From the Snowy to the Yarra (Orbost to Warburton)

Jan 2, 2015 | cherry plums, chicken, chickory, cycle touring, dirty energy, Entropia eco-village, family on bikes australia, fruit leather, geebung, play, rabbits, stealth camping, walnuts, wild lettuce | 9 comments

We set out from Orbost with the prospect of travelling almost 100 kms along the East Gippsland Rail Trail, passing over the Snowy River,

and past an incredible hedge of wild lettuce (Lactuca virosa), an early relative of cos that is also called opium lettuce. Yes, it is mildly psychoactive taken in large quantities and is supposed to have a chill pill effect; good for people suffering from high blood pressure.

After about 10 kms on the trail we decided that the rough surface was better suited to mountain bikes and that our heavy bikes on touring frames and tyres were not really suited. We got back on the bitumen and rode with the noisy ones to a wonderful little caravan park in Nowa Nowa that sported this awesome open communal kitchen, and whose owners greeted us with just-picked strawberries and fresh eggs. Thanks Helen and Neil!

With more rain about we stayed a few wet nights, swimming during the sunny days in the creek.

While at Nowa Nowa we received an invitation to join some friends in Traralgon for Christmas. We had just a day to ride 170 kms, not quite manageable for us, so we took off early in the morning passing these roadside walnut trees,

noting the central problem of our culture: paid for food, or as Daniel Quinn puts it:

Making food a commodity to be owned was one of the great innovations of our culture. No other culture in history has ever put food under lock and key – and putting it there is the cornerstone of our economy, for if the food wasn’t under lock and key, who would work?

After 50 kms of riding we arrived at Bairnsdale station with a bright blue box to help smuggle Zero onto the train to make up the remaining 120 kms.

We hadn’t been separated from Zero the other times we smuggled him on public transport. He always kept quiet because he knew we were there, beside him. This time he whined for us from the cargo carriage and we were paid a visit from the conductor, who thankfully was delightful and explained that next time we travel we have to have a proper regulation travel box for our dog-kin. Even though this is absurd, we weren’t about to argue with this nice fella. He didn’t kick us off the train and we got to Traralgon, where our friend Ben Grubb met us and led us through the town and out into the outlaying fields to his parents’ home.

We all got to work preparing for the feast. Patrick and Ben killed and dressed a chicken,

Jaala and Shannon Freeman (friends of ours from Daylesford, and who are also Grubb family members) joined the festivities and helped Jim and Jeni (Ben’s parents) and Meg in the food preparation. It was a joyous collective effort using herbs, vegetables and fruits from the garden,

to deliver a delicious lunch. Thanks earth! Thanks chicken. Thanks Grubbs and Freemans.

The following day more food prep continued, turning cherry plums,

into fruit leathers,

until it was time to thank Jim and Jeni for so generously hosting us, and say goodbye, Zeph feeling pretty poorly with a cold. Ben rode with us for several kms showing us the back roads and short cuts, and

he also helped Zero catch a rabbit by blocking one end of a drain with sticks and his feet. It is a technique worth finessing…

Patrick butchered the rabbit, apportioned a share to Zero and we kept the rest for later in the day. Not far on from the rabbit catch we came across Aaron, a solo cycle tourer on his maiden voyage. Go Aaaron!

We farewelled Aaron, and a little later on Ben, and rode into the altered country of dirty coal.

About 70% of water in Australia is used by industry, a remaining 20% is used by government and a tiny percentage, less than 10%, is used in domestic use. As we rode past the old relic of old thinking that is Yalourn power station we listened to the millions of litres of water running through the cooling towers, reflecting on these figures.

We ate our free lunch a little further on, poaching the rabbit for 4 minutes in the billy and separating the soft and tender meat from the bone.

On another invitation, from an old Hepburn Relocalisation Network friend Liz, we visited Entropia eco-village near Moe. Liz is one of a number of residents who are about to live rent free on the 20 acre site for one year and be filmed for a documentary, which sounds a bit like Hippy Big Brother. Watch that space!

There are a number of small or tiny houses being built at Entropia, which came about after Samuel Alexander’s book of the same name.

Part of the land is bush and we found a few geebungs (Persoonia linearis) growing there. When the fruit is ripe it will yellow and fall to the ground. The skin and the seed was traditionally discarded when eaten.

Certainly Woody found utopia at Entropia.

But the dystopian road called us back, and the prospect of home.

Play fighting has been a fun part of our day to day. It gives the boys an opportunity to push back from we ever steering adults. It builds strength and body control and develops emotions that can cope under physical pressure.

Research is another thing we’ve all been learning: how to find out stuff that interests us and grow our knowledges.

By the time we reached Yarragon, Zeph was on the mend from his cold but Meg and Patrick were starting to fall apart. We’ve all been fit and strong the whole way and now in the final weeks our defences are crumbling. We nestled into this little wetland forest setting up our version of a MASH rehab camp,

but after another short leg we figured some hot water and a place to get out of the strong winds was needed in Warragul.

