Back to the Sacred Mountain

When we bought Finca Sagrada, eighteen years ago, the mountain was degraded, pretty well included for free. The irrigated five hectares at the bottom had all the value. About six years ago we had a volunteer couple from Switzerland and they stated that their dream was to reforest the mountain. True to their word, they have raised about $150,000 and still counting. We have planted over 25,000 trees, built a path up the mountain, built a cabin towards the top, found an endangered species and are working with a local university, UTPL, to do more scientific research.

All this I could not have planned. It makes me so happy. I know it is just the beginning. Thank you Kai and our hard working Local crew

Back to my vision quest. Climbing the mountain is extremely tiring. Coming down is even worse. Four hours of hard climbing each way. Coming down, my legs became so weak that I had to sit down every ten minutes. My whole body was shaking. It was a Sunday afternoon and if I fell there would be nobody around until the next day.

Vision quests are always rough on me. The cabin is in a totally beautiful location, but how long can you look at the clouds and wind blowing through the grass? No phone or internet connection to fill the mind. Just forty eight hours of my own thoughts. I did take Rudolf Steiner's Knowledge of Higher worlds. That was sobering. I bought it in my early twenties, have read it twice but never seriously followed the path it describes. Wow, sort of like fifty years of spiritual laziness on my part. Maybe I have another ten or twenty years left. Maybe I can do better.

The Anaichay community project is coming along. I still have four hectares and I am going to try to fulfil my Ecuador dream. To create a Biodynamic learning center for Ecuador and Latin America based on the work of Rudolf Steiner. There are four individuals and families interested in joining so far. I have ordered five copies of Knowledge of Higher Worlds and we are creating a study group to read and study the book together. I do not want to repeat the mistake that I made at Finca Sagrada, where we did not work out of a common vision. I do admire what they are doing, it just isn't my thing.

This is a link to Anaichay: https://spiritland.blog/anaichay

The photos show the beauty of the mountain and how much the first trees planted have grown. It is really exciting to see the new landscape is being created. Soon the clouds will cling to the mountain, caught by the trees and the water will come back.