For now, I’ve got a ton of photos. Enjoy!

© jessicareeder for Uprooted, an eco/travel blog, 2010. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: adventure, alternative, art, desert, featured posts, graveyard, Madrid, New Mexico, outdoors, tourism

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Post tags: adventure, alternative, biotecture, buy nothing, earthships, ecotourism, energy-efficient, environment, featured posts, green building, lumber, New Mexico, outdoors, sustainable, Taos, travel, video, vigas, volunteer, voluntourism

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On Monday, I started my month-long internship at Earthship Biotecture. Earthships are self-sufficient houses that use recycled materials in their construction, and that are equipped with systems for rainwater catchment, solar and wind power, water reuse, waste control, and food production. What does that mean? It means that once you build an Earthship, you never have to pay an electricity or water bill again. Ever.

Don’t believe me? Good, because I can’t explain it all in a single blog entry. Go read the Earthship website instead, and then watch Garbage Warrior.

I’ve been working on site at the visitor’s center, which was constructed in the 90s as a demonstration building. That’s the entrance in the first photo. Earthships don’t look like much on the outside, but on the inside they’re really lovely.

 
The main room is filled with posters & diagrams of the various Earthship models and systems, plus a demonstration video and press books.

Yes, the TV runs off solar power collected from the roof panels. There are computers running in here too, and an extension cord stretching over to the building site, where it powers all the tools. With enough panels, you can have as much power as you like, even in cloudy areas.

What’s great about this design, however, is how little energy is really being used. Natural light makes it so you don’t need lightbulbs in the daytime, and even in extreme weather the building maintains an even temperature through passive solar heat and thermal mass. Today was cold and windy outdoors, but totally comfortable inside.

Bottle walls are one of the coolest features of Earthship design. They’re literally trash stuck in mud, but they create this beautiful stained-glass effect. That’s the bathroom door, and in front of it is a demonstration water cistern.

Less glamorous but much more important is the Power Organizing Module, which processes all the incoming power and sends it out as DC or AC. Normally this wall would be plastered, but the tires and cans were left exposed so visitors can see the construction technique.

All Earthships have indoor greenhouse areas, which are used for growing flowers and food. The food production techniques are still being perfected, but the ultimate goal is to make it so that you don’t need to buy groceries. It’s pretty amazing to look out over this healthy garden and see how dry and desolate the outside world is.

By the way: look at that window again. See the wooden arch at the far left? That’s part of the new construction.

This structure, and the identical one next to it, are part of Mike Reynolds‘ new additions to the visitor center. You can see that the walls are made of tires stacked like bricks; tires are filled with rammed earth (aka “dirt”) to make them incredibly solid, strong, and temperature-resistant. Non-load-bearing walls are made of cans & bottles, stuck together with cement and adobe.

This wall is just getting started, but you can see the design taking shape. The cans will be plastered over, but bottles will have their ends exposed to let in the light.

Once the wall’s thickness is determined, the bottles are cut with a tile saw and the two fat ends taped together. Then you just cement them in.

But before you can get to the fancy stuff, the tires have to be pounded! That’s what we’re doing at the big building, which will eventually become the new visitor center.

That’s my fellow intern Andrew off to the right, showing how it’s done. Yep, a shovel and a sledgehammer and lots of elbow grease. These things are seriously labor-intensive; pounding one tire takes 15-20 minutes for experienced (and acclimated) workers, so for us green kids from lower elevations, it’s taking half an hour per tire.

That’s Tim, the crew member who’s been managing us, working out the levels. Technically, this is a decorative (non-structural) bottle wall so it doesn’t have to be perfect. But sometimes it’s nice—actually, necessary—to stop hammering for a minute, so we’ve been getting everything good and even.

Tim and the other crew members have been amazingly patient and supportive while Andrew and I learn the ropes and build our strength. Working at 7500 feet can be totally exhausting, and when the winds are high it’s hard to catch a deep breath. But we’re learning and getting stronger, and benefiting from all the knowledge around us. Everyone on the crew lives in an Earthship, and many of them built their own houses. They’re professional and creative, and easy to talk to. I feel lucky to be here, even despite the sore muscles.

On that note, it’s off to bed for me. Tomorrow is a full day of tire-pounding on a new site, with all six interns. I’m gonna sleep all weekend!

© jessicareeder for Uprooted, an eco/travel blog, 2010. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: alternative, art, biotecture, design, earthship, Earthship Biotecture, earthships, ecotourism, energy-efficient, featured posts, garbage, green building, New Mexico, recycling, reuse, sustainable, Taos, volunteer, voluntourism

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It was an overnight journey, 18 hours, and that little girl (Autumn) was bored to tears. Autumn’s guardian actually thought she could force a four-year-old to sit still for 18 hours, and hadn’t brought a single toy to keep Miss Hyperactive America entertained. But she was cool with letting Autumn clamber across the seat to poke slimy fingers at me.

