Tread Lightly Wherever You Travel

A recent guest at Casa Viva, our sister property in Troncones, recommended that we provide bags at the gate to the beach so that guests can use them to put trash when they walk the beach. We listened and added our own twist, the bags we are providing for beach clean up are all made in Mexico by cottage industry workers from recycled, canvas billboard material [more on this in future blog].

As part of our continued commitment to regeneration, both in the ecology and the community, we recently invited Laura Kuri, a specialist in community development and environmental engagement, to moderate a group of local leaders. The goal was to address the problem of garbage management and develop a set of concrete commitments from this group. While the bad habits associated with garbage management may take a long time before we see major improvements, it only takes 4 minutes to watch a short video, produced by Carlos Cardenas, about the town of Juluchuca’s commitment to cleaning up. Do you want to get engaged with the local community? Are you the type that feels good about taking an empty bag for a walk on the beach and bringing it back full of waste? Is your idea of travel and living to “tread lightly and leave the place better than how you found it.”?

Come stay with us at Playa Viva. The New Year holiday is completely booked, but we still have space Christmas.  For reservations, contact us at info@playaviva.com.

What You “Should” and What You “Are”

 

This advertisement caught my eye a while back, enough for me to stop and take a picture.  What struck me was how a large hotel chain like Westin was using images that were more appropriate for our use. What was it about this image that Westin wanted to portray about itself? Was it the call of the wild? Was it the serenity of nature? Was it the peacefulness of being one with the path and the woods? Was it just the green, lush vegetation that was so inviting? Or was it the stark contrast between the airport environment in which the ad was placed that would catch the eye of the passerby.  Would the passerby see the image and think, green, lush, peaceful, tranquility, connectivity with nature and then associate it with Westin? Is this what Westin wants its brand to be associated with?

I also appreciate the tag line, “This is how it should feel.”  Now Westin may want to emphasize the “feel” part of the sentence, but what caught my eye is the “should” part of the tag line.  When they mean “should”, do they mean, that Westin wants the experience of staying at their hotels to feel like this (green, lush, etc.) . What part of their brand identity is being driven by this image and the prononcement of what they “should” be? Either way, what Westin is telling us, at least Playa Viva, is that Playa Viva “is” what Westin wants to be. We don’t think it “should” feel this way, we know that it does feel this way.   This is who  we are, not who we want to be or what think you “should” be or feel, this is what we know the expereince will b

All this reminds me of a conversation I recently had a with a friend. We were talking about how important it is for our children to engage with the right peer group, get into the right schools and focus on the right activities.  This turned to a discussion about how private schools are now emphasizing public service and a sense of global citizenship as part of what makes up a well rounded applicant.  At this point in the conversation my friend turned to me and reminded me of the importance of  the community service and local engagement component of Playa Viva.  He basically said that coming to Playa Viva would provide an opportunity to have his children engage with the local community and become more well rounded citizens.  So it reminds me of what we “should” do in the community, about how that makes us “feel” about ourselves and our responsibility to give back. 

We welcome our guests opinion about how we should work with our children, the children of our freinds and family, in engaging them with the community and building their character.

The Tragedy of the Privates

Over a recent discussion at brunch in Los Angeles at Akasha Restaurant with some friends of Playa Viva, the discussion turned to some changes we were seeing in the economy.  We were discussing the inefficient use of some resources and the tragedy of these dormant assets. The example used by our friends came in an “aha” moment as they were walking through the boat marina near where they live on the coast. As they walked past pier after pier of gleaming yachts docked and unused over the weekend, the tragedy of these assets laying idle made a significant impact on their ecological psyche. What if each of these boats were not private property but available for use by the commons?   So many assets would not lay idle, less waste, better for the planet. And so they tossed out the the phrase, “The Tragedy of the Privates” which lead a longer discussion.

This is the same concept that drove our decision making early on in Playa Viva, to develop a “fractional” model for vacation homes. Why build a home, sell it to one person and have it sit idle. Sure, we all love the idea of having our own beach home, our own yacht, our own everything. But in the emerging sustainable economy, the real winner is the zip car, the zip home the zip yacht.

