to cook ourselves dinner, and we plan to have a longer tour and meet more of their residents in the morning.

Intentional Community Tour Days Eight and Nine

We woke up at Water Birch Co-Op (https://www.ic.org/directory/marion-street/) and had breakfast, a tour, and some conversation about their history. Their home has a single owner, with plans to reorganize with co-ownership once all the legal entities are in place. We got to see what could be multiple discrete units with kitchens in the house, and some construction in progress.

In the middle of the day we visited Meow Wolf Denver, Convergence Station (https://meowwolf.com/visit/denver), which is a huge interactive art installation project.

Later we visited Nyland Cohousing (https://www.nylandcohousing.org/) who kindly rescheduled their community potluck dinner to coincide with our visit. We got to walk around and see their houses, garden spaces, communal areas, and their common house. Dinner with over a dozen residents involved a lot of great conversation about them and about us and intentional communities in general.

We spent the night at a hotel between Nyland and our next stop.

Our planned stop in Fort Collins CO ended up not working out, so we pivoted to visiting Polestar Village (https://www.polestarvillage.com/). Their community was displaced from Hawaii by lava damage to their common house and gardens there a few years ago. They have purchased land and prepared a design for a cohousing community, with more than a few of their prior residents and newcomers already on board. I look forward to seeing what they accomplish in the coming years.

After that we visited Nyland again for a longer conversation with a few residents. We got more insight into the long term communication and decision making processes there, and some community approaches to conflict and concern resolution.

Through both of these days, we discovered the bus would be out of commission indefinitely thanks to UPS losing a relatively unique replacement part. To keep the trip alive, we decided to adjust our travel plans. We’re skipping a few scheduled stops in Montana and Washington in order to cut down on long drives with no stops. As I write this, we have just flown from Denver to Portland and checked into a hotel east of the city. We will pick the trip itinerary back up in Carson Washington on Sunday or Monday, with a dozen stops still ahead of us before we reach San Francisco in about a week.

Intentional Community Tour Day Seven

Today we drove into Denver and dropped the bus off at a mechanic who specializes in this rare make, with parts en route. We switched to a rental car again for the day.

Our first stop was at Highline Crossing Cohousing Community (http://www.highlinecrossing.org/). They are a townhome HOA with shared pedestrian ways, gardens, outdoor social spaces, and a common house with kitchen and dining and recreational amenities. We had dinner with a handful of their residents and met a couple more, with conversation about their history and organization. My favorite part of their property is the direct connection to a 70 mile long canal trail for biking and walking.

Our second stop was at Water Birch Co-Op (https://www.ic.org/directory/marion-street/). We met a few residents then got settled in to spend the night. Our further interactions with them will come in the morning, with breakfast, a tour of the house, and a conversation with more of the residents.

Tomorrow we see Meow Wolf and one intentional community, and hopefully get the bus back!

Intentional Community Tour Days Five and Six

Ongoing bus saga will, once again, be covered in another post or series. I’m combining two posts to catch up and because I am lacking insight into a couple of stops and legs of the trip.

The trip participants traveling by car spent the night outside Chicago then started Day Five with coffee and a tour at Jesus People Chicago (https://jesuspeoplechicago.org/) which is a nonprofit that houses the homeless and runs a coffee shop in addition to their many other projects. I hope to get more info about this visit from the trip participants later.

They proceeded to a second stop at Arizmendi Ecovillage (http://arizmendiecovillage.com) where they had a tour, conversation, and spent the night. Again, I hope to learn more later from the folks who were there.

On Day Six we reunited in St Louis, returning the rental car and all traveling by bus again. After breakfast we shared a trip to City Museum (https://citymuseum.org/), one of my bucket list stops on this trip. This place combines some actual museum exhibits (plants, animals, history, etc) with the most impressive collection of climbable and otherwise physically interactive exhibits I have ever seen in one place. A dozen different different 5% slices of the building would fit right in at Burning Man. At least a thousand feet of slides and a mile of crawl/climb/shimmy tunnels of stone and steel and wood with a dozen different styles. More branches and choices and chances to get lost than any maze I’ve explored, let alone so densely packed in 3D. Oh, and no maps (until you find the one at the top of the space). I strongly recommend a visit for anyone with children, and any adventurous adults as well.

I am writing this as we drive west from St Louis from the afternoon into the evening of Day Six. I failed to find a community to host us for a visit between here and Denver, so we have most of a day of driving and sight seeing and sleep ahead of us before our whirlwind tour of central Colorado communities starts tomorrow afternoon.

Intentional Community Tour Day Four

Today the trip participants and bus parted ways for at least two days. The bus is still running fine, but needs repair on a wheel hub and I’ll have them address a few less critical concerns at the same time. Further details of the comedy of errors surrounding that situation will come in longer posts outside this series once that situation is resolved.

