About Keela Yoga Farm

Yoga and Permaculture in Portugal — Laurence Manchee & Kimberly Wright

Keela is a vision of a couple Laurence and Kimberly Manchee who want to see a healthier, happier world through the practice of Permaculture, restoration, reforestation, Yoga, sustainability and producing food. Whilst working in the rat race, Kimberly and Laurence always struggled to keep up their yoga practice and reduce their carbon footprint.

They had been teaching yoga, growing their own food, and travelling and learning wherever possible. After three years of planning, in early 2016 they travelled to Portugal with plans to buy a plot of land. After almost a year of travelling and volunteering , they finally bought an 18 hectare magical plot of land in Mata Da Rainha, central Portugal on the 22nd November 2016.

Please click here to read our blog about our journey from city to farm, searching for land, volunteering and more.

We have retreats, permaculture courses, natural building courses and volunteers starting every month, volunteer start days are once per month and treated like a yoga retreat, with a 2 day induction to the farm, daily yoga and good fun. You all start on the same day to allow a good introduction together and the group to form easier.

If you want to find out what it is like to start a project like this from its inception then please do come and volunteer, we would appreciate your help. Alternatively you can join one of our retreats, courses or donate towards our reforestation program or join our mailing list.

What is at Keela Yoga Farm

Food Forest Program

Maintaining our of the polycultures in our food forests

We have 3 new food forests (a human planted forest that has a mix of trees, shrubs, small shrubs, climbers, ground cover and underground plants, all of which are edible) that have been planted from 2017 until now, one to integrate annual vegetables, one as a specimen and propagation food forest and one design for chickens.

We run many food forest courses, these courses help us fund and expand our food forests. We also need help from volunteers to work in our food forest all year. Click here for our food forest blog posts.

Daily Yoga

Yoga Portugal — Our Yoga Deck with a sun rise view of countryside. Without noise pollution and in pure tranquility

Kimberly Manchee and guest yoga teachers provide optional free daily yoga classes to volunteers and students on the Natural Building and Permaculture courses.. She also teaches drop in classes in the local village and on the farm for locals.

If you are a yoga teacher and want to volunteer please click here. If you would like to run a retreat at our farm then please contact us.

Natural Building

We try and use materials from our land as much as possible. So far we have built 2 large straw bale houses, a wattle and dorb chicken house, a long drop compost toilet, a non flush pee station and 2 compost toilets.

We offer dedicated natural building courses as well as providing natural building as modules and optional workshops on our sustainable yoga retreats and permaculture food forest courses.

We are also looking for people to volunteer and help us continue with our natural buildings

Permaculture Gardens

Food Forest One of our three growing areas

A big focus of the farm is gardening and growing food for ourselves and guests. We work in the gardens every day of the year. We growing perennial vegetables and fruits in our food forests, we grow annual vegetables, we have sunken beds, raised bed, wood chip beds, herb gardens, herb spiral spiral, traditional beds, a kitchen garden and we are working on reviving some springs and systems built on our land the moors.

Where we do not grow food we buy organic from a local organic permaculture farm or the local market. All of our dry food is bought in bulk from an organic distributor or food (we purchase this with a food bulk buying co-op that we run)

Offgrid and sustainable

Our PV panels that make us our electricity for the farm

We have our own drinking water from the land, our own electricity, a lot of our own food and we make our income to live and expand the farm from the farm (courses and volunteers).

Fun

We have pizza parties with our stone built pizza oven, BBQs, fires around the stone circle, film nights, visits to the cafe and fun during all courses and work. ‘Smile, it’s your birthright’ Sudhir RIshi