TEMICTLA, Mexico – If there were ever any doubt that Quetzalcoatl lives, that doubt was dispelled in one moist, glistening, luminous week in the heart of Mexico. Here in Temictla, a sacred valley, a tiny ecovillage and spiritual retreat center on the edge of Chalmita, a pilgrimage destination to millions of people of diverse traditions, […]

Canadian author and activist Maude Barlow atop the Cerro Quemado with Wixarika leader Santos de la Cruz. (Tracy L. Barnett photos) REAL DE CATORCE, Mexico – From the moment Maude Barlow passed under the crumbling stone arch and saw the first nopalera laden with red cactus fruits, she knew she was entering another dimension. Accompanied […]

By Tracy L. Barnett Antonio Sánchez Gramiño was always one of those who would shake is head and laugh when he heard people talk about changing the world. It’s not that he didn’t care; he’s always been ecologically minded. It bothered him to see people wasting water and creating trash. It’s just that he thought […]

MEXICO CITY – The old Mexico met the new one Saturday at the massive Foro Sol and together, in an explosion of rhythm and light and living energy, they danced the night away. Wirikuta Fest, a lineup of nearly 20 big-name recording artists, was as much a celebration of Mexico’s indigenous roots and living heritage […]

Editorial note: This historic pilgrimage occurred on Feb. 6, 2012. After much pressure from the Wixárika people and civil society, and a favorable court ruling, the mining projects were put on hold — but only time will tell how this will end. Story and photos by Tracy L. Barnett. REAL DE CATORCE, Mexico – They […]

The last golden rays of 2011 slipped away gloriously yesterday, lingering across the chalky face of the Pinnacles, an ancient towering limestone formation in the north of Boone County, Missouri – one of the places on this planet I will always call home. The unseasonable warmth had us removing layers as we scrambled up to […]

MERIDA, Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico – Finally, I can relax. The sound of running spring water and the night noises of the jungle surround me, the toil and trouble of the city far behind. This long-anticipated journey with my parents – their first to Mexico, and the first stamp on their brand-new passports – had gotten […]

By Tracy L. Barnett Magis Magazine October 2011 “Fierce winds ripped huge branches off the thousand-year-old redwood, sending them crashing to the ground two hundred feet below. The upper platform, where I lived, rested in branches about 180 feet in the air … As the tree branches whipped around, they shredded the tarp that served […]

Meet Dave and Anna, the Permacyclists. She was a corporate lawyer from Brussels; he was a sociologist from New York. Neither of them was happy with their chosen profession, and after a great deal of soul searching, they decided to do what many dream of but few actually do: They quit their jobs, studied permaculture, […]

The planning had taken a long time, and the date had been postponed three days in a row – rain, problems with the tractor, but Friday night, the word went out: The next morning would be the Siembra de Mujeres. There had been collective plantings before, but it was the first time at Teopantli Kalpulli […]

Story and photos by Melissa Gaskill This blog frequently covers travel that makes a difference – trips that incorporate volunteering, are culturally sensitive, support local businesses, and respect the human and natural environment – or all of the above. I wrote a guest post about such a trip about a year ago, Turtle Rescue on […]

A beautiful and proud, but probably very guilty, neighborhood rooster TEOPANTLI KALPULLI – I was watering my wilted sunflower seedlings when the first rains came. First one fat drop, and then two, and then a whole scattering. I laughed and ran to shut off the faucet, delighted that I had been wrong. I’d listened to […]

TEOPANTLI KALPULLI, Jalisco, Mexico – I live at the corner of Earth and Fire streets, around the corner from a pyramid. I wake each morning to the crowing of roosters and the lowing of cattle. On Sundays I join my neighbors in kneeling and entering the womb of my mother in the form of a […]

By Tracy L. Barnett MIRANDO CITY, TEXAS – It was an unforgettable meeting of cultures: Lakota and Navajo, Chippewa and Cree, Coahuiltecan and Chichimecan and more, joining hearts and minds wth their Wixaritari brothers in a hogan in South Texas. “Never in my life did I imagine that this moment would come,” said Efren Bautista […]

CANCUN – “Arriving at the ocean is very important; you can’t just walk up to it like it’s a common thing,” Antonio told us as we bumped along through the night on our way to Isla Blanca. “We consider the sea to be sacred; we come from the sea. We have to ask permission to […]

CHALMITA, Mexico State, Mexico – Long before the sun appears over the towering white cliffs all around us, this temporary village comes to life. The guardians of the ceremonial fire are stoking the flames for the temazcal; the kitchen crew is chopping and peeling and stirring; smoke is rising from the women’s tipi. Suddenly the […]

MEXICO CITY, Mexico – Thanksgiving day – I awoke this morning far from home and family but filled with a profound sense of gratitude. Grateful for the sun that was just beginning to brighten the sky outside my window; grateful for the dear friends who have given me a home in this city of cities. […]

Tracy L. Barnett LA FLORIDA, El Salvador – “That’s one of the purposes of the Salvadoran state, to make us forget,” Juan Rojas explains to me as we bump down the rugged dirt road that leads to his homestead, just six kilometers from San Salvador, but a world apart.

My time in Colombia was so full of amazing people and organizations that it didn’t leave me time to write as much as I would have liked. This roundup gives a little information about each of them, with hopes to come back to each of them with more information later. Perhaps more than any country […]

By Tracy L. Barnett Nov. 6, 2010 MEDELLIN, Colombia – I arrived just after dawn after a nine-hour bus ride from Cali, but a fresh breeze from the mountains awakened my excitement at being here in this legendary city at last. Known as the City of Eternal Spring, its descent into war and drug-related violence […]

  By Tracy L. Barnett SUCHITOTO, El Salvador – A gentle breeze ruffles the thatched roof of the hilltop shelter here at the Permaculture Institute. An electric-blue morpho butterfly flits past, a sharp accent against the muted blue of Volcano Guazapa in the background. An incongruously peaceful backdrop for the violence, massacres, scorched earth and […]

VALLE DE CAUCA, Colombia – When Alicia Calle, an environmental scientist with Yale’s Environmental Leadership and Training Initiative, first told me of El Hatico Nature Reserve, her face lit up for the first time since I’d met her an hour ago. We’d been talking about the state of the environment in Colombia, a subject with […]

SAN RAFAEL RESERVE, Alto Vera Province, Paraguay – “You are about to enter the most beautiful place in the world,” Daniel advised me as we bumped along on the rutted red road, which was growing more rutted and narrower by the minute as the dark forest closed in around us. Waist-high ferns and vine-draped trees […]

IGUAZU FALLS NATIONAL PARK – Agoutis and coaties, monkeys and toucans and brilliant morpho butterflies blessed my path in this jungle wonderland, as did a brightly colored bird whose name in Guarani means “grandchild of the rainbow.” These waterfalls are famous the world over but are known mainly in the United States for their starring […]