Firefly Gardens

Firefly Gardens is a budding seed poking its head out of the ground, seeking the light!

We are ideally situated next to the caldera rim at the southern edge of Bahia de Santiago and Lago de Atitlan. An area that is known for hosting the Cosmic Convergence music festival every New Year's eve.

The top-soil is incredibly rich and productive, and we are planning to expand and grow a diverse food forest while demonstrating the use of simple, shareable technologies like rainwater catchment, solar cooking, renewable energy, composting, thermal mass, fog harvesting, and contained waste treatment.

So far as a community we have built a 2-story SuperAdobe Earth dOMe, a 2 story cob/wattle and daub tiny home, permaculture gardens, a covered earthen yoga shala, communal bamboo kitchen temple, fruit tree citrus grove, sacred fire gathering area, and composting toilets. We are now working on covered camping platforms, a stone temascal, compost powered hot showers, a treehouse, and finishing the inside of the superadobe dome with a rocket mass sofa bed and boolshelves

We are developing partnerships with local community organizations in order to develop in a responsible way and offer educational opportunities for indigenous locals and travellers alike. We hope to offer a peaceful space for spiritual growth and nature retreats. Jolene is an experienced yoga teacher and registered yoga therapist. Mateo is an international adventure guide and wildland firefighter.

Together we are the Fireflies, trained in natural building practices at the Earthship Biotecture Academy in Taos, New Mexico.
We are living the intention to build bridges of culture between North & Central America, and transition towards a more sustainable, just, and mindful expression of life.
We aim to do this through creativity and love, by combining the ancient wisdom of indigenous practices with modern technologies of green energy and audiovisual arts.

It's a place of magic. Come and see for yourself!