“Be-Coming was the most exquisite container I have ever been held in for my soft animal body to unwind and begin to rewild in nature. I am so thankful to the facilitators and all of the love and care they put into hand picking/ custom designing each aspect of this retreat to make it special to all of the individuals that comprised the group. I will “Be Coming” back next year.”
– 2019 Participant
For this gathering, we will have access to 17 acres of land ranging from the domestic comfort of home, to the communal village, to the fertile forest and wild water. The land supports a beautiful home that was designed and built using ancient vastu energetic principles and Vedic readings. You can learn more about this special space at http://liminalia.space.
The home includes a spacious studio that we will be using for yoga, dancing, or other movement activities that are supported by amplified music and level ground.
Outside the home, there is a barn and stalls that are home to two goats, two dogs, and two donkeys. There are also a collection of small cottages that sleep 2 to 6 people each. There is plenty of land for camping, hanging hammocks, and finding private space.
Rock Creek runs along the property. It is shallow, but a small swimming hole is a short walk from the house. Grassy river banks are available for lounging and enjoying drying off after a swim. Two fire pits serve as gathering and ritual space. There is also a sauna adjacent to the yoga studio that will be available.
A Sacred Cedar tree presides over the whole area and is a powerful conduit for connecting to the divine. The wild forest just beyond the fence invites you to discover its magic and mystery. 500 year old Cedar stumps and nurse logs nourish the next generation of silent giants. Elk roam wild throughout the land and murmurations of birds fly overhead. For more information on this history of this land, including the native peoples of the region, please scroll to the bottom of this page.
The land is excited for our visit. They have requested of us to court them, treat them well, to show reverence and responsiveness, and to offer our immense gratitude. They have asked us to bring our wild play to their shores and fields and groves of trees. They have requested for our support as this land expands into its current and future role as a liminal space.
Logistics:
If you prefer sleeping inside, you may choose from a bed in one of the many cabins on the property. The cabins are heated and have power. How many cabins we open, will depend on how many attendees want to stay in one. Your cabin stay will include pillows, sheets, blankets and towels.
If you prefer sleeping outside, bring your tent or hammock. There are many camping space options, from the lawn and shaded wood lot to the dense forest or along the creek. If you chose to camp, be sure you bring your own collection of towels (for showering, swimming, and sauna).
Food
The event includes twelve meals and snacks lovingly made with local, seasonal ingredients. We will do our best to accommodate dietary restrictions and all meals will have gluten free options.
Toilets/Hygiene
The house has two bathrooms with showers available. The barn has one bathroom with a steam shower indoors, and a double shower outside. The Red Shed also has a double outdoor shower to bathe under the stars. There are also three outhouses around the property.
We will have stations set up for hand washing and dishwashing and encourage everyone to practice excellent hygiene practices.
We ask that if you are naked, that you have a towel or sarong available to sit on.
We will provide safer sex supplies and ask you to practice good clean love (including informing yourself about their proper use and disposal, and to always leave no trace!)
History of the Land
The yoga-farm is located on the banks of Rock Creek, on the Eastern side of the Northern Oregon Coast Range mountains in the town of Vernonia, Oregon. Rock Creek is fed from atop that mountain range and travels 26 miles before feeding the Nehalem River, which goes on to reach the Pacific Ocean.
Over 30 million years ago, the land on which we will gather was covered by an arm of the sea. Over time, the land was uplifted permanently from the sea leaving over 2,000 feet of marine sediment laden with fossilized evidence of this area’s oceanic past.
The Nehalem Valley was home to dense old growth forests whose massive trunks and towering canopies must have been a sight to behold. The forest canopy was so thick, that there was little underbrush for large grazing animals like deer and elk.
Local historians believe that the native Chinook and Clatskanie peoples who lived throughout the region rarely came into Vernonia or the surrounding areas and had no settlements in the area because hunting, fishing, and gathering were far easier along the banks of the Nehalem River as compared to the dense rainforest of the valley. Other resources who are familiar with the Northwest and the Native Peoples and how they used trees for ceremony, very much believe that Native People were on this land and treated it, and the ancient Cedar tree here, as a sacred site. (For more on these native peoples, please see below.)
The first white settlers arrived in Vernonia in 1874. These pioneers came to farm, which required them to clear the land of the large timber. Lumber quickly became the dominant industry as the Central Coal and Coke company bought up much of the forest in the coast range, and sold this property and surrounding land to the Oregon American (OA) Lumber Company. The OA established the nearby logging camp called “Keasey Town” that once was home to 100 people and included a post office and school.
The yoga-farm and the surrounding area was logged in the 1920’s when the railroad was established. The railroad took the trees back into the town of Vernonia and it’s electric saw mill. The road to the yoga-farm follows Rock Creek and the right of way for the old railroad.
In the 1970’s the Alexander Family had an off grid summer cabin on this land. The property was used during this time for a community of musicians and “back to the land” folks for campfires, playing “timberbound” roots music, plant medicine and psychedelics, and the experimentation with channeling “cosmic awareness.”
The Gwinn’s, a logging family, purchased it from the Alexanders. And the current steward of the land, purchased it from the Gwinn Family. While the yoga-farm land retains the magical mystery of the forest, is a protected home for Grandmother Cedar, and will be preserved, the adjacent property is industrial forest, but is fortunately managed by an owner who believes in selective logging, rather than clear cutting.
Rock Creek is home to native populations of trout. Chinook and Coho salmon return here year after year to spawn. Second and third growth trees, including species big leaf maple, red leaf alder, vine maple, cedar, fir and hemlock, now populate the land. Many birds and animals call this land home including beaver, eagle, elk, cougar, coyote, hawk and heron.
More on the Native Peoples
The Chinookan peoples include several groups of indigenous people of the Pacific Northwest who speak the Chinookan languages. They were skilled fishers and hunters and some elite members practiced head binding, the practice of flattening their children’s forehead and top of the skull as a mark of social status.
The Chinookan peoples were devastated by waves of epidemic diseases beginning with smallpox in the 1770s. Scholars estimate that more than 90 percent of the Chinookan population was wiped out by these epidemics, the worst of which was a malaria outbreak in the 1830s. Beginning in the 1850s, many surviving members of Chinookan groups were removed to the Grand Ronde, Warm Springs, and Quinault Indian reservations.
The Chinook Indian Nation currently has 2700 members and have long had a community on the lower Columbia River. They re-organized in the 20th century, setting up an elected form of government and reviving tribal culture. Despite repeated attempts for recognition as a federally recognized sovereign tribe in the late 20th century, which would provide certain benefits for education and welfare, the U.S. government refuses to recognize them as an official tribe.
The Clatskanie peoples at one time lived on the prairies bordering Chehalis River, Washington, at the mouth of Skookumchuck River, but on the failure of game, crossed the Columbia and occupied the mountains about Clatskanie River, their best-known historic seat. As of the 1910 census, only three members of the Clatskanie people were recorded.*
*(Sources: Wikipedia, The Oregon History Project, and Access Genealogy)