Author Archives: Julia

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It’s a Monk’s Life

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Settling into a rhythm here. Mondays through Thursdays we usually start around 7:30 or 8 am. Every morning begins with watering all the potted plants and seeds, feeding the chickens, and cleaning the chicken coop. (Like having eggs? Gotta clean chicken poop.) Roughly 4-5 hours of work in the morning, a lunch break between 12:30 – 3:30 pm, then another 2-3 hours of work in the afternoon. At 6 pm we feed the dogs, which involves chaining four of them lest they fight and bite each other’s necks off. I’m usually tuckered out by 8 or 9 pm!

Fridays and Saturdays are a bit different and start earlier around 6:30 or 7 am. Friday is spent harvesting in the early morning before it gets too hot, then cleaning, sorting, weighing, and packing all the vegetables for next day’s farmers’ market. Saturday we pack everything into the van at 7 am, sell at the market from 9 am – 12 pm, do grocery shopping for the week while in town, and then finish with resorting all the unsold veggies.

Sunday we rest, like god.
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Going North!

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Spent the past week ironing out upcoming travel plans in between farm work. I’m leaving the peach farm on Wednesday. My time here has been short but fruitful. The next legs of the trip are completely different from my original thinking, but I’m excited.

Rough itinerary:
8/29 – 9/13: WWOOFing at Bobcat Ridge avocado farm in Watsonville, CA
9/14-17: Boise, ID
9/18-26: Seattle, WA
9/26 – 10/1: Portland, OR
10/2: WWOOFing at Kern Family Farm in North Fork, CA

Unfortunately, I only packed with the intention of visiting warmer climates. Time for some thrifting!

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First Days at the Peach Farm

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“It’s nice today, only 90 degrees.” Welcome to farming in the California desert!

I arrived at the Ananda Marga Organic Peach Farm on Tuesday. Although it’s called a peach farm there aren’t any peaches in season right now, so we’ve been working with many vegetables. It’s been very enjoyable so far. Dada runs the farm and has been teaching us so many interesting things, from how to help seeds germinate to making delicious Indian corn bread. There are two other volunteers here from Taiwan, so there’s also a lot of Chinese-speaking going on. Randomly pleasant surprise.

The living quarters are rustic, and the work is hard. Even with several breaks throughout the day, I’m still ready for bed by about 9 pm. We spent most of the last two days building raised beds. I’m now steps closer to becoming an expert wood worker.

Cutting wood with Ann and Richard

Assembling the beds

Collecting chicken wire for the raised beds — rough work!

There are six dogs on the farm. They help guard the land and also provide great entertainment.

Meet Will. He follows us around everywhere. Most of the time it’s endearing, unless he’s panting in your face while you’re using the power saw.

Today is our big harvest day. We were up at 6:30 am collecting tomatoes, kale, arugula, beans, basil, and chard. Tomorrow we head to the farmers’ market!

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Road Trip Finale

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The last few days of the trip took us through some interesting places. First, Santa Fe where we visited the historic downtown as well as the beautiful opera house. I got the unique opportunity to glimpse into life as an opera singer — a very interesting but demanding lifestyle! Becky and I attended a performance of Tosca, which was actually really enjoyable once I figured out how to turn on the subtitles. The next morning I took a nice and hot run through the Santa Fe desert.

Downtown Santa Fe

Night at the opera


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We’ve Arrived!

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Greetings from the beautiful (and hot!) Malibu, CA. Road trip was a great success. Possibly the most painful part was the last 2.5 hour drive from LA to Malibu in horrible traffic! Currently running on 3 hours of sleep after a late night in Vegas so I’ll recap the last legs of the trip later. Looking forward to turning in early and NOT having to wake up and get in the car in the morning. 🙂

Trip overview:
Hamden, CT –> Malibu, CA
~3,900 miles (according to a cursory Google map outline)
9 days
16 states (Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Nevada, California)

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Colorado the Beautiful

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Colorado was at the top of my list for this road trip. I’ve been dying to get out to those mountains for so long, and they did not disappoint! Yesterday I spent the day exploring Rocky Mountain National Park near Denver. Time was limited, but I got to spend a good three hours up in the mountains. It was absolutely breathtaking!

Driving toward the mountain — already gorgeous


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South Dakota: The Underdog State

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Driving cross-country makes the United States feel majestic and small at the same time. It’s so cool how the topography differs from state to state — prairies to mountains to lakes to deserts. Some states required more loud music to keep us awake than others (ahem Wisconsin and Minnesota), but it’s been a blast so far. Since we’re so familiar with the East Coast and Midwest, we logged those miles as quickly as possible.

The first really exciting destination: South Dakota. We were pleasantly surprised. Who knew South Dakota had so much to offer?! First stop was the Corn Palace, the one and only in the world. This place was tacky and great. Corn on the outside walls, fresh popcorn at the “Corn-cessions” stand, huge corn gift shop inside… hilarious.

Entering the crux of the giant Corn Palace

We then traveled to the Badlands National Park. Somehow this place didn’t even cross our radar when planning the trip, which would’ve been a gross oversight because it was awesome! We managed to get a little trail hiking in.
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And I’m Off!

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Lesson learned from constantly moving: Material possessions are a burden. Yet it’s so hard to part with them. Trying to pack everything for an open-ended farming/traveling escapade into a single backpack proved near-impossible. I managed to whittle it down to this, but it still required an extra duffel bag. How do backpackers do it??

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Hitting the road bright and early tomorrow! California, here we come!

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Shoutout to New Haven Farms

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A few photos of my time with New Haven Farms.

The beginning: Planting strawberries

The early days of our hoop house

Making beds. I arrived one Sunday after a 20 mile run to find this waiting for me. Quite a day!

Sunset at the Market & James garden. Beautiful day!

Trellising tomatoes

Liberty garden ripe for harvest!

Purple beans! Very yummy

Distributing our CSA!

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Two Weeks Notice

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Time is flying! A few lofty to-do list items made for a busy busy June and July. I’m thrilled and satisfied to check these off the list before hitting the road!

– Ann Arbor Marathon complete

– GREs FINALLY done & scores are good

– Started Crossfit — still in my third week of on-ramp classes but I’ll be able to finish by the end of the month

— Two weeks notice at work

This week I wind down most of my commitments in New Haven: CitySeed, New Haven Farms, Breathing Room. So many memorable days, nights, and weekends spent with wonderful people at each of these places. Sad to have to leave them behind.

It’s hard to fathom that in two weeks I’ll basically be homeless and unemployed by choice. I’ve been soaking in these last days in my lovely apartment — the quiet mornings with fresh juice and the New York Times (I can’t fit a juicer in my travel gear, can I?) and lazy nights in bed with Netflix. I’ll miss these things for sure, but it’s time to trade in some comforts for adventure.

A glimpse into the first leg of the trip!

Cross Country Road Trip