Welcome to our Permaculture and Sustainability Team Showcase! 🌱 
Here, you’ll meet the diverse group of passionate individuals who are dedicated to making a positive impact through unique, small-scale production items and services. As you scroll up and down, you’ll have the chance to get to know each team member and learn about their offerings that contribute to a more sustainable world.

Our team is an open and collaborative community, where hierarchies are replaced by shared passion and a commitment to making a difference. Each member is excited to connect directly with you, so feel free to reach out and start a conversation about their expertise and offerings.

From handmade crafts to innovative services, every team member’s contribution revolves around the principles of permaculture and sustainability. We understand the importance of preserving our planet and creating a better future for all.

With around two dozen members and counting, you’ll find a diverse range of talents and offerings. Explore their profiles to discover their photos, personal bios, and brief descriptions of their unique products and services. Whether you’re interested in gardening solutions, eco-friendly products, or sustainable consulting, our team has something for everyone.

We invite you to dive into each member’s story, explore their offerings, and engage with them directly to learn more. Together, we’re fostering a community of like-minded individuals who share a common goal: to nurture the earth and live harmoniously with nature.

Feel free to explore our Offerings page as well, where you can discover our products and services in reverse, and easily connect with the team member responsible for each offering. Let’s work together to create a greener, more sustainable future.

Eco-Friendly Cleaning and Maintenance Services Offer – Marcela Cleaning and Maintenance Service

1. Property Types and Services:
We offer cleaning and maintenance services for houses and vacation apartments, both private and commercial, as well as properties with structures, gardens, or vacant lots. We provide regular, deep cleaning, and post-renovation cleaning, in addition to garden maintenance and grass trimming using a motoweeder.
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Freddy Acuña Acuña
Aguas Zarcas, San Carlos. 1958

Costarican Folklore Wooden Sculptures
He is a painter, sculptor, musician, writer and poet; a complete artist. With more than 35 years of rescuing Costa Rican legends and traditions. As an artist, he has represented Costa Rica, exhibiting his art on 3 occasions in the United States, being an ambassador of our culture in the northern nation thanks to the Peace Corps and on one occasion on a cruise through the Panama Canal. He has been invited on several occasions by the Ministry of Culture to exhibit his art at the International Arts Festival and at the Hecho AquĂ­ Fair (Made Here Fair).

He has written several poems related to nature and traditions, and has published a catalog of part of his artistic works called “Ser de Luz” (Fuit Salad Shaker Ed, 2018).
Freddy Acuña finds the inspiration for his art in Mother Nature, in meditation and in the Beings of Light or Big Brothers, who give him the knowledge to continue creating his masterpieces.
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Daniel and Lena
Artisans from Bogotá, Colombia and San JosĂ©, Costa Rica. We arrived in La Fortuna in ’98 with our jewelry and opened Neptune’s Casa de Hamacas, located on the way to the La Fortuna Waterfall.
We make our hammocks by hand using recycled materials from nylon and other textile waste.
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Israel y Blanquita
We are an artisan couple.
Our workshop is located outside of La Fortuna, Costa Rica. We are very proud of our garden, and our natural vegan lifestyle.
We make stringed instruments; electric and acoustic guitars, charangos, bass etc., and teach others how to make them.
We also make and teach how to make paintings and embroideries, among other things.
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VĂ­ctor Hugo Quesada Obando
A great lover of nature, making his life together with his loves who are not limited to but include every class of reptiles, amphibians and insects.
Victor offers the whole range of services and products related to bee’s; pure organic honey, with and without hive, wax, pollen, propolis, queen bee’s, colonies, drones, bee suits, smokers, and more.
Un gran amante a la naturaleza, haciendo su vida junto con sus seres queridos que no se limitan a pero incluyen toda clase de reptiles, anfibios, e insectos. En este grupo ofrece toda clase de servicios, productos y subproductos relacionados a apicultura, tales como la miel pura orgánica de abeja, cera, polen, propoleo, miel en panal, reinas, colonias, zánganos, trajes, ahumadores, entre otros.
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Coletane Billings
Born in Johannesburg, South Africa
In Arenal area of Costa Rica since 2021

I overcame stage 4 cancer (brain tumour) in 2002 and have since been following the path of my calling, being a traditional healer.
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Juan Francisco Rojas Araya
58, de/from Costa Rica

Propietario de “Rancho Alegre” Boca Tapada. Te invito a visitar mi finca agroecologica. Disfrute con su familia y sus amigos de Fran’s Pepper Tour, un deleite cultural y de entretenimiento y de sabor. Somos especialistas en Piper Nigrum, pimienta negra.