We were all sporting hacking coughs and rode up to Neerim South in blustery, wet conditions and again took refuge in a motel room. The next day the winds abated and the sun shone and we rode through the prettiest country, passing wild displays of the sweet flower of the coffee substitute chicory (Cichorium intybus),

and later moist valleys filled with giant tree ferns,

along quiet C roads with little traffic.

We rode 66 kms to Warburton in time for New Years eve,

to stay with our friend Maya Ward in her tiny house that she designed and helped build,

and to see in the New Year a festive picnic followed by fireside music and intimate chats.

The first day of 2015 saw Zeph gearing up for high school. Go Zeph!

Maya and her lovely man James treated us to delicious meals and restorative places. Thank you both so much, it has been a gentle few days in beautiful Warburton and now we are ready to begin our final leg towards home.

We wish you, Dear Reader, a peaceful and productive International Year of Soils, filled with great adventure, slow travel, encouraging friends and free, walked-for food.

Good Wood

Apr 15, 2012 | carless capers, community gardens, community op-shop, ethical consumption, family, food resilience, harvesting, homelife, play, recycling, social warming, transitional communities, upcycling, waste, zero carbon | 5 comments

We found some wood, you see. A whole stack of old hardwood batons that were holding up the tiles of a roof that was being retiled in time for the winter rains. The tiler was thrilled when we asked if we could take it, saving him a trip to the tip to dispose of it.

Off we went.

‘But it’s my billy cart, Dad. If you’d like to use it, you have to pull me up the hills.’

‘Let’s stack the longer bits first and then the small bits.’

Toot toot go the cars as we wobble down the footpath towards home.

A few days later we decided to take the billy cart on another adventure: to our newly opened local community op-shop. In no time at all we had completed our autumn clean-out and had filled five big bags of goodies to recycle.

The Daylesford Community Op-Shop is based on a Swedish thrift store model: to provide local community members with what they need including electrical items, so they don’t have to shop outside of town or buy new items, and all profits are then put back into the community.

Local not-for-profit organisations can apply to receive the profits for a month. The month of May for example is for Hepburn Wildlife Shelter, which means that they promote that month as theirs. They can bring in their saved-up goods to be sold and their members volunteer at the op-shop.

Based on the size of our town the op-shop is forecast to inject $100,000 a year back into the community.

There’s also a community space where mothers can nurse their babies, a book nook, a seed bank and a chai lounge. Pretty amazing, huh?

A brief stop at one of our community food gardens to turn over the compost, and then on we go.

Back home and our day was not quite done. Inside our chicken coop, our birds have been flying over the low fence and have been digging up one of our vegie patches. We have been setting up more substantial fencing over the last few weeks. And after our recent score we finally had enough timber to make some gates.

We harvested the last of the potatoes and Jerusalem artichokes, dug the beds over, added compost and planted them out with heirloom vegies.

We planted broad beans, three varieties of carrots, kohlrabi, two varieties of beetroot, celeriac, leek and plenty of cabbage.

We are a bit obsessed with cabbage in our household. We love to eat it raw in salads but even more so, we love to lacto-ferment it into sauerkraut. Here is a jar of our latest batch.

And here is the final fruit of our labours: a stack of kindling wood ready for the winter.

Tip Trip

Sep 18, 2011 | artist as family, michael reynonlds, play, recycling, travel, waste | 4 comments

It’s been nine months since we sold our car and we have loved every minute of it. Yes—even walking in the pouring rain in winter. We agree with British adventurer Ranulph Fiennes who said “There is no such thing as bad weather, only inappropriate clothing.”

But there is much to be said for walking in the sunshine, and today we said it as we walked to our local tip. We wanted to get rid of some unwanted goods, and have a fossick to see if there was anything we had use for at home.

We fossicked high and we fossicked low. And we fossicked around and around the Earth Ship demonstration wall we built earlier in the year with waste warrior Michael Reynolds.

We test rode all the bikes,

we sniffed out hidden treasures

including 30 metres of tangled chicken wire we are going to use to keep our five hens and one rooster out of a new garden bed.

We spent the better part of an hour pulling it this way and that until

it was ready to roll up and

roll all the way home.

Roaming

Jul 4, 2010 | artist as family, family, play, Sydney, travel | 0 comments

We have a big week of planting ahead of us, so we decided to take the weekend off to roam.

Even though it wasn’t on our agenda, each day we started off at St Michael’s to check that everything was as we left it.

The wind was chilly, but the sun was out. Perfect weather for drifting.

Good night. See you on site tomorrow.

Social Warming

Sep 28, 2009 | beach, food, friends, gleaning, play, social warming, street food, waste | 3 comments

There’s a café just down the road from the Lock-Up that roasts its own coffee using the energy they create by burning their own waste. A fantastic idea. I wonder when such actions are going to be the norm rather than the exception.

