Hi. :sunny:Long time reader of this forum but haven't posted much. I'm 27 and have lived in southern california all my life. I have a job and live in a rented house with a friend, and I find myself occupying most of my time with working or figuring out ways to make money, to support these things and it makes me wonder. What is the point really? Keep it all going, just to keep it all going? I've long been interested in permaculture and non traditional housing situations. When I was little my dad took us on a road trip to Wisconsin Dells and we visited the Xanadu house, but at that time I called it the Igloo house. It had round rooms, and tunnels between them, and was different from anything else I've ever seen. I loved that place. But I'm posting because I have a serious interest in attempting to create something different. Rather than stressing out just to keep things going and be able to live I think it's possible to make more time and have less stress. One important need everybody has is where do you go to sleep at night? You need a place to stay. The problem is that real estate is so expensive. To buy in a city is impossible, even the mountain areas and back country are expensive. So I started looking at the desert. There is land for sale out in the desert for relatively affordable prices, and also some of them owner finance and so you can make monthly payments and make it cheaper that way. I have been looking at 5 acre sizes and I've found some that are around like 20k, or a few hundred bucks per month owner financing. Yes it gets hot in the desert, but there are ways to deal with that. The rest of the year it is beautiful and relatively warm compared to most places. The views are beautiful and epic, there is lots of space, and houses are pretty far apart from each other. Some of the land parcels available are really remote, which is also tempting. My idea is to start building a sort of permaculture ranch out in the desert. Eventually I'd like it to have some interesting buildings and what not. Probably at first it would start out as a cheap trailer or something, I don't have a ton of money to invest into it. But I do have passion and time, and patience. I can imagine with some work and sweat what an amazing place this could be. And since the land is owned outright it's possible to create something amazing that lasts a long time. I imagine that there could be several housing structures , possibly 1 per acre for a total of 5. How people are divided between them is up for grabs, but at that rate it would never seem crowded. We could have community buildings as well, maybe a place to eat or something. A big fire pit, bbq, stuff like that. Basically the idea is that we would own the land, relatively cheaply, compared to renting in the city. We would be relatively remote so perhaps we could also create some types of businesses or make crafts and sell them or something to make money. We could also grow our own food, even in the desert, I've seen documentaries about it as exampled in Jordan and Israel, it can be done. As far as the personality of the place, I'm thinking sort of like an artistic place. I am a musician and enjoy music a lot, and enjoy all types of art and unconventional stuff. I think creative people also try to find time to work on what they have a passion for, so by lowering our costs we could have more time to work on what we really want to work on in life. Also, if there are people creating, the creation energy will probably help everyone and bounce ideas off one another, etc. To keep costs down we could also share cars, stuff like that. Think of the stars out in the clear desert night, like those stars the possibilities of something like this are infinite. I also think that it would help us build a small community and even develop our own culture/ideas. The traditional structure of society for every family being their own separate unit is kind of depressingly lonely. We'd still have our private space and all that and respect each other's rights, but at the same time we'd have the backs of the other people who live there. Like a desert tribe of people who just want to do their own thing. I'm totally serious about this and am going to probably get the land this year, before prices start going up again. It's my dream to build a desert permaculture ranch but it would be even cooler, to be able to share this dream with others and create it together. I just thought I'd put this out here, see if anybody is interested in something like this, or comment/ideas. This is still in the idea stage, but this is very realistic plan that can be done, without much financial resources, or complicated planning. Thanks for taking the time to read this. I look forward to hearing from anybody who wants to talk about this.
what a beautiful idea. i've always been deathly afraid of the desert, but recently i have been hearing its call.
The Desert was awesome, loved it out near Tecopa. had plans to set up a Waffle garden Anasaze style but using Terra Preta and also adding misting sprayers like as used in the produce sections for the evaporative cooling effect in the fields,,, too bad my Employer was a menopausal basket case. No worries in my world though, VA is another great place to be. Palm fronds thatched together would last forever and also provide a good source of needed shade for most of your crops. And I'd keep an eye out for the Ephedra Vidris plant, Mormon Tea may look scarey but it's damn tasty stuff. Oven roast the twigs after soaking in honey water for a couple days then throw it in the coffee grinder once dry. Beats coffee hands down.
I love this... I'm (nearly) 23, lived in SoCal all my life too. I have been dying to get away from where I live, and to start my life on my terms. I don't have any money, but I'm a hard worker, a fast learner, a great housekeeper, and have an excellent green thumb. Keep me updated. I would love to be a part of this.