Taking this model even further, we have become big fans of freecycle.org.  This further lessens the impact of the tragedy of the private, yet in this case you get all the benefits of private ownership and common benefit.  Freecycle has worked particularly well for us with childrens’ toys.  Our daughter has obtained as much benefit from someone else’s Barbie dolls as they did; and we will sure to pass along this derived value to the next young girl when our daughter grows out of the “Barbie” phase. The same is true for our son and Pokemon cards. Rather than buy all new cards and be a wasteful consumer, which would have helped the local economy through our expenditures at the locally owned independent toy store, instead my wife turned to freecycle where she found a family whose older children came over to our house to personally deliver their once treasured Pokemon cards. I’m not sure who enjoyed the moment more, my son upon receiving the ultimate card collection in one gigantic gesture of charity, or the young man who handed them over and the pleasure he gained in seeing the joy he brought to our son.

In your quest to use less, we encourage you to look for solutions where you can share assets, hand them down, re-use, recycle, freecycle.  This type of behavior will be a large step towards a more sustainable economy. Sure it may reduce the size of key measures such as GDP, with fewer Barbie’s and Pokemon’s, Yachts and Houses being made and sold, but the key measure of human satisfaction, an under-measured and under-appreciated key indicator, will probably go up, significantly.

Playa Viva Featured in Book on Green Building

Playa Viva was recently featured in a book entitled “The Integrative Design Guide to Green Building: Redefining the Practice of Sustainability” by the 7group and Bill Reed.  We highly recommend the book as well as Bill Reed and the team from Regenesis that lead our early design process.

We have been contacted recently by several groups that have been inspired by Playa Viva as a model for sustainable development.  These folks wanted to know how to get started working in a sustainable manner. Many of the early lessons we learned are covered in this book.  A quick look at the table of contents gives a snap shot of the process we underwent over the last three years.  With Playa Viva scheduled to open November of this year, we are about to enter into one of the most important cycles in this regenerative process – Feedback and Evolving in the Field (see Table of Contents of the book below).

In reality, we have constantly maintained a feedback loop and have been evolving in the field. What started as fractional offering now will open as a boutique hotel.  Moving palm trees in order to build tree houses on the beach, evolved to moving the tree houses to were the palm trees are already located. These are just two of so many examples of feedback and evolution in our project. Yet each of these changes remains true to the core values that were agreed upon by the entire development group early in the design process (see Chapter Four).

We congratulate Bill and team for this wonderful book and thank them for including Playa Viva as a case study from which others can learn.

Chapter One: Many Minds.

Chapter Two: Building as an Organism.

Chapter Three: Reframing Sustainability.

Chapter Four: Aligning Values, Purpose and Process.

Chapter Five: The Discovery Phase.

Chapter Six: Schematic Design.

Chapter Seven: Design Development and Documentation.

Chapter Eight: Construction, Operations, and Feedback.

Chapter Nine: Epilogue: Evolving the Field.

Chapter One: Many Minds.

Chapter Two: Building as an Organism.

Chapter Three: Reframing Sustainability.

Chapter Four: Aligning Values, Purpose and Process.

Chapter Five: The Discovery Phase.

Chapter Six: Schematic Design.

Chapter Seven: Design Development and Documentation.

Chapter Eight: Construction, Operations, and Feedback.

Chapter Nine: Epilogue: Evolving the Field.

Mexico Tourism Department Report on A(H1N1)

We have been reticent to report on the most recent influenza virus A(H1N1) until time provided us with some perspective on the topic and allowed us to be more rational and less reactive. We now feel that enough time has past to put this “potential pandemic” into perspective, at least for this season.

 The influenza story is part of the story of place.  Mexico’s reaction to this threat has catapulted Mexico into the middle of the international media and has placed its public health system under the world heath infrastructure’s microscope. Did Mexico react appropriately to this potential pandemic threat?  What will be the repercussions of this event for Mexico over the short-term and long-term both economically and from the perspective of cultural evolution? All questions that will be answered over time.

However, the reason for this post is to share a recent update “For Travelers in Mexico” distributed by the Mexican Department of Tourism (English – Influenza Update paquete 5 May 12 ENG/Spanish – Influenza Update May Paquete 5 12 SPA).  The report is dated May 12 and claims that Mexico has the second largest reported “laboratory confirmed” cases of A(H1N1) influenza of any country with 2,059, second to the US with the largest number of reported and confirmed cases, 2,600.  The schools in Mexico opened officially on Monday, May 11.  Only 3 states in Mexico did not report cases of this flu. Also, no cases have been reported in the resort cities of Puerto Vallarta or Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo.

