116 Washington Avenue - A.K.A. Shred Shack
Cambia Intentional Community (9562 Shannon Hill Road, Louisa VA)
Cambia Intentional Community (9562 Shannon Hill Road, Louisa VA)
On some days, walking on the immaculate Lawn through throngs of Canada Goose jackets, amid whispers of KPMG investment banking internships, it may be hard to imagine that there exists a network of off-grid, self-sustaining, income-sharing communities a mere half-hour from UVa.
Indeed, 37 miles due East of C’ville is Louisa County: home to several “hippie communes” out of a Ken Kesian fairytale. Within each, resources are equitably distributed, each individual contributes in some way (be it farming, architecture, cooking, what have you) and the communities share seeds and crops with one another.
Next Sunday, February 9th, we’ll be visiting one of them — Cambia — to glean insight into how to live harmoniously with the land and with each other.
ITINERARY
-12 pm: Leave the Shred Shack
-Drive 35 minutes to Cambia
-4 pm: Return, newly woke and inspired
We will be given tea and fed a home-grown meal! They will encourage you to donate, but it is not required.
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More info about Cambia:
“An education center for ecological living, complete with outdoor classrooms, fossil-fuel free technological experimentation, curious living spaces and campsites, a whimsical forest playground, unique museum models, and a group of people living on-site and demonstrating the possibility of ecological, communal living.”
*** Things to get excited about ***
-Converted ‘70s cars made electric; natural building and “biomimicry” design; solar showers; solar thermal roofs; solar-electric hybrid ovens; efficient masonry wood stoves; buildings made from clay, sand and straw; composting toilets; an organic farm predicated on the idea of regenerative agriculture; plentiful fruit and nut trees; vegetable and herb gardens; a community of growers who sell open-pollinated, organic seeds; an extensive composting system; a self-cleaning pond, and MORE
-An “interactive walking museum trail” featuring hands-on models showing land use and carbon footprints, natural & alternative building technologies, pond ecology, water filtration, solar technologies, etc.
—> An interactive model that represents the atmospheric carbon level as affected by human activities
—>An aquarium with water plants, equipped with a CO2 meter, that shows CO2 levels as affected by photosynthesis, and plant and animal respiration
—> A display showing the per-capita United States American land use footprint
-Interactive, game theory-based simulations around the idea of the Tragedy of the Commons and resource scarcity, different versions of the “hawk-dove game” and the “public goods game” to understand our role in this complex ecological system
Want more info about the community? Check out https://rustlingroots.org/ or https://cambiacommunity.weebly.com/ !