In addition to building our home, Café Cosmos and some out-buildings, we have built vegetable gardens, herb gardens and ‘food forests’...

We harvest all year round from a wide variety of banana, citrus, mango, avocado, mulberry and other trees, while picking abundant coffee beans, cacao, jicama, arugula, lettuce, tomatoes, parsley, carrots, cabbage, peppers, sweet potatoes, mint, rosemary, lemon balm and many other crops that grow in the understory of the larger trees.

Café Cosmos

Near the southwestern end of the Garden of Paradise is Café Cosmos, our lovely two-story building with a three-room B&B and mini conference center. with a large kitchen and various meeting spaces.

To see more photos and a full description of Café Cosmos, click here and scroll down to the entry about Café Cosmos.

Before and After

We began building and gardening in July of 2007. Below you see photos taken BEFORE and AFTER we started transforming the land. We believe that these help demonstrate the great potential of the beautiful land in the Garden of Paradise.

BEFORE

AFTER

We are continuing to landscape with ever more plantings, connecting the various garden areas and buildings with attractive river stone and cement paths. These paths are lined with trees, garden beds and a fish pond for raising tilapia - here shown with water hyacinths in bloom.

In the following series of photos taken of the Downstream Farm, where we’ve focused much of our attention since mid-2007, we want to give you a feel for the great potential of the Upstream Farm and of our remaining lots for sale - for building homes, attractive outbuildings for different purposes, gardens, fish ponds, food forests and more.

These photos show the improvements we’ve made over the last few years, primarily near the far south-western edge of the Garden of Paradise.

Our fire circle

Immediately below you see our house (far left) and Café Cosmos (far right, more Café Cosmos photos below). These two buildings are connected by a path, stairs and small arched bridge that are all made of stone and concrete.

A large blackberry patch produces prolifically, as do passion fruit vines. We are constantly adding to the variety of plants, including an extensive array of local medicinal herbs for which Vilcabamba is famous.

Behind our house, a stone path leads you up to the round meditation and music building....

Another view of the round meditation and music building, looking down from the spa building.  Our house is just to the right of the round building, lower down.

This is our family recipe for Amazing Blackberry Cobbler.  Click here & we’ll send you the recipe. 

....and some of the fruit plates we’ve enjoyed....

Imagine going out and picking your meal, just before eating it!

Here are some of the vegetables, fruits and herbs that we’ve been growing...

The white building in the upper right corner of the photo below is the spa building, still under construction. This is currently the place where we have our internet connection.