For more information, visit the CDC (Center for Disease Control) website specific for the A(H1N1) virus or for specific information about Mexico go to the Mexico-Update website managed by the Mexican Department of Tourism.

Playa Viva Refracted in a New Light

Brown Pelicans Surfing the Waves

In the last few days I’ve received some of the best photographs ever taken at Playa Viva.  While we have been involved in this place for close to three years, the images that are captured there still do not cease to amaze me.  Just when you thought you saw all of Playa Viva, someone sends you slices of life from Playa Viva that refract the place in a whole new light. 

In late January, Daniel Camarena, an amateur photographer, naturalist and co-founder of Mexican non-profit Gente Como Nosotros (translates to “People Just Like Us”) spent 3 days in Playa Viva taking pictures of the wildlife.  His primary purpose for the trip was to photograph the birth and migration to the sea of the highly endangered Leatherback (Laud) turtle.  The turtle sanctuary, La Tortuga Feliz, had reported to us that a nest of Laud turtles had been found and the eggs were scheduled to hatch on that weekend.  Daniel and Gente Como Nosotros are in the process of deploying an environmental education  project in Mexico that will involve hundreds of schools and thousands of school children.  As part of this project, they wanted to capture the Laud Turtle for promotion and adoption by the school kids for environmental protection – we will provide you with more on this project as it gets formally released.

Daniel took photos of the volunteers of the turtle sanctuary at work in collecting and storing eggs safely in the sanctuary. He also got great images of the birds of Playa Viva and the landscape.  Enjoy PowerPoint below.

Save the Turtles Campaign

Organization Supporting "La Tortuga Feliz" at Playa Viva

The last few months have been the height of the turtle season in Playa Viva. The all volunteer team has released 27,000 plus turtles last month. But the bad news is that overall, they have released 30% fewer turtles than last year and the reason for these lower results is that the volunteers just don’t have the same support as last year and are in vital need of key resources. As a result, for this holiday season, we have started a small charitable giving campaign to raise $10,000 for a new 4×4 vehicle and gas to keep the volunteers reaching and rescuing as many baby turtles as possible.

How are we doing this? We have partnered with several organizations. First, the Oceans Foundation has agreed to serve as a clearing house for charitable giving. This way, you can make a donation and it will be tax deductible. We are asking you to give $100 (for adults) and $10 (for children).  Go to the following link or go to www.oceansfdn.org and click on the “Donate Now” link. On the Donate page, you will see this:

Gift Information:

I’d like to make this donation on behalf of in memory of Please send acknowledgement of this gift to:   (email address or postal address)

Make sure to click “on behalf” and write in the blank either: ”La Tortuga Feliz” or “Playa Viva Turtle Sanctuary”. This will guarantee that your donation will directed to this campaign. You can also send an email acknowledgment to info@playaviva.com. If you would like to send a check, please make it payable to “Oceans Foundation” and on the memo or for line please write “La Tortuga Feliz at Playa Viva”. Mail checks to our address: Playa Viva LLC, 20 Melrose Court, San Mateo, CA 94402.

Also, the good folks at GreaterGood Network/CharitiesUSA.com, LLC have partnered with us on click-to-save program that will direct matching funds.  We recommend highly that you visit their website and participate in their click-to-save programs.

Please let us know if you have any questions or if you have any ideas on how to help these volunteers continue their great work in saving more turtles.

Thank you for your donation and support.

