[Scpg] Spreading the Green Gospel Surfers Without Borders Take Sustainability to Barra de la Cruz and Beyond By Ethan Stewart Independent Feb 12/09 Loren Luyendy

Thu Feb 12 09:52:26 PST 2009

Loren Luyendyk and Aubrey Falk

Spreading the Green Gospel Surfers Without 
Borders Take Sustainability to Barra de la Cruz 
and Beyond By Ethan Stewart Independent
www.independent.com/news/2009/feb/12/spreading-green-gospel/
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<http://www.independent.com/photos/2009/feb/11/13596/>
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KaleGray.com

Loren Luyendyk (left) and Aubrey Falk spent most 
of last summer taking the slow road through Baja 
and mainland Mexico sharing surfboards, art, and 
the powers of permaculture with the people they met along the way.

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Spreading the Green Gospel

Surfers Without Borders Take Sustainability to Barra de la Cruz and Beyond

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Thursday, February 12, 2009

By <http://www.independent.com/staff/ethan-stewart/>Ethan Stewart

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Generally speaking, the legacy of the traveling 
surfer is a pretty crappy one. Armed with 
surfboards, cameras, and cash, passport-toting 
wave hunters have been leaving behind their home 
breaks for decades now and jetting, sailing, or 
driving to far-flung exotic locales in the name 
of surf discovery. In and of itself, this act of 
stoke-searching exploration is beautiful; 
unfortunately, what the single-minded surf junkie 
typically leaves along foreign shores is anything 
but. From plastic bottles and steaming piles of 
poop to greedy land grabs and unintentional 
culture bashing, the ugly blowback of selfish 
surf travel can be seen firsthand from Mexico to 
Micronesia. Luckily, like modern-day Johnny 
Appleseeds of environmentalism leaving composting 
toilets, worm castings, and water bottle 
recycling programs in their wake, two 
born-and-raised Santa Barbara surfers are on a mission to change that legacy.

The story of Surfers Without Borders (SWoB) began 
nearly two years ago when Loren Luyendyk, acting 
“on a whim,” entered an essay contest sponsored 
by Keen Footwear, which wanted to know: “How does 
your passion support sustainability?” A certified 
permaculture designer and consulting arborist, 
the 35-year-old Luyendyk was in a unique spot to 
answer the question and, as a result, made a 
winning case for the intersection of his surfing 
addiction and sustainable pursuits. In short, he 
pitched the idea of SWoB as a nonprofit 
organization that would travel to developing 
world surf spots to spend some time, assess the 
conditions, and introduce the Earth-minded 
tenants of permaculture to the communities. “It 
was always my wildest dream to travel, surf, and 
teach sustainability,” said Luyendyk, adding with 
a laugh, “And then I actually won that contest and it was a real possibility.”
<http://www.independent.com/photos/2009/feb/11/13597/>
Luyendyk throws shakas over one of his flushless toilet creatio

<http://www.independent.com/photos/2009/feb/11/13597/>
Click to enlarge photo

KaleGray.com

Luyendyk throws shakas over one of his flushless toilet creations

Shortly after getting a check from Keen, Luyendyk 
and his girlfriend Aubrey Falk (the couple is now 
engaged) put the wheels in motion to get SWoB’s 
first mission underway. An accomplished artist 
and professional surfer, Falk had just wrapped up 
her first year of being a fully sponsored pro, an 
experience she enjoyed but was far from satisfied 
with, often finding herself on foreign beaches 
with other pros just wanting to get photos and go 
home. “It was so unfulfilling to me,” said the 
25-year-old regular foot. “We come from one of 
the wealthiest and luckiest countries in the 
world. It’s our duty to do something more. We owe 
it. 
 With SWoB, we have a chance to do more than 
your average surf trip and actually give back a little.”

So with a little extra help from Falk’s sponsors 
Volcom and Channel Islands Surfboards, the duo 
outfitted a late-model diesel Dodge Ram named 
Ellie and stuffed it to the gills with 
surfboards, art supplies, tools, and dozens of 
Spanish-translated copies of Bill Mollison’s 
legendary Introduction to Permaculture. More 
importantly, they intended to bring something 
often left behind on surf trips: open minds.

On July 27, 2008, the SWoB team finally rolled 
out of town and headed south to Baja at a time 
when stories of carjackings, kidnappings, brutal 
murders, and other drug-fueled violence along the 
dusty roads of Baja Norte were making 
international headlines. Throughout the course of 
the summer, Ellie rumbled slowly and safely down 
toward the tip of Baja, through places such as 
Scorpion Bay and Todos Santos, into the 
American-flavored urban sprawl of Cabo San Lucas, 
and up the east cape to La Paz. Along the way 
were unending amounts of trash, huge piles of 
plastic, and community planning that seldom 
considers the health of the environment.