We rented a car near Pittsburgh PA and drove to our next stop, Maker House (https://www.mkr.house/). This single house was built specifically to accommodate maker endeavors and a small coliving community. On our tour we saw their common spaces including a large office, living and dining area, gym and rec rooms, and a large garage workshop housing what would be an impressive small makerspace in its own right. Their community moved a couple of times before this house was built, and they focus on long term residence with space for hosting occasional events and pursuing frequent maker projects. Unique among our stops so far, they accept new residents based on unanimous consent of the current residents.

I stayed in Pittsburgh to oversee further efforts on the bus, while the other folks took the rental car ahead to Chicago. They are a few hours behind schedule and will have to skip one of the planned stops there, but I anticipate reports of success otherwise from them tomorrow. If the bus repairs go quickly I hope to catch up with them at planned stops in St Louis or Kansas City on Wednesday. Otherwise I’ll be driving a long straight leg to Colorado to meet them between Thursday and Saturday.

Intentional Community Tour Day Three

This morning the flat tire was defeated. After a very slow drive through Valley Forge for the second of three times, the helpful folks at Norristown Tire Center made short work of the problem, mounting the spare tire on the rim quickly. The other trip participants stayed at Camphill Village Kimberton Hills (http://www.camphillkimberton.org/) for breakfast and further conversation with our host there. I picked them up on my way past and we proceeded further west. Our first stop of the day canceled due to a COVID outbreak in their community, fortunately giving us enough time to resolve the tire problem without falling behind schedule.

We moved on toward Hundredfold Farm Cohousing Community (http://www.hundredfoldfarm.org/) for our second stop of the day. Unfortunately, along the way, disaster struck again. One of the wheel hubs failed, flattening the bearings and winding up red hot before I could pull over to diagnose it. Another casualty of the missed maintenance cycle due to the house fire eating all the time I had planned to spend on trip prep in the last two weeks. I sent the other participants ahead in a cab while I started working the problem. They made it there about an hour late and spent the evening on tour and conversation and a meal.

I called a mobile mechanic to come while I hitchhiked to the nearest open hardware store to buy some chain and other hardware. The mechanic opened up the hub, extracted the now-flat bearings, and unmounted the wheel. When I got back in a cab we coordinated to jack the hub up so I could chain it up in a driveable position. Then I got underway to Hundredfold Farm. I met half the community there, had a bit of dinner, shared a recap of my adventure and heard about what they had been doing with the tour group. Then we parted ways, accidentally leaving them more bread from other communities than we intended, and taking more snacks from them for the road.

I called a few truck stops with 24 hour service along the way to Pittsburgh and one said they could help us. 90 minutes later we made it there, just to find out they wouldn’t do any of the work we needed. As I write this, we are going to sleep in the bus. We are two hours behind schedule now, since we were supposed to sleep in Pittsburgh tonight. Again “fortunately”, my friend who was going to host us had to cancel for family reasons. Tomorrow morning, very early, I’ll start the remaining two hours of drive to Pittsburgh, then search for a mechanic that can do at least some of the needed work. I may stay with the bus while the others take a cab to our Pittsburg community stop, or I may go with them. The mechanic will have about 4 hours until our scheduled departure, or longer if we use one of the alternate plans we’ve been brainstorming. More on that tomorrow. Good night.

Intentional Community Tour Day Two

This morning we woke up in the guest rooms at Ganas (http://www.ganas.org/). Two of us participated in their most-mornings planning meeting while the other two had coffee, did laundry, got some work done, etc. The meeting involved a lot of status updates from various members and groups, and some discussions toward decision making. We departed around 10AM and crossed out of New York for the last time on this trip.

Our first stop today was at Bryn Gweled Homesteads (http://www.bryngweled.org/), a community of dozens of homes on separate parcels, with the land owned by the community and leased to residents who own the houses. We saw their community center and walked around seeing many of their houses, in a variety of architectural styles. Some of the houses have small amounts of livestock and some other aspects of living in connection to nature, which is a common theme across the community that is embodied differently by each of the residents. We talked a lot about their history and governance model and trials in dealing with the local government.

Our second stop was at Altair EcoVillage (http://www.altairecovillage.org/) which hasn't been built yet. We met the founders, saw their model of the community, and walked around on their land for a tour in our imaginations. “Over here imagine there's a two story townhouse” etc. They are building a 55+ community with a focus on sustainable living in modern construction housing. We talked mostly about their planning process, buying and re-zoning the land, etc.

Our third and final stop of the day was at Camphill Village Kimberton Hills (http://www.camphillkimberton.org/), a huge community that is part of the larger Camphill Village meta community. They have many communally owned buildings with many elder and mentally challenged residents, couples that manage the households, and younger “co-worker” residents who assist with all aspects of the community. They operate a small dairy farm and have a variety of workshops including a bakery, weavery, pottery, fiber arts, and others. We split up to each have dinner with a different household, which seemed to produce a bunch of different experiences that we'll be sharing with each other in the coming day(s). My group asked me a lot of questions about myself and my trip, and I learned about their history as a househole and with the larger community.

