Grand Rapids local media coverage and the Boys and Girls Club in Lansing

Local Grand Rapids media coverage: http://griid.org/2010/06/15/grassrootes-caravan-creates-community-on-its...

We made it safely from the Leaven Center in Lyons, Michigan, to our stop here in Lansing. A big warm thanks to our host, Karen, from the Leaven Center. The village really needed that quiet retreat into the woods with no internet access and minimal cell phone access.

Today, village volunteers worked at the Urbandale Community Gardens on Hayford Street while Madtown 2 Motown organizers went to the Michigan State University Campus to talk with Boys and Girls Club middle school students in their summer program.

We showed them our bikes, the zine, and had a discussion with them about bikes, gardens, intentional community-building, and what they are interested in. They were full of questions about the logistics of this experience, and what we encounter on the road in this car-driven world. One boy asked us about the animals we see and whether they come into our camp and steal our food. In all of my years of bike traveling, I have only had a raccoon enter my camp once in the middle of the night looking for food, I told him. We have not had any pesky rodents trying to join us for a nice village snack on this ride so far!

Looking ahead, we will travel 60 miles tomorrow to Tall Trees Community Farm in White Lake Michigan where we will help set-up for a Summer Solstice Celebration on Saturday night. The next day, we will work on building a cob composting toilet for the farm before heading out on the 21st to Detroit and the US Social Forum.

Another world is not only possible, we have achieved it in our mobile village of resilience traveling to Detroit. We are planting the seeds of resilience in the communities we pass through and will continue pedaling ourselves into another world! US Social Forum, here we come!