We went to an agricultural research station 45km outside of Cusco in a beautiful mountain valley.

In this greenhouse is part of the collection of wild potatoes. There are 2500 different varieties they are keeping going. Many different kinds of plants, they don't even look like potatoes.

In the foreground is quinoa growing. There are also 3000 varieties of potatoes that are growing on Incan terraces. The place was an ancient farm.

All of the Andean tubers were growing here, oca, ulluyco, mashua, and yacon besides all the potatoes. It was a fun place to visit for a permaculture geek like me.

The old colonial town near by called Zurite, had an old church in the center like most towns here.

I am in the Sacred Valley of the Incas. This is where the Incas grew a lot of their food. The old terraces that go all the way up the mountains are still used.


 The Urubamba river flows through the Sacred Valley. The level of the water is just to the edge of the banks where corn is planted.

The Sacred Valley from Pisac.

 Pisac market on the first day of Carnival.

A local girl from a village near Iquitos

 This is a neighborhood of Iquitos where people live in floating houses. One of the advantages is you can go swimming whenever you want outside your door. This only works during the rainy season when the water comes up about 20 feet. The kids were having a blast.

Amazon Permaculture Course

Dear Family and Friends, I am currently in the Amazon city of Iquitos. I just returned from teaching a permaculture design course near here for the past 10 days or so. We have been living in community together with the students and three teachers. The site is very humble and designed to have people connect deeper with the natural jungle environment. There is no electricity or running water in the cabins. But there are showers in the bath house and the food was simple and delicious. I am on my way back to the Andes tomorrow to start work on a permaculture design project in the Sacred Valley near Cuzco. I'll send more updates soon. Sending love from here,

Andy

The immensity of the water here is beyond comprehension. This is a tributary of the Amazon. I took this picture on the flight from Tarapoto to Iquitos and noticed the familiar pattern of this huge scale on this section of river. Part of the permaculture course is pattern recognition and applying it to design.

 
One night the rain and thunder and lightening came with such an intense force it felt like we were going to wash away, Ten inches of rain must have fallen throughout the night. The result is the lushness and verdant green of this forest.

The first day of class we walked the property. By the end of the walk we literally were up to our necks in the creek crossings. The first test of our intrepid students, and teachers(me) as well. This was one of the first crossings, just swamped our rubber boots.

Here I am in a calm moment between mosquito swats. I did get more used to the bugs over the days and didn't lose too much blood.

I'm obsessed with butterflies. These little creatures are nature in perfection. I chased them around the forest trying to get a photo and I caught a few.

 Neon colors on this swallowtail.

 

 

This is where I spent the past 11 nights. I might as well have been in the open. I was glad to have some palm fronds over my head that night it rained. Although it was so noisy that night I couldn't sleep. The sounds of the forest brought some amazing dreams. Some of the most vivid dreams in recent memory.

 This is the classroom we used for teaching the permaculture design course

 Gregory teaching our students. We didn't have any electricity so we used the whiteboard as our main tool. We were also able to get outside and do some hands on composting demonstrations and look at some of the systems already in place on the site. Compost toilets, greywater systems and fish ponds among others.

I loved this bird, its a snail kite. Check out his beak, specialized to pluck out snails from their shells. I watched him do it a few days down by the fish pond. Beautiful!


More soon......