Unfortunately on arrival at our final stop one of the bus tires was punctured. Due to the location and timing we are currently semi-stranded and waiting for either roadside assistance to become available in the morning or for me to hazard a 15 mile drive with a flat tire (fortunately on a dually axle) to a shop also in the morning. I have a spare tire but not a spare wheel (which the bus has 3 different types of anyway), which will hopefully increase our odds of getting help. We're about to go to sleep in the bus, and that decision will come in the morning after breakfast with one of the residents here who was shepherding our visit. Wish us luck!

PS: “Fortunately”, our first planned stop tomorrow canceled due to a COVID outbreak in their house, so we have some wiggle room on timing that will hopefully accommodate one or more tire repair efforts in the morning.

Intentional Community Tour Day 1

Thanks to the recent house fire at Estate of Mind, I couldn’t spend the week before the trip on preparations as I had originally planned. Due mostly to that, last night and this morning were a hectic rush of just the most high priority steps before we could hit the road. The bus seats got vacuumed and bleach wiped instead of gone over with the upholstery cleaner. We brought coolers instead of a chest freezer. I had to fuel up at a local station rather than on the road, spending an extra $30. I didn’t get to make a briefing for the trip participants describing what to expect or who we were meeting at each stop. I also failed to coordinate with the first few people joining the trip, to confirm who was arriving when, so it was a mild surprise that two folks arrived on Thursday night (as they had said they would, days and weeks earlier).

Despite all of that, we still departed just one hour behind schedule, an hour of delay I had already baked into the plan. With two great copilots the drive from Estate of Mind in Whitinsville MA to the Fellowship Community in Chestnut Ridge NY went pretty smoothly and relatively quickly. The bus is most efficient around 50-60MPH but we mostly kept up with traffic doing 70-75 for this leg of the trip in order to catch up on lost time.

We were greeted by a few members of the Fellowship Community and had a short tour before sitting down for lunch. They told us a bit about their community and its history. I won’t know which parts are most unique until the end of the tour, but what stood out to me was their focus on intergenerational living, employing younger members of the community to provide necessary services to everyone and the older members in need of care, and a refreshingly forthright attitude and acknowledgement of death. The lunch was great, the same being served to dozens of other residents and their families and other visitors in their dining hall. The dining hall, along with many other core amenities, are located in a central building which also houses their most mobility-impaired members. Other members live in houses and lodges spread across part of their 80 acres. In addition to the living facilities and amenities, they also have separate communal studios for pottery, weaving, baking, etc. The folks in the bakery sent us away with a heavy bag of fresh baked breads, savory and sweet. We haven’t dug into them yet, but look forward to doing so tomorrow. Our tour ended with a drive around the farm occupying the rest of their acreage, with cows and sheep and a small dairy operation.

Our second stop was planned at the Lakeland Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in Wayne NJ which is a church with residents and an artist-in-residence program. Unfortunately there as a miscommunication regarding our arrival time and the person that was to meet us, so we did not manage to catch them in person. We saw the facility and walked around outside, including their cozy outdoor spaces and an impressive walled sunken garden area that I suspect will be beautiful in the spring.

Missing out on the second stop allowed us to take a stop for groceries and other supplies. We picked up some food for the next few days and I got a chest freezer to put in the bus. With us driving multiple legs every day it should be able to keep cold through the stops and obviate our need to buy ice for coolers. I also got some tape to reattach a few fiberglass panels that detached from the bus when we encountered too steep of a grade on a driveway earlier in the day.

Our final stop of the day was at Ganas in Staten Island NY. They welcomed us to their regular communal dinner which was an amazing spread with a dozen options including a salad bar, chicken, pasta, vegetables, bread, etc. We chatted over dinner then segued into their regularly scheduled visitor night. We spent about an hour on Q&A in both directions. Their community owns 8 houses mostly adjacent to each other, with private space in most of them and some common amenities spread out, and has a 44 year history of developing their various intentional community experiments. I hope to find time to write more about all that we’ve learned, a bit later in the trip. As I write this, I am in one of the two guest rooms we’ll be sharing tonight. I have just showered, two of our trip participants have started doing their laundry, and the fourth is off watching TV with a regularly scheduled social group here. I’ve been sleeping early recently, so I’ll probably nod off soon (it’s only 9PM) and get relatively early to get started on final planning and communication for tomorrow’s stops as well as earlier steps of planning for some of the final stops on the trip about two weeks from now that I didn’t get to in advance.

Overall I’d say the first day of the trip was pretty awesome. Fellowship Community and Ganas have set an exceptionally high bar for interactivity and hospitality and put our trip off to a great start. I am looking forward to what we discover next.