As a kid, I would always travel by Bruco, the giant dome caterpillar, on our family trips to visit my grandparents before they lost their home to one of the Texas fires several years ago. So this was the first time I actually pulled off the highway and took a look at the actual domes and houses that made up this unique dome community!
I officially met Nicholas Burtner and his wife, Kristi Burtner, at their suburban home demonstration site in Plano, Texas, for one of their free ‘Intro to Permaculture’ classes — which was the Friday before the start of their in-person PDC class weekend from Saturday to Sunday at the Plano Environmental Education Center.
After my eco-inspired road trip, I had a hard time getting involved with sustainability initiatives in the Dallas Metroplex area compared to my time in Oregon. However, during Earth Day weekend, April 20-22 (with Earth Day on April 22), Dallas hosted its annual EarthX Expo, and I was excited to attend for my second year in a row!
“The festival, formerly called Earth Day Texas, is the world’s largest environmental festival, having drawn as many as 130,000 people. The main festival costs $5 and runs from Friday through Sunday at Fair Park.
But there are also two weeks’ worth of events, including a film festival and professional conferences that aren’t open to the public.
The three-day expo draws the general public with a tiny house village, a petting zoo, goat yoga, a scuba diving pool and about 1,000 exhibitors. At the same time, the festival is hosting conferences to discuss sustainability initiatives in the oil and gas industry and the E-Capital Summit to link investors with clean technology startups.” – Dallas Morning News Article
Last year in 2017, I went to EarthX for networking purposes and to drum up new business for the marketing agency I was working at. And the experience was more than inspiring getting to talk with hundreds of vendors/exhibitors, touring the tiny house community, watching some award-winning documentaries, and seeing cutting-edge sustainability initiatives and technologies!
I spent the majority of Tuesday driving from Santa Fe, New Mexico, to Lubbock, Texas, where I went to college at Texas Tech University – and stayed with college friends, Kelly Kingston and Sidne Smith, in their downtown bachelorette loft!
This is a view of downtown Lubbock, and yes, there are high-rise buildings in West Texas!