Work-Trade, Landance & Eco-Rentals
Come and experience our permaculture homestead on the Big Island of Hawaii.
We are open to people looking for education, transformation, healing and growth.
Landance-and-Lunch
For people who want to see our place and get a feel for us as a community, you can come by in the morning for a project, a tour and a meal.
On weekdays by appointment, from about 10 am – 2 pm, we offer a Landance & Lunch at GaiaYoga Gardens. It’s a time when people are invited to join in our life. This might include a community meeting, doing a project, hanging out and “talking story” with residents, and a delicious, organic lunch of coconuts and local fruits.
While you’re here, you’ll get to meet us and get a tour of some of our land and infrastructure, including our eco-structures (which we call “tropical breeze houses”), coco-bar, plant nursery, solar and water catchment systems, composting toilet, and you get to enjoy the overall ambiance of our land.
If you’re interested in coming by for a Landance & Lunch, e-mail us and we’ll send you more information.
Worktrade
For individuals, couples, and families who are wanting to explore life here at Gaia Yoga Gardens without participating in the Immersion.
We ask for a minimum of a 1-month commitment for work-trading.
This arrangement involves a “looser orbit” with the Members and Residents at GYG (due to Work-Traders using a separate kitchen and having some separate meetings from the rest of the community), but it also gives Landers a taste of what it's like to live here. Some Work-Traders might only stay here a few months and won't be part of an Immersion, while others are engaging in a work-trade exchange for some or all of the tuition for an upcoming Immersion.
In either case, we offer this option temporarily, as we want everyone living here to eventually integrate fully in to our community by participating in the Immersion. Therefore, by the time a Work-Trader has been at GYG for a second Immersion that they don't participate in (either because they don't want to or because they haven't paid the tuition for it through money and/or work-trade), our policy is to ask them to leave GYG.
Since Immersions happen about once every 2-3 months, the maximum stay for a Work-Trader who doesn't move on to participating as an Immersee is 2-5 months, depending on the timing of when they arrive and when the Immersions occur. We show preference to Work-Trading applicants who plan to participate in an Immersion within their first few months at GYG.
We meet with Work-Traders (and most of the rest of the community) every weekday morning at 8am to coordinate the days activities. Work-Traders are free to socialize as is natural with everyone, but are not able to come to our Heartcore meetings until after they’ve completed the immersion. If we have enough Work-Traders at the same time, we open up a second kitchen for them to be their primary kitchen.
Work-Traders fill out the same application as those who are interested in the immersion, and can easily transfer into taking the immersion whenever they want.
Work-Trade people can handle their own food or be in on our communal food plan.
We have several work-trade options that vary in amount of hours per week, initial financial contribution, and monthly financial contribution. These are gone over in detail if you apply to stay with us.
(We don't like labeling people, especially with phrases such as “work-traders,” “interns,” “WWOOFers,” etc. that can support unconscious power dynamics. Nonetheless, for order and clarity, we like to have words to indicate the type of relationships people currently have to GYG.)
Landance
(Our word for doing projects, chores, and maintenance on the land or infrastructure.)
Most of the Landance people do during their first month(s) here is of the “chop wood, carry water” type: it’s mostly “unskilled” labor. It’s not glamorous, but it’s essential for our survival and to maintain order and beauty.
We call it “Landance” to remind and encourage us to find enjoyment in doing all of this repetitive, cyclical bodily labor and to bring the realization that we are interacting with our environment to experience our body, sculpt out our home and food supply, and physically harmonize with the natural world.
It’s a big part in our life here; it's not all of our life, but we consider it an essential core element.
Typical Landance occurs in and around:
• orchards
• perennial gardens (we don't currently do much annual vegetable gardening)
• fruit tree and bamboo nursery
• pasture, animal care, feeding, and food acquisition
• domestic maintenance and cleaning
• infrastructure building, repair, and maintenance
• movement and management of organic matter (compost, manure, mulch)
• foraging for coconuts and other food
• driving to Pahoa and Hilo to run errands and purchase food and supplies for the community
• childcare
If people arrive here with lots of skills already, they might use them after the immersion, but it takes a while on any homestead to get the basics down so that you can become more creative and do more “interesting” projects. Depending on what’s happening on the homestead, you might be involved in a bigger creative project like building a structure or creating a new garden, but that may or may not happen.
Think of homesteading as a martial art: you’ll be working on your white or yellow belt here, getting a lot of the foundational moves down — swinging a machete, using a hammer, drill, shovel, digging bar, sickle, pushing a wheel barrow, learning to identify all of the different plants (weeds vs. not weeds).
Eco-Rentals
A wonderful alternative to an impersonal hotel or an expensive vacation rental.
Stay in a gendered dorm or a private tropical breeze house (depending on availability), and enjoy the beautiful, tropical environment.
1 Night: $40/night for singles – $70/night for couples
2-5 Nights: $35/night for singles – $60/night for couples
Weekly: $200 for singles – $320 for couples
Monthly: $600 for singles – $1000 for couples
Family rates are also available.