To keep her from climbing all over me, I handed her The Navigator and a pen to color with. It kept her quiet for an hour or two, and I got some good footage.

Meanwhile, the great Southwest rolled by outside the window. This is one year ago today; enjoy.

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Post tags: adventure, amtrak, featured posts, kids, New Mexico, train, video

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Madrid (pronounced MA-drid, not ma-DRID) is a place unlike any other on Earth. The closest thing to a chronosynclastic infundibulum I’ve ever experienced, it’s at once a ghost town and a close-knit community, a hippie haven and a biker joint, a pile of junk and a work of art, an abandoned battleground in the war of Man vs. Nature and a fertile bed of new life… I stayed here just over a week, and took over a hundred photos.

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Read the rest of Madrid, New Mexico (656 words)

© jessicareeder for Uprooted, an eco/travel blog, 2009. | Permalink | 5 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: adventure, art, buy nothing, coal, environment, featured posts, garbage, ghost town, gorge, hiking, mining, museum, nature, New Mexico, outdoors, outsider art, photography, recycling, reuse, starving artists, touristry, travel, wild west, wood

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Took some photos of this crazy junk-art town while I was here. Here’s one to tide you over until I can post the rest:

Come back soon now, y’hear?

© jessicareeder for Uprooted, an eco/travel blog, 2009. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: New Mexico, photography, starving artists, touristry, travel

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Ah, the Angel’s Nest. Arguably the most famous “Earthship” in existence, this peach-and-mint confection of modern organic architecture sits close to the highway in the Greater World Community, beckoning visitors with its flashing windmills, bevy of solar panels, turrets, hydrogen/biodiesel Hummer and fire engine parked in the driveway…

Well, it used to anyway.

Nautilus floor plan from earthship.net

This house started out as the Nautilus, a one-bedroom Earthship with a design based on the Fibonnaci spiral. It was small, but beautiful— or so they say. You can see what remains of the Nautilus in the above photo: it’s the round bit at the right side of the house.

Sometime around 2001, the Nautilus was bought by Robert Plarr and Victoria Peters, two self-described idealists who are dedicated to furthering the cause of sustainability. They decided to turn the Nautilus into a showcase of sustainable and eco-friendly technologies, and renamed it Angel’s Nest.

This is generally where the story ends, when you’re talking to an Earthship community member. The Angel’s Nest involved some crew labor, and shares land with the Greater World; people in the community are reluctant to be overly critical of their neighbors. But from what I can piece together, Mr. Plarr and Ms. Peters may not have been playing with a full deck of cards.

photos from angels-nest.org

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Read the rest of The Fallen Angel’s Nest (466 words)

© jessicareeder for Uprooted, an eco/travel blog, 2009. | Permalink | 12 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: art, biotecture, design, earthship, earthships, energy-efficient, environment, featured posts, green building, New Mexico, photography, solar, sustainable, Taos, touristry

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Happily for me, I moved along the very next day.

I mean, look: when you stay in a hostel, you know pretty much what to expect. Shared rooms with bunk beds, lots of young people with interesting accents and stories, common areas with lots of books to read. The Mansion has all of that, and a very relaxed, open feel. Charm to spare, and free toast&cereal in the morning? Super. But after the charm wears off, this place is kind of a dump.

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Read the rest of Taos Lodging: The Abominable Snow Mansion (626 words)

© jessicareeder for Uprooted, an eco/travel blog, 2009. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: hostel, lodging, New Mexico, review, Taos, touristry, travel

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Springtime in Taos is a lot like winter in most places, except maybe harsher. People are full of stories about it:

“Oh yeah, you’ll be out working in short sleeves and then suddenly there’ll be snow and lightning and then the rest of the day you’re in full-on winter gear.”

(...)
Read the rest of Springtime in Taos, Part II (252 words)

© jessicareeder for Uprooted, an eco/travel blog, 2009. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: biotecture, earthship, earthships, energy-efficient, environment, nature, New Mexico, outdoors, seasons, snow, spring, Taos, volunteer, voluntourism, weather, winter

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But for today, I’m settling in at my new digs. So instead of posting a full piece now, I’ll just recommend some April Fool’s Day reading for you: Burning Man announces plans for a 4 lane toll road to Black Rock City, and Gmail automates your email responses!

© jessicareeder for Uprooted, an eco/travel blog, 2009. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
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