Once again we want to put out an appeal to anyone who is ready for a Brazilian  adventure and eager to learn about cob or to participate in a permaculture project – come join us for a week or two. To come from the US you will need a minimum of around $2000  for airfare and incidentals. We will pick you up at the airport in Brasilia and host you (good food and wonderful sleeping in a quiet dark space where the stream gurgles by and the stars jump out at you at night) in exchange for four or five hours of work a day, very flexible. Of course, there is a whole lot more to see and explore in Brazil and Latin America. Contact us through the Comment section below, or by email or Facebook.

Mangoes and guavas on window sill.

January             2017

In these times of political unrest, both in Brazil and the United States, I sometimes wonder if we’re in the right place, doing the right things. Guy often wishes he were in the US in order to participate in marches and other actions to protest the direction this new president is taking the country, and to hold our elected officials accountable for preserving the rights of every American as well as safeguarding the rights of those world citizens, including countless children, who have been displaced as a result of the war-making in which the US is complicit.

On the other hand, our work here compels us to continue with ongoing projects. The cob house is more than halfway done, goats and chickens need daily attention, fruit trees require care. We’ve also taken our commitment to ‘living into our place’ to another level as we help found and build a non-profit organization which will dedicate itself to the preservation and recovery of springs and creek beds in this high plateau where many rivers have their source.

Looking North toward the crest of the Continental Divide of Central Brasil and to the beginning of the Amazon Basin beyond. We live just South of the divide at the beginning of the La Plata Basin. 

Just two miles north of us runs one of the ridges of the continental divide - between the Amazon River Basin to the north and the Plata Basin to the south. Rainfall here has decreased steadily over the past few years (climate change?) while farmers, large and small scale, continue to clear land with reckless disregard for ecological balance. People in this area of abundant water are for the first time in memory worrying about the  water running out. In Brasilia, only 60 miles away, water rationing  has become necessary. If it doesn’t rain enough between now and May, when the dry season starts, the situation could be drastic, even deadly. So it makes sense for us to stay here and do our bit for sustainability.

The site of a spring that has been totally cleared of trees to make a watering hole for cattle. 

Our permaculture project began its sixth year in August and we moved into the first house we built a full four years ago. Trees that we planted back then have begun to bear fruit: pomegranate, pitanga, coffee and orange. Guy has produced two years of fully-cured humanure that we use in our vegetable garden and on our fruit trees. I’ve developed a flock of chickens with Rhode Island Red hens that are just beginning to lay, and we collect four eggs a day already. Our goats provide enough milk for our daily needs and we’re learning to make cheese.

Among other things, I would like to plant ginger and turmeric – both grow well around here -  to use with goat milk to make turmeric tea, supposedly a powerful anti-inflammatory.

Very soon I plan to post a complete update on the cob house so I won’t go into any details in this entry. Please stay tuned.

A peek at the cob house with its new roof.