Balancing Wildfires and Chaparral

Southern California chaparral

On NPR this morning, Richard Halsey of the California Chaparral Institute discussed “Balancing Wildfires and Chaparral” with Maureen Cavanaugh on These Days.  He attempted to set the record straight about the role chaparral plays in the natural fire cycle of Southern California. It was a fascinating and informative radio talk, explaining how old growth chaparral (the native plant environment of SoCal) helps to prevent erosion and direct rainfall to aquifers instead of flash-flood-type runoff.

Take a peek at Chaparral & Manzanita at Sacred Rocks Reserve! We invite you bring friends, family, and botany nerds to Sacred Rocks and shoot the exuberant springtime blooms with your camera.

The Bloom of 2009

Blooming yucca plant with pink flowers

The hillsides are spectacular.

Just enough rain this year to yield an amazing crop of wild flowers.

It is fun to learn and even more fun to be amazed at seeing what I have not seen before.

Was it not there?

Or are my eyes opened in a different way?

Makes me wonder about life in general.

What is in front of our eyes that we cannot ‘see’?

What do you notice about your life, or your self, or your surroundings that seems new to you, that you are just now ‘seeing’?

Grand Opening of Mountain Homes and Solar Wine and Cheese Party

San Diego County RV Resort Is 1st in the Nation To Offer Solar-Powered Park Models as Low-Cost Weekend Cottages

Sacred Rocks Reserve Mountain Homes is the first park to offer solar-powered park model homes to consumers. Typically upscale in appearance, park models are 400-square foot movable resort cottages that are designed exclusively for part-time recreational use. Park models are technically classified as recreational vehicles, that can be set up on leased or purchased sites in campgrounds and RV parks and used as weekend retreats or seasonal vacation cottages. The park model homes are manufactured by Phoenix-based Cavco Industries, which has equipped its cabin- and cottage-style park models with solar panels, eco friendly features with custom feature options.

“We think these units will be particularly appealing to consumers who want an affordable, environmentally friendly mountain retreat cottage,” said Sharon Courmousis, owner of Sacred Rocks Reserve, located at 3,900 feet in the mountains east of San Diego and is roughly an hour’s drive from San Diego and Imperial County and less than two hours from Yuma, Arizona. Prices for the solar powered park models offered at Sacred Rocks start at around $55,000, which includes the first year’s annual lease fee of $4,800.

Solar Presentation: Saturday, January 24, 2009 from 1:00 to 3:00 pm, an educational presentation about solar power, with a Q&A session following.

Party Hosts: Sharon and Dimitri Courmousis park owners, Ready Solar Inc. and Cavco will co-host the event

Mountain Home Tours: Which are open to the public from 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM daily, will provide an opportunity for consumers, government officials and members of the news media to tour the nation’s first solar-powered park models.

Wine and Cheese Party: will be served after the Solar Presentation which will provide an opportunity to socialize and ask additional questions.

FREE Camping Special: During this event pay for 1 night the weekend of January 23-25, 2009 and get the 2nd night free! Please RSVP.

For more information on this event, download the PDF, visit Sacred Rocks Reserve and RV Park, or schedule a private tour of the nation’s first solar park model vacation cottages, by contacting Sharon Courmousis at (619) 766-4480 or sacredrocks@gmail.com.

How to Make your Business Eco-Friendly, Step 4

The Underground: We ran into a few challenges when working through the underground issues.

1. No one knew or mapped where the main water valves were
2. The electric meters were ancient and broken
3. No one know where the septic tanks were, or lids

Can you see? Can you image digging over 17000 feet of trenches – by HAND? Yes, it mostly had to be dug from site to site to site, avoiding existing pipes that worked, laying in new piping for telephone wires, repairing old water, electric and sewer connections, all the time avoiding tree roots to keep from killing the beautiful oak trees. Thanks to workers from the Freedom Ranch, and to winter workampers, as well as to Dimitri, owner, for this hard and important work.