Around the corner from that café is a laundromat we took our washing to this morning. Outside it are some planter boxes in which the owners have planted vegetables and herbs. “Why have flowers when we can grow vegetables?” They asked us. “Why don’t more people grow their own food?” We wondered back.

We found other food today. Though unfortunately not all of it was edible.

Mostly we just found rubbish. I guess because that’s what we were looking for.

At one point in the afternoon we found some trash that was a little out of our reach.

So we had to ask some of our feathered friends to help us.

Normally nimble Zephyr would have climbed that fence in one swift swoop and retrieved the rubbish from atop. But today Zephyr spent the day at the local primary school where he joined a class of other grade ones. School holidays have already begun in Victoria, but being the sociable kid that he is, Zephyr jumped at the chance to hang out with some peers and talk about his experience as one third of the Artist as Family. Here is some of the work he did today:

Although we’re meeting lots of people, kids have an innate knack of social warming wherever they may be. And Zephs’ brand new school was no exception. When we went to pick him up at the end of the day, we were invited over for a play at Perry’s house, one of the kids from his class.

We ate delicious cake and drank tea (Meg’s first good cuppa since we arrived)

and helped out with another art project: making Xmas tree decorations to be sold at Perry’s school’s upcoming school fair.

But not everything is always fair. Zeph declared it was most unfair that we couldn’t move to Newcastle so he could play with Perry and his other new friends every day.

Meanwhile, our own project continues to grow.

Our Proposal (excerpted)

Jul 17, 2009 | compost, family, play, time, waste | 3 comments

The whole idea of detention in a closed space as a form of human punitive corrective action seems to have come in very much in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries – at the time perspective and pictorial space was developing in our Western world. Marshall McLuhan, The Medium is the Massage, 1967

Waste and Time – an Artist-as-Family adventure
Newcastle Lock-up Artist-in-Residence Sept-Oct 2009.

The Artist-as-family includes Meg Ulman, Patrick Jones and Zephyr Ogden Jones. We propose a multi-tiered residency that includes gleaned waste collection, filmmaking, blogging and an exhibition about what we find while in Newcastle.

Things that may help you understand our working holiday.

3 types of waste.

1. Compostable waste – is not really waste at all as it is returned to the earth to feed new life as part of a closed-cycle system.

2. Non-compostable waste – is material that breaks down slowly, does not feed the natural world, and harms the environment as part of a broken-cycle system – aggregate-growth capitalism.

3. Social waste – wage slavery, anti-ecological schooling, punitive punishment.

3 types of time.

1. Cyclical and airy time – traditional cultures are very good at this type of time. Time decompression, as contiguous with biomimicry and permacultural practices, will be a main focus of our residency.

2. Linear time – birth, school, work, death as specific to industrialised culture. Time compression enabling wage-slavery and other forms of social bondage. Linear time is anti-ecological, it helps create a disposable and wasteful society.

3. Doing time – serving a prison sentence and being trapped in the cycle of offending. Much has been written over time of the interrelationship between privatising things and prisons. Prisons, it could be said, are a middle-class phenomenon, and part-and-parcel of class war.

The exhibition.

Patrick will build an installation with the waste that the AaF find in the streets. The exhibition’s theme will be based upon these lines: a reliance upon the importation of resources is our society’s zeitgeist. A centre large enough to rely upon importing resources will never be sustainable. Therefore the food has to be walking distance, and composting is the key to this future society.

Social warming.

Meg will build an offline-online community around the residency based upon chance encounters and by strengthening relationships already formed. She will keep this blog updated to record the AaF’s encounters as we glean materials and meet people in Newcastle. These entries will be based on chance encounters and shared stories. Through this social warming aspect of the work we hope to meet people who will offer their time here and there to collect materials with us, expanding the shared labour of this AaF activity.

Zephyr.

As seven year-old Zephyr’s attention will come in and out of focus and be mainly concerned with play opportunities. While in Newcastle, we aim to structure the day with a good balance of work and play. We three will start the day with a two-hour drift, scouring for material, talking to people, exercising and generally being a part of the social space of the city. Then the rest of the day will be broken up with one parent concentrating on the requirements of the residency, while one parent concentrating on the requirements of Zephyr.

Zephyr is an outgoing child. He may like to speak to primary school kids who come to the Lock-Up about his experiences. Meg and Patrick will also speak to visitors to The Lock-Up, TINA festival goers and other interested parties about the work we are doing as a family in Newcastle.

The Lock-Up.

Interrelations with Lock-Up staff will be essential for the success of the residency. Whereas we will aim to carry out the majority of the work to ensure a successful residency and exhibition, we will need assistance and local knowledge to make sure the wider community access and enjoy the work and skills we bring to Newcastle. And while in Newcastle ensuring we also glean skills, ideas and social warming from staff and fellow Novocastrians.

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