New Mexico is brilliant! We passed through Santa Fe to pick up some groceries & then proceeded northward to our home for the next week, El Vado Ark. It is almost completely self-sustainable, built & run by one man, with solar & wind power, indoor greenhouses, gray water irrigation, rainwater catchment, bio-gas (from chicken waste) and even an outdoor adobe oven. We busied ourselves building a new trail, securing a fence, watering & tending plants, feeding chickens, monitoring the bio-diesel (aka chicken you-know-what), learning about alternative energy, and baking four loaves of no-knead bread in said adobe oven. (Now it seems that a future in baking may be in the works, too...)It is beautiful, isolated country out here. Our host is demanding & particular, but generous, knowledgeable & proud to show off where he lives. His neighbors live in an earthship, a type of completely off-grid home that utilizes thermal/solar heating & cooling, solar & wind electricity, contained sewage treatment, building with recycled & natural materials, water harvesting and food production. We were able to visit this as well as view some other earthships in Taos, where the idea originated. It is a new goal of mine to build my own someday. When I enter one, the energy feels so positive, the residents so content. They are definitely happy homes.
Recycled wall material in an earthship.
Exterior of an earthship.
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