Surfers Without Borders Community Event

    * When: 
<http://www.independent.com/events/2009/feb/21/>Saturday, 
Feb. 21, 2009, 7 p.m. to 10 p.m.
    * Where: Faulkner Gallery, 40 E. Anapamu St. , Santa Barbara
    * Cost: $10
    * Age limit: Not available

<http://www.independent.com/events/2009/feb/21/14315/>Full event details

“Traveling along the coast,” said Luyendyk, “it 
was just so apparent the ways that permaculture 
could help.” Unfortunately, besides meeting some 
like-minded organic farmers and sharing their 
translated copies of Mollison’s book with them, 
it wasn’t until they hit the more rural and 
remote coastline of mainland Mexico that the SWoB 
crew were able to get their hands dirty.

In the surf-rich town of Rio Nexpa, Luyendyk went 
out to a popular campground on the point and 
built a composting toilet out of a 50-gallon 
plastic drum, worm castings, and entirely 
salvaged materials. The waterless, flush-less 
toilet can support two adults for six months 
before it needs to be set aside to decompose; six 
months later, it’s perfect food for plants and 
trees. In small coastal villages where waste and 
water sources all too often come together in a 
nasty and potentially deadly swirl, such a simple 
solution not only saves money and water quality, 
but it is also a heck of a lot more practical 
than the traditional, flushing alternative. The 
camp hosts were, of course, stoked, and neighbors 
quickly took notice. “All they need are the big 
blue buckets, some worms, sawdust, and a little 
bit of knowledge,” said Luyendyk.

 From Nexpa, SWoB continued onto Barra de la 
Cruz, a modest fishing village that has gained 
international fame for its sandy-bottomed, 
practically perfect right-hand point break. With 
a forward-thinking community mindset and a 
refreshing commitment to protect their natural 
resourcesnot to mention the bevy of good waves 
peeling nearbyBarra was an ideal match for the 
mission. In fact, they were able to make so much 
headway that they stayed for two months. Once 
again, they built a composting toilet to much 
fanfare at Pepe’s Cabanas, a popular resting spot 
for gringos owned by the town’s vice president. 
Luyendyk also used the “ubiquitous” 50-gallon 
plastic drum to construct a slow sand water 
filter that helped make the town’s water supply 
potable. Filling the drum with rocks, charcoal, 
and sand, the easily made contraption removes 99 
percent of the disease-causing pathogens. Costing 
less than $50 to make, the filter is big enough 
to serve two families for an entire year.
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KaleGray.com

Aubrey Falk creates with children from Barra.

Looking to solve the plastic water bottle problem 
that plagues all of Central America, Luyendyk and 
Falk convinced a restaurant in Barra to set up a 
clean drinking water station, where patrons now 
pay five pesos to refill their own water bottles. 
It made sense economically, too, because the 
water was cheaper than bottled water for the 
customers, but allowed the restaurant to turn a 
profit on water sales. “No matter where you are, 
the bottom line is everyone wants the best deal 
as far as money goes,” said Falk. “And the refill 
idea not only saves people money and makes people 
money, but it also uses way less plastic. 
 And 
everyone is stoked with that.” Taking the refill 
program one step further, Falk rounded up dozens 
of the metal Jumex bottles littering the town, 
sanitized them, painted them basic colors, and 
then gave them to schoolchildren to decorate as 
their own water bottles, thereby jumpstarting the 
refill program for the villagers themselves. With 
toilets, filters, and water refill stations, 
Barra proved to be SWoB’s first truly successful 
story and, if you travel there today, you’ll see 
the sustainable seeds they planted beginning to bear fruit.

After more than three months on the road, SWoB 
returned to Santa Barbara in early November. 
Inspired, broke, and buoyed by their success in 
Barra, Luyendyk and Falk currently are preparing 
for their second trip later this year. Funds 
permitting, they are aiming to take their 
grassroots environmental act to the coasts of 
Nicaragua and El Salvador before retracing their 
tracks back into Mexico and visiting the sites 
they established last year. The latter will be a 
key component to helping SWoB grow because, as 
Luyendyk put it, “If people don’t continue to use 
the stuff we helped put in place after we leave, we need to find out why.”

Besides continuing to spread the permaculture 
gospel, the couple hopes to add water quality 
testing to their quiver of projects and, 
eventually, create a network that will allow 
similarly inclined surfers to lend a helping hand 
in outposts the world over. They know their plans 
are ambitious, but they remain undeterred. “I 
thought I wanted to do a lot before [the first 
trip],” said Luyendyk recently, “but now I have 
seen how much more there is to be done and I feel 
like we have to do even more.” It sounds, in 
fact, like they’re more inspired than ever.

4•1•1

Learn more about Surfers Without Borders during a 
night of education and fun on February 21, in 
Santa Barbara Public Library’s Faulkner Gallery. 
Expect food, drinks, a film on their first trip, 
and an auction to raise money for the the second trip.

Santa Barbara Permaculture Network
    an educational non-profit since 2000
(805) 962-2571
P.O. Box 92156, Santa Barbara, CA 93190
margie at sbpermaculture.org
www.sbpermaculture.org

"We are like trees, we must create new leaves, in 
new directions, in order to grow." - Anonymous

First Annual Southern California Permaculture Convergence August 2008
http://socalifornia.permacultureconvergence.org
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