“Fran” is the owner of Rancho Alegre, Boca Tapada. He invites you to visit his ecological farm with your family for a Pepper Tour; a cultural delight of entertainment and flavor!

“We are specialists in black pepper; Piper Nigrum.”
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Tomas “Tomasito”
47 years old
Born in Czechia

Coauthor and host of Gavilana Permaculture Excursion. Member of the Gavilana property management team. His favorite fields are fungi and bamboo cultivation, food, drinks and fertilizer fermentation. Resident of El Castillo with his wife Hannah and son Noah.
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Hannah
36
Washington State

Artist and soap maker. Co-creator of La Gavilana. Draws inspiration from landscapes and nature’s healing capacity, sound, silence and solitude.

Finds joy in family, in painting, in the wild mystery of the unknown, cosmic beauty of any size, intuitive music making, writing, learning, connecting with animals, baking, dance…rest…and change.

Lives in El Castillo with her husband Tomas and son Noah.
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Anna
57 years young
Born in the United States

Member of the Gavilana property management team. Her favorite fields are baking, plants, birding, fermenting food/ drinks, mind expansion.

Resident of El Castillo with Pablo the dog, cat, chickens, horses, sheep.
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Jose “Pájaro”
68 years old
Born in Nicaragua

Manager and Host at Food Forest retreat farm. At very early age he started to learn and to love the company of a landscape, both wild and cultivated. An expert in flora and fauna, cultivating and foraging. The grandpa in the team. His latest strong fields are bamboo, banana, sugar cane, yuca and peach palm.

Sun(Jay) Youn 
39 years old 
Born in South Korea 

Founder of Awu.Awakewithus & Awuamki Restaurant. He enjoys attracting all beings; humans, animals and plants. His favorite fields are healing, creating, and fungi. Resident of Costa Rica. Father of daughter’s Grace, daughter of Jae Gyung, and Melissa, daughter of Vanessa.
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Eric
57 years old
Born in Long Beach California

Apiarist and owner of Bee Haven, a concierge honeybee service.

Enjoys learning, working with and sharing his love for the bees, playing and exploring outdoors in nature, spending time with family and friends, building, and cooking. A former special education teacher working with autistic children, he also spent 20+ years as an investigative and feature television producer responsible for researching, writing and directing network news magazine reports for shows including ABC ’s 20/20 and Dateline NBC.

Loves Arenal and lives in New Jersey with his wife Mary, daughter Eva and son Simon.
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Douglas Brisbois

“I love outdoors, Costa Rica and exploring. I enjoy working with people. Growing a food forest with Gavilana’s help since 2010 on my land in El Castillo.”

Walter Crumbley
68 years old
From the United States

A full time resident of El Castillo since 2010. Co-creator of El Castillo Welcome Center, licensed, realtor, and property management specialist. My passion here has been to create a fully self sustaining house by applying a collection of “off the shelf systems” and easily available technologies that would provide food, water, and electricity (both for living and transportation), and to do this on a 1 acre footprint. Currently we are actively experimenting with utilizing used tesla batteries for solar energy storage, rainwater collection systems, aquaponics systems and black soldier fly animal feed systems. My focus is on helping to develop resilient, self-sufficient communities. (we all do so much better in groups).
PuraVida

Rodolfo Villalobos Castro

Vivo en Nuevo Arenal Tilaran, soy el creador de la Finca de Permacultura Muricata hace 12 años, apasionado de las frutas tropicales de Costa Rica.
Living in Nuevo Arenal, Tilaran, founder of Muricata Permaculture Farm since 2010. Tropical fruit of Costa Rica is my passion.

4-generation female power born in the Czech Republic.

Granny Jaroslava makes beautiful crocheted bags, pot holders and other things. She loves crosswords and cooking.
She’s never short of a positive mood.

Her daughter Gabriela owns the house located across the street from La Gavilana. It is available on Airbnb which is a great opportunity to have La Gavilana nearby. 
A positive being who loves traveling and enjoys life in all her walks.

Vanessa, Gabriela’s daughter makes crocheted earrings. Together with her daughter Melissa they shuttle between Costa Rica and their homeland. 
Also a positive being interested in gardening and plants. Loves baking and learns about her new role as a mother.
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Adam
52 years young
Born in Prague, Bohemia.

Plant-based instructor of 1-day Yoga, OSHO meditation, Shamanic Journey intensives.
Visual artist, photographer, VJ, NFT, VR cinematographer, startup founder.
Since 1987 he has been practicing various methods of self-discovery.
Seeks symbiosis between body and spirit, between bodies, between spirits. 
Webmaster of Gavilana website.
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