Solar Living Center

SLC strikes me as having gotten stuck in a 'proof of concept' stage. It wants to show the world (well, its visitors) that we all CAN live sustainably -- and here's how: with solar energy and cobb buildings and permaculture. But with limited examples of each (barring an impressive array of solar panels), and sparse signage with some stats on sustainable energy in California -- it doesn't feel very 'convincing'... It's as though it is preaching to the choir, and it's the believers who will take the trouble to make a pilgrimage to the site... Rather than its being a shining beacon luring in the Ignorant or the Doubting Thomases with its delights, and sending them home with a fire in their belly to install a solar shower or run their cars on bio-diesel.

The SLC has beautiful grounds and magical buildings and artwork and landscaping to discover...but it's as though the architects imagined part of the charm was to have visitors 'stumble' upon things. The signage at the road-side announcing the SLC's presence, for example, would do a down-market garden center proud, and once you've proceeded down the driveway and past the 'Welcome Station' (please pay $2), you are in the embrace of a large dusty parking lot. So... Where is this Solar Oasis I imagined?

The 'heart' of the center has its back to where visitors arrive, the 'Tree-thru-Cars' (vs Drive-thru-Trees, get it?) sculptures are in a glade down an overgrown pathway, and even the lovely ponds feel like they're 'round the back, edged by the dusty driveway .

Everyone we met -- especially the two site interns, a couple of volunteers, and the care-taker couple -- were very welcoming and happy to have us poke around and answered questions freely as to cobb recipes and solar oven cooking times etc etc. However, it seems like the center was short-staffed...and rather short of visitors as well...a bit more of a ghost-town than a serene sanctuary. Admittedly, it was a Monday, and I imagine weekends would be a lot busier.

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Wren & I had a fresh fruit salad breakfast and then nosed around the Pacha Mama cobb building the interns had plans to finish plastering and flooring. Wren commented it's like working on a clay pot, where it's an artistic as much as a structural endeavor. The caretakers, meanwhile, were busy working on the roofing of their (very) compact (but very cute) pseudo-mobile-home.

Then we (all three, W&I&me) walked into Hopland with Andy (one of the volunteers), along the abandoned railroad tracks to get some coffee and some tacos from one of the two rival taco trucks (owners are from different parts of Mexico).

Back at the ranch, we took the self-guided tour, and discovered all sorts of lovely nooks and crannies.

16.30 dept, E to Clear Lake, cont E to Hwy 5, S to Sacramento, E on I-80. And here we are in Auburn at a Super 8.
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