Salmon Creek Farm 🌈️
2022-23 RETREATS
We are opening up cabins for a first full season of two-week retreats from October 2022 through April 2023 to support our continued transition into a land-based arts non-profit program in 2023.
Read through all of the information below and the details for email inquiries can be found at the end.
We have found the two week visit to be the optimal amount of time, to slow down, become familiar with the place and it's rhythms, to quiet the mind, and really be present on the land. (The co-founder of the original Salmon Creek Farm commune in 1971 and professor of ecopsychology, Robert Greenway concurred. He would lead students on two week wilderness excursions and then evaluate the therapeutic effects.) This may be a time to take a step back for some critical distance from daily life, a chance to create something new, or even a pause from projects and productivity altogether.
We are in Albion, on a 33 acre ridge top and south-facing slope, two miles from the coast, and 25 minutes south of the village of Mendocino. Living here under the coastal redwoods is humbling, and SCF is an especially good spot to feel your small place in the big cycle of life on earth. The cabins are wood-heated, we harvest and chop our own firewood, so you should be comfortable starting and keeping a fire going to stay warm. (Though in our coastal climate we only occasionally get down to a night-time frost in the winter). We turn human waste into rich soil, so you should be down with our humanure outhouses, featuring sawdust lined buckets which you empty into a nearby compost pile where, through miraculous alchemy, it is turned into black gold. We collect and treat our own spring water which is gravity fed to all of the cabins from the top of the ridge. We strive for zero waste, shop for minimal/no packaging, compost zealously, and for many reasons SCF is strictly vegetarian (fyi many carnivorous visitors have found it to be a helpful place to experiment with a fully plant-based diet for the first time).
Each of our modest homespun cabins occupies a unique secluded nook in our south-facing wooded slope. They were lovingly built, rebuilt, repaired, furnished, and embellished by many hands over the years with scavenged local materials. They are cute, cozy, comfortable, well appointed, and pretty rustic (ie. an occasional mouse may find it’s way in and something will have to be done). All cabins have fast wifi, outhouses, full kitchens, hot water, wood burning stoves, cozy beds / bedding / pillows / comforters, and outdoor showers.
Once on the land we put everone on a whatsapp party line, where guests can all be directly in touch with each other, to announce communal meals, invite each other over, ask for help with something, organize an event, say “hey I’m going to town in case anyone needs anything,” etc.
Please note:
- So sorry, but no pets, even though we absolutely adore them.
- There are accessibility issues, with cabins reached exclusively by footpaths through the woods.
- Arrivals are *exclusively* on Sundays from 2pm until 5pm.
- Monday mornings we lead a comprehensive 2 hour tour of the entire property, including visits to all cabins and a hike down to the creek. This also serves a chance to meet the entire group and a critical/compulsory orientation to life on the land (outhouses, compost, firewood, making & tending fires, etc).
- We have potluck meals at the OK (Outdoor Kitchen) on Fridays for those who want to join.
- Departures are on Saturdays before 11am.
Cabins are first made available to the SCF community, then to a waitlist that has been growing over the past year, and finally to selections from open applications. We try to schedule guests we think would enjoy meeting and sharing the land, so let us know about your interests and how social / solitary you might want to be.
For a SCF Retreat, write 2022(at)salmoncreekfarm(dot)org with a bit about yourself(s), your interest in visiting SCF, how you might spend your time, your preferred cabin, and your available 2-week periods in order of preference. Sunday arrival dates: Nov 27, Dec 11, Jan 1, 15, 29, Feb 12, 26, Mar 12, 26, and Apr 9.
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