So we are very protective of our undergound. First, we emphasize to all guests that only biodegradable products are to be used for RV holding tanks, and washing dishes as well as laundry. Secondly, we test the septic system annually to be sure the ‘good’ bacteria are doing their jobs of breakdown.

Our store only sells eco-friendly products. We do not allow mechanic work to be done on vehicles due to oil and gas spillage.

The end result is all systems have been updated, we have a map of main connections, our trees remain green and healthy AND our guests enjoy the benefits of a careful conservation strategy.

It’s a Fall Day at Sacred Rocks Reserve – and 73 degrees!

Officially fall, yet, still in the midst of the Santa Ana conditions that blow the desert air over the mountains to the sea. At this time, though, not a breath of air, people are out in shorts and t-shirts, and as long is the sun is out, it just about perfect. The deciduous trees have completed their shedding for the winter. Most of our trees, however, are oak trees. About 95% of our trees are oak, and green all winter AND summer.

What is you weather like at this time of year? Wouldn’t you just love to come for a visit?

How to Make your Business Eco-Friendly Step 2

Plant/Tree Husbandry

When we came here 6 years ago, we had been city folks but with a background in living in small towns, Dimitri from Djibouti, East Africa and Sharon from Valle Vista, a community 5 miles east of Hemet, California. We really did not know much about the plants of the area of Boulevard. Every year we learn more.

The trees. The ancient and venerable oak trees One of the draws of Sacred Rocks Reserve is the huge trees that provide shade during the warm days of summer. The outside temperature can be 95 but 10 degrees cooler in the shade, lounging in a hammock or chaise lounge. The sound of the wind passing gently through the leaves of the trees, whispers

relax, let go, take a nap

A tree dies. A beautiful 300-400 year old majestic oak tree just dies. For whatever reason; age, infestation, drought, it is gone. What do we do? We get the tree company to fell it, then the workers all drag it to the wood pile. From that point it is aged [green wood does not burn well] the big logs are cut with a chain saw, then put through the wood-splitter. All winter long we cut and pile, getting wood ready for our guests. We have heard comments such as,

‘the reason you disallow wood is so you can sell your own firewood’

We laugh because we end up selling the wood at about cost. Cost, you say? Yes, cost. The tree cutting people are expensive to hire. The workers who cut and split the wood must be paid. The stacking and wood chipping the small branches is a job for hired hands. The delivery of wood to campers is a job for our Workampers.

Start with a tree and then it dies….

tree sections

stacks of firewood

Ah, the campfire. Sitting around chatting with your family and friends, it is easy to forget all the work in the getting of the wood. For centuries, people have taken wood from forests to burn for campfires. It has been a healthy and environmentally conscious act, that we have purposefully carried on.

How to Make your Business Eco-Friendly Step 1

Old Outdoor World 1972-2003

Imagine a one ton pickup truck AND a 4 cubic yard, and one determined owner along with a myriad of worker-bees, hauling load after load of trash. It was 2003, the RV Park just purchased. Sharon and Dimitri had a dream. The dream was to take care of the land, and to pass it to future generations. There have been challenges and a big one was, TRASH.

From Boulevard to the Miramar Landfill and back there are 140 miles. For years, people around had been using the RV Park 163 acres as a dump site. For whatever reason, they thought it was normal to dump their trash on other people’s land. The new owners put a stop to that. Then the clean-up began.

Each load of TRASH took 1-3 days to load. Behind nearly every group of beautiful trees and big rocks, the trash of years was cleared out. Day after day of sweating, lifting, hauling, loading, and driving and unloading and returning home. More than 80 TONS OF TRASH were hauled off Sacred Rocks Reserve [formerly Outdoor World RV Park]. Appliances, beds, garbage, cans and bottles, old cars, old parts of machines, more garbage, over 500 tires to the recycling company, over 2 tons of steel and aluminum to the recycling plants in National City. Thousands of miles driven.

So when we go out on to the Reserve to check things out, we take a plastic bag with us, to pick up what has blown or been dropped by careless campers. And we encourage everyone to do the same.

Shall we leave this world a better place? I would like to know of other experiences in cleaning up a business, or a home, or land.