Puraw Festival Spain 2014

The last official fruit festival I went to this year was the Spanish Puraw Festival in Malaga, Spain.  This one was a little different to the others as it had no official invited speakers which gave it a different vibe to the others.  Add to this the fact that virtually all of the fruit was grown locally and the majority of it was organic.

I arrived at Malaga airport and took a train to the resort town of Torremolinos where we were to be picked up by bus.  A large group of attendees met at the Wala room (a vegan cafe with raw vegan options) and I met a variety of people there from all over Europe, most of whom I had never met before.

A bus was arranged to pick us all up and it took a long and winding journey in to the hills to our camp where we found our tents waiting for us.  Each individual gets a tent to stay in or can bring their own.  I would recommend taking a  good sleeping bag as it can get quite cold at night, a lesson I learned quickly.

Each day started with classes; calisthenics, pilates, yoga and fitness but I must admit I slept in most mornings and missed them, the tiredness from all my travelling had caught up with me.  There were other events on through the day, discussion groups, bike rides, trips but many of these did not run on time or did not happen due to lack of communication and interest.  This would be my only criticism of the festival but in many ways it suited the relaxed vibe that they were going for.

I enjoyed meeting the organisers , Claire and Stephane, who have been living on a fruit based raw lifestyle for about a decade and moved to Spain to grow their own fruit and live in a more natural environment to bring up their kids.  They are a huge inspiration to me and both look youthful and vibrant and have a high level of fitness.  Meeting them and seeing their way of life is a good reason to make the trip in itself.

Most of my days were spent hanging out with great friends.  Myself, Rob “Raw Viking”, Jelle and Ana (who had all shared a cabin with me at Woodstock in 2012) enjoyed walking up the river looking for pools to swim in and sunbathe on the rocks.

We also spent a lot of time chatting on the hammocks often into the night.  We were entertained by a gypsy jazz band one night, and a reggae group another night. We danced and had fun.

The fruit was indeed a highlight.  I have never had really good fresh figs before and I delighted in making them a staple every day along with the locally grown watermelon.  Unfortunately the Mango’s were generally not quite ready yet so we did not have a chance to feast on those as much as other fruits.

It is a very different set up to the other festivals and has less of an educational element and is more open with discussion groups and no one being the expert or guru.  No one is taught a particular philosophy is right or wrong and the attendees at the event were a very mixed spectrum of all types of people following all sorts of raw-ish lifestyles.  The beautiful pools and rivers nearby are great for those looking to swim and connect with nature and the food is locally sourced, fresh and ripe.   I hope to return to the festival myself, perhaps I will see you there?

I have some more videos of my time in Spain at my youtube channel here:

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLutoSbzrNCKlfb0uOPaPO_IJpBByFORPK

Yours in fruitful abundance,

Ronnie

Woodstock Fruit Festival 2013

I arrived in New York a few days before the Woodstock Fruit Festival, and stayed over with my good friend Conor McMillen at his friend’s flat in Brooklyn.

We had a long chat and catch up and the next day got some great quality peaches in a local fruit shop that had a fantastic quality and variety of fruit.  We walked to the river and had a relaxing morning eating fruit and looking at the Manhattan skyline.

The first few days in New York were spent meeting up with other people who were going be going to Woodstock and attendinga large meetup in Central Park which I had coordinated on facebook and the WFF forum.

We also got a chance to meet and work out with Noel Vegan Fitness, a well known vegan advocate on youtube who is a master of calisthenics.  He showed us that he and his friend Jonny would work out anywhere in the city particularly on scaffolding, we had great fun.

We were given a lift to the camp by my friend Bill Lesh, who had stayed with me for a few days when he had visited Scotland.  Nine of us crammed into his bus and I got a chance to talk to my friend Dr Robert Lockhart about his 25+ years experience on a fruit based diet.  Later on at a rest stop he climbed a tree with the agility and athleticism of a teenager, for a man in his 70s this is surely an amazing feat.

Arriving at Camp Walden felt like a homecoming.  I was excited to re connect with the friends I had met the previous year and stayed in touch with online.  I was also happy to meet new friends that I had only ever communicated with through facebook and youtube.

Over the week, I had many memorable moments.  I got the opportunity to play on stage at the talent show and had great fun dancing round the camp fire to the music of the drum circle each night.  Morning fitness classes and daily swimming in the lake made up most of my activity but I was also able to really surprise myself on the day of the marathon.  I decided to see how far I could run despite not really being a runner.  I went at a slow pace and ended up continuing for 20 laps of the course which added up to about 22 miles which took me just over 5 hrs and 20 minutes.  What most surprised me was that my joints and muscles did not ache particularly badly after it.  I put this feat down not only to the power of the diet but to the energy and positivity of the Woodstock event which takes us to a new paradigm of health, positivity and fitness for the duration of the event which we can carry with us for the rest of the year along with the good memories.

I particularly enjoyed seeing Dr Douglas Graham’s lectures and attended his 430pm lecture daily.  Even if I hear him speak on the same subject twice or 3 times I always find something that I did not pick up the first few times and I enjoy hearing his anecdotes and experiences in his own learning process.

The other lectures I really enjoyed were those given by Ken Love.  Ken is an expert on tropical fruit growing and was featured in the film The Fruit Hunters.  His passion for fruit really shines through despite the fact he does not follow a raw fruit based diet.  Watching the Fruit Hunters film with an audience of other fruitheads was a great experience and quite emotional in a way.  Ken gave an inspirational talk after it about the issues concerning GMO and Monsanto which felt like a call to action.

Although it may seem like I should feel sad to leave Woodstock I always feel inspired and positive to come home and share this message as best as I can by being a positive example of natural abundant health.  I often miss the mark on this and am still working on improving many habits.  I have a lot to learn yet on this path and I will be back at Woodstock this year to learn more.

I hope to see you there!

Ronnie