Doyle's River cabin retreat

Get ready for a little taste of previous technologies &

19th century mountain living!

For our pre-semester retreat, we will be staying at a primitive cabin owned by the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club (PATC) near Doyle's River in Shenandoah National Park. This cabin will provide us with an excellent technological experience for the start of our studies this semester since it has no electricity or running water, but is otherwise stocked comfortably. A nearby mountain spring, wood and gas cookstoves, bunks with mattresses, blankets, kitchenware for eating & cooking, and even a dry load of wood and an outhouse for our convenience.

I've rented PATC cabins many times in the past, but I've never been to this one, so these images are ones collected from the web. In the black & white image above, the part

of the cabin to the left of the chimney is the porch featured here in this color shot.

The cabin is supposed to sleep up to 12, but I'll be bringing a tent, just in case. We will be packing our own food in about half a mile to the cabin and there are miles of local trails and waterfalls to explore, so boots or sturdy shoes will be helpful.

The end of the summer is often a dry time, but Doyles river should still have some waterfall activity remaining for our refreshment.

I will be posting here as well as sending an email with preparation recommendations and a brief equipment list.

Anyone who does not have their own lightweight sleeping bag or pack, please contact Zach Sussman to gain access to the Lodge's collection of gear.

If you have your own maps, or would like to obtain one for the area, go to your local outfitter and ask for PATC Map 11 for the South District of the Shenandoah National Park.

Stay tuned...

cooperation, collaboration, creative evolution

Though I've altered it a bit with the 'Warhol' effect available on my Mac, this knot image was originally hand-drawn in charcoal by 

Rebecca Bacheler for my "Radical Perspectives" literature class and I think it brilliantly portrays successful community as a loose knot of specific actions and attitudes - thanks Becca!

Whether it's the fading echo of Social Darwinism or the dying gasps of empire, It's nearly a required dogma these days to believe and assert (if not celebrate) that humans are inherently competitive, greedy and war-like - but maybe it's this story that is the bad influence. Maybe it's time we consider the potential consequences of this story at this specific time in technological history, a time of Weapons of Mass Destruction and the World Wide Web. What is possible? Nothing is inevitable.

Apocalypse or abundance: which future do we tell?

Since the psychological reality of the "self-fulfilling prophecy" is well demonstrated in terms of expectations and the stories we tell about ourselves, perhaps its time to consider telling new stories and looking at the evidence all around us of cooperation, collaboration and creative evolution. If our internal organs fought each other we would be weakened and it would be called disease, right? Those who profit from war and scarcity are only a tiny minority of the planet who try to convince the rest of us that we're just like them so we will defend their 'rights' but with the Web, the flow of information has been like Toto exposing the false power of the Wizard of Oz.

Though sensationalism catches our attention and the media feeds us a constant diet of news about violence, Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker argues that humanity is actually becoming less violent in "A History of Violence". And a recent New York Times Magazine article "How Are Humans Unique?" suggests that humans may actually be more naturally cooperative than we're usually told. In our age of global conflict, WMD's and environmental degradation it is clearly a time to tell a new story about our species and its future.

Hello from Karen!

Hey kids! After all this encouragement from Lee, I guess I'll step up and brighten your day with greetings and news of my "summer adventures"... so far, summer has been great. I am actually still in Richmond, and so this past weekend I went to Pocahontas State Park with 2 of my roommates for the summer, Emily Jaicks and Katy Einerson, and 2 other former Earth Lodge/Outdoor House kids, Geoff Cox and Marion Kruse. Pocahontas is actually a great park, with some fun hiking and bike trails, a lake, and lots of trees, and it's relatively close to campus- with the price of gas as high as it is these days, and the fact that we left at noon, we didn't feel like we could justify a 2-hour drive to the Blue Ridge mountains! So Pocahontas proved a great alternative, only about half an hour south of campus (150 south to rte 10 east, follow signs!).

So anyway, one of the things that I have been doing this summer, along with my roommate Katy, is learning to fence! Geoff used to fence in high school, and he's been giving us some backyard fencing lessons on weekends. This past weekend in Pocahontas was an opportunity to test out our new skills on some fresh terrain, so we had a few practice duels, including an epic match between Marion and Katy in front of the lake's dam (see pics!).

Other than that, summertime in Richmond has been a lot of fun. I'm working at a Mexican restaurant called "La Siesta," getting to practice my Spanish every day. When I'm not at work, I like to ride my bike all over town, or hang out in the backyard with our dog, Max.

I'm definitely looking forward to the Earth Lodge this fall! Hope youse guys are all doing well!

-Karen

hot, Hot, HOT !!

Today's 'heat-index' in Richmond, VA will be over 100 and the temperature will be near 100 degrees as well. But there is a riverside festival today down by Pony Pasture, and a whole summer full of events during "James River Days". It's heat like this that makes me appreciate the shade and oxygen provided by trees! (and those secret swimming holes)

In 2004 the James River Park system (JRP) was recognized as one of the best urban parks in the country, and our parks manager Ralph White

Don't forget to start reading Stewart's Earth Abides so we can discuss it on our retreat. As you read, do so actively with highlighter and pen so when we study & share the novel we can access passages more readily. What does this novel have to say about technology?


So...what are YOU doing this summer my fellow Earth Lodgers?
I hope you will all make an entry or two with a few words and maybe some pix about your summer adventures....

We've gotten the OK from the school about early move-in and I'll keep you posted about the plans for our retreat. (I guess we should call it a 'pretreat' but that sounds too much like stain removal!)

Be well, stay cool and let us know what you're doing!