Internships

Permaculture/Raw Food/Bio-Architecture Experiential Internships

Join our evolving permaculture community  for a unique Eco experience in an optimal healthy, tropical environment.   For the period of your internship, your personal goals are integrated with shared community goals to foster a rewarding and co-creative experience for all.

Imagine going to sleep to the tranquil symphony of crickets, night birds, and mating frogs under a milky way starry night. Wake up naturally to the circadian rhythm of sun and moon with the sound of birds and monkeys.

Work begins at 6 am a little after sunrise when it’s cooler (and more sunny in rainy season), leaving afternoons for personal activities. Getting into the natural ways  is refreshing and great for your body, mind, and spirit. Personal activities can include walks to our waterfalls and pools, rainforest hikes, yoga classes next door (2000 colones, or here as you wish), social gatherings, or day trips (with gas share)  to nearby breathtaking local natural sites like Nauyaca falls, Diamante falls, or a quiet Pacific beach during time off.

For those who want to use their experience for maximum body building and health, work here can be as physically challenging as you wish. We look at co-creating, tending and building as a natural and essential activity of a healthy, meaningful life contributing to the betterment of self, Man, and Earth.

You may also have the opportunity to work with our beloved Tico hired-help Ramiro and his son Gregory, whose creativity, gorilla strength and local understanding of the land and its people will make a big impression.  Working with Eric Rivkin is a delight as his problem-solving and design skills and creative mind achieve beautiful “Eco-Chic” solutions to anything that needs to be built on the farm.

 

A Unique Raw Food Experience
Today, the food we eat is nearly 100% local and organic, yet we aim for 100% fresh from our own farm, eating what we grow and forage. There’s a large farmers market in San Isidro each Thursday where we buy food we don’t grow ourselves. Together we  prepare gourmet or simple raw recipes that will often blow your mind as to what is possible with raw and wild tropical food.  We aim to provide you with as much as you need to sustain your energy levels and we offer an abundance of fresh fruit and greens while meals are prepared together.  We  make things like sun teas, sprout beans, sun-dried cacao, and sprouted hummus, all without cooking.  You’ll need to be OK with a fresh food diet during your stay.   There’s often raw pot lucks and gatherings with our  neighbors where there’s lots of fresh food and great like-minded company.

Minimum stay for Internships is 30 Days at $400 per month. 
Includes:

• Daily basic raw meals and fresh fruit snacks. Dehydrated snacks available at a nominal cost. Bring your own nuts and seeds, dried fruit for extra calories, and personal teas for sun-tea making. We have only the healthiest diet possible – whole, raw, local, organic, wild, fresh foods. To conserve energy and encourage raw foods, we do no cooking.  No cheap rice and bean meals here! Need tea? Sun-brewed is delicious.
• A sheltered and raised bamboo tent platform, camping style tent,                3″ mattress, sheets, blanket. Please bring your own towel. (you may bring your own tent, bedding, mattress)
  
• Experiences with making healthy, low fat raw food recipes, permaculture farm lifestyle, gardening, eco-building or internet projects

 

Interns work a 30  hour week, which begins at 6 am for a 6 hour day, with 1-2 hours reserved for necessary weekend chores like watering and taking out the compost. Mealtime prep and cleanup is not included in the 30 hours because all eat anyway and is the time for hands-on raw food education. Afternoons are open for personal activities. Market Thursday visits are an option on personal time with hours made up on weekends. Interns are responsible for keeping honest track of their hours. Hours can often be shifted/traded depending on particular  project scheduling, skill learning or preferences, or personal needs.

Laundry machine service with bio-degradable non-allergenic soap is available for $5 per load, $3 if you bring your own biodegradable detergent. The solar clothes dryer is free to everyone.

For excursions on personal time, it’s always possible to  connect you to arrange transportation on local buses, taxis, and neighbors with tours to Diamante Falls, Nauyaca Falls, Manuel Antonio Park, Pacific beaches, Canopy tours, and on-going community activities as time allows. Fees vary. We cannot always offer transportation with our farm car, but when you do share the ride, there is a nominal gas share charge  from $2 to $10 per person depending on distance, including rides to San Isidro for $4 round trip (a $50 savings over taxi)

Although many people come here for cleanses, detox, juice and water fasting, this is not permitted during an internship period. But you are certainly encouraged to stay longer for this personal health journey at guest rates.

APPLYING FOR INTERNSHIP

Volunteers are accepted via our application process on the basis of general good health, positive and enthusiastic attitude, skills and fitness as applicable and a deep sense of gratitude for life and nature.  Our policies are  flexible upon application in consideration of  advanced skills or those who need to meet a lower budget or a shorter time frame.
CLICK HERE for the internship application form. Select MS word to open the file. Please fill it out completely, attach it with a current photo, and email it to Eric at emrivkin@gmail.com.  A Skype call is used frequently to touch base and answer questions and solidify travel plans.

A $100 USD non-refundable deposit via Paypal is due with your confirmation and commitment, with the balance due in cash on arrival, either in USD or Colones. Please note we require 72 hours notice for changes in your length of stay in order to accommodate you. NOTE: If you give less notice, convert from internship to guest status or shorten your stay below the minimum 30 days for interns, then guest rates will be applied with no exceptions.

For information What To Bring please visit THIS PAGE.