I am looking for volunteers to help on a number of different sustainability-related projects at Maya Creek for 2014. I'd prefer volunteers to stay a minimum of 1 month, but I'll consider volunteers for stays as short as 2 weeks. Volunteers staying longer will be given opportunities for more complicated work as well as preference on housing.
The work season starts at the beginning of April and runs through the end of October. All volunteers will be provided room and board in exchange for 20 hours of work per week.
Garden Help
I am looking for volunteers to help with the garden, food forest, medicinal and wild plant identification and harvesting, and food preservation. This will involve weeding, watering, making compost, pest management, research, harvesting, canning, dehydrating, and fermentation. There may also be an opportunity to build an herb spiral for a volunteer staying a month or more.
Construction Help
The other main area of help will be on natural building projects, such as mixing and applying earthen plaster, helping construct the rainwater cistern, root cellar, and rocket stoves. Artistically minded volunteers may be encouraged to get creative with the finish coats of plaster, frescoes can be added with a little lime, and shelves and other sculptures can be incorporated as well.
Workload
You will be expected to put in 20 hours per week, weather permitting. Cooking and doing dishes from communal meals count towards this. There is a work log where everyone enters a general description of what we did each day and roughly how long we spent on it. It will serve as a chronicle of Maya Creek and is useful for future planning, but it also lets you know if you need to find more to do or you can chill out and spend the day down at the lake or the river.We will attempt to do most of our work during weekdays and keep the weekends free, but sometimes circumstances demand we work on the weekend, ie workshops, weather, etc.
Accommodations
One side of the strawbale duplex with loft or a small 80 square foot strawbale cabin. Both come furnished with full size beds, night stand, dresser, etc. Each place is livable, but not totally complete. If you would like to spend some of your work hours working on making your quarters nicer that would be more than acceptable.
The first construction project next Spring will be setting up the indoor solar shower system, but until it is working rainwater can be heated up on the stove and you simply pour it over yourself with a cup. There is a composting sawdust toilet outhouse in the campground.