Permaculture and the Financial Meltdown of 2008

I recently attended a two week permaculture design intensive, at the Occidental Arts and Ecology Centernear Sebastopol, CA. Over nine hours of class every day for two weeks including a design project with a randomly assigned group of the students, the class was no vacation! But it was magical. For starters, OAEC is a permaculture paradise. Operated for over 15 years as an active permaculture farm and community, there are incredible gardens and edible landscapes all over. With ecologically designed structures interspersed over the ample grounds, including a few light straw structures, cob benches and aerating fountains, the place is a showcase for how elegant and functional permaculture can be. And the place is populated by an incredible and vibrant group of teachers and educators. Their passion for transformation is palpable. And then there were the classes: Having not been in such an intensive learning environment for many  years, I literally drank in the knowledge that was amply communicated to us. Incredible classes on the foundations of permaculture, community and communication as well as a huge assortment of permaculture technologies including landscaping, key line, swales as well as energy efficiency in building design and farming practices. Truly information overload of the best sort. And did I mention my fellow students? We were truly blessed with such a warm, motivated and incredibly fun group of students ranging from 17 years old to over 60. A diverse and incredibly well matched group, I fell in love with all of them.

And literally in the middle of our course, the foundation of our so called free market economy collapsed! I can’t think of a better place to have been than on a permaculture farm! News of the 700 billion dollar bailout was met with swale design and harvesting from organic gardens and the possibility of living a sustainable life. It was a truly breathtaking contrast. And it has since put me into a place of examining the life I am living: I am part of an industrialized world, loving the conveniences and ease of our lives. Yet recognizing that at some level our lives our ultimately unsustainable. And questioning the choices I am making constantly, recognizing my disconnection from community, from the earth. I know that these times are a blessing, giving us all the opportunity for reevaluating our lives, and hopefully, soon, being able to make the right decisions for a more sustainable future.

From the Sublime to the Mundane – Hope Springs Eternal

The Light Just Seems to Have a Different Patina

Ever since the morning of Wednesday, November 5th, the sun seems to shine with a brighter patina in the morning.  On Tuesday, November 4th, I picked up Sandra at the airport, she had just returned on Northwest Air from 4 days of door-to-door canvasing in Columbus, OH.  At 6:31 PM, Pacific time, on our way to the home of dear friends to watch the results, NPR announced OH for Obama. Sandra cried with joy. The knowledge that her efforts and those of everyone involved in the campaign had paid off was both emotional and overwhelming. A the light of a new dawn was rising across America.

The reality of the next morning came in with the new light, Sandra heading to the office, the kids off to school.  As she walked out the door, she handed me a copy of “World Traveler”, Northwest Airlines Magazine and said, “take a look at this article on Green Travel“.  The article is about EcoTravel and featured locations worldwide and companies like REI Adventures.  Interestingly, at the end of the article is a side bar on how to “Go Green with NWA” introducing their carbon offset program with The Nature Conservancy.

We should probably develop our own carbon offset program with our affiliated non-for profit conservation project, Rainforest2Reef. 

Air travel will be severely impacted by issues such as Peak Oil and Carbon Offsetting and we look forward to being part of the solution.  Tomorrow offers us hope, hope that we can change things for the better, change as large as the first African-American President or as small as the individual sacrifices we will need to make in our daily life to make this change work for all of us.  It is a new dawn in America and around the world.

Unplugged and Loving It

In the Escapes Section of The New York Times, September 12, 2008, Steve Bailey writes in the article entitled, “Unplugged“, “Many people say that they want their weekend place to be a refuge from the modern world, a place to disconnect and reconnect.” Wow. We couldn’t have said it better ourselves.  While many folks ask us how we can create a place that is luxury and not have “a TV in every room”, the answer is simple, luxury is not about granite counter tops and gold plated fixtures, nor is it about TV’s, mini-bars and hairdryers in every room, luxury is about really disconnecting and reconnecting. Luxury is about creating an environment that allows you to disconnect and reconnect with grace.

Steve goes on in the article to state, “But a little tech subtraction can add up to the weekend experience you really want, creating a sense of togetherness in what might some might consider a poorly equipped vacation house.”   We have owned and operated another property, Casa Viva, for about 7 years. We have watched guests go through a process of detoxing from the need to be connected all the time.  You see them pacing, as if they have forget something or something has forgotten them.  Then eventually they sit, still, for a moment or maybe longer and they peer out farther than the distance between them and a screen (either in their hand or on a desk) and they see nature. They see the iguana basking in the sun of a nearby rock, the pelicans diving for fish in the shore just beyond, the fisherman tossing his net out to sea, and the moment grabs them and they reconnect.  Mr. Bailey, thank you for confirming our basic assumptions behind the design of Playa Viva.