From HerbMentor.com, this is Herb Mentor Radio.
You are listening to Herb Mentor Radio on HerbMentor.com. I'm John Gallagher. My guest today is Sunny Savage. Sunny is a wild foodie, filmmaker, and homeschooling parent traveling with the wind aboard a sailboat with her husband and son.
Sunny spent a year eating foods only grown within a two hundred and fifty mile radius of her home and traveled every continent on earth and has a television show called Hot on the Trail with Sunny Savage that follows her adventures. She recently re released her clothing line that is made from wild plants and is working on a docudrama about skills we need to learn to thrive in the future. You can visit Sunny at sunny savage dot com and see your clothing line at savage designs dot net and follow her current adventures at the sailing movie dot com. So live from an Internet cafe in Panama, Sunny Savage, welcome.
Woo hoo. Aloha, John. Aloha.
Oh, yes. Happy day of the dead. Right. We are one day after, Samhain Halloween here. And, you know what, Sunny? I just realized, this morning that this is, like, within a day or two of the, fifth anniversary of HerbMentor.com.
So we started Very cool.
Inspiring. Congratulations.
I'm a huge fan, supporter.
You guys have really helped me out in my own personal journey with Herb. So cool.
Thank you so much. And so it's an honor to have you here. And it was so cool seeing you at the Medicine of the People gathering in Arizona a couple months ago. It had been way too long.
It seemed like I used to run into you every once in a while up here in Washington, and then it's been a while. It's been years. So I was like, sunny. Yeah.
So it was Yeah. That was great to see you as well. It was a great gathering.
It sure was.
That's at herbal resurgence dot org, I believe, if anyone listening wants to check out that cool gathering.
So let's see. You know, people will be amazed at the really cool stuff that you're up to right now. I mean, they must be. I think we set the stage at your Internet cafe in Panama.
I mean, this is first time I've ever, like, done that where someone's been in really exotic locations. It's kinda fun. It should be a new thing. Actually, I'll just interview It's fun.
Everything.
I mean, that's kind of Live and direct from Panama.
We should just check-in all the Yeah. Live and direct from Panama.
We should just check-in all the time whenever you're traveling. Get into a new Internet cafe. Just call in and you can tell us an update.
Let's see.
Yeah. Well, there's some adventures that are coming up for us. We're gonna be on the move soon.
Wow. So first, before we talk about all the cool stuff you're doing right now, I wanna go back a little bit. I was reading your bio, and you have quite an ancestry, like a long line of adventures. It said on your it said there that Thomas Savage arrived at Jamestown at age thirteen.
So that's like an ancestor of yours. And so how does all these these amazing people that are in your lineage, how's that affected who you are now?
Well, I mean, it's hugely affected me because I decided to change my name.
So kind of growing up with my story of my ancestor my whole life, of Thomas Savage. And then I just started getting into the plants and my wild lifestyle. And I'm like, oh my god. This rocks. You know? I love this name, and I feel like, you know, it's part of my ancestry.
So I changed my name to Sunny Savage.
And, so, anyways, the story is just something that I've I've had with me my whole life, but, you know, it it it really plays into my daily life. Every time somebody says my name or I write it down, it's like, woah. So, anyways, yeah, it's it's cool.
And and when did you start learning about plants?
Well, I, grew up really deep in the woods as an only child. And so I was just kind of out running around by myself a lot, as a child. And, so I guess this kind of deep respect for nature and living, you know, within nature and not feeling separated from it was kind of something that I grew up with, luckily for my my whole life. But, we we tapped maple trees, and we would harvest a few berries, and we grew you know, we had gardens and stuff. But the, the real connection, with the wild plants and kind of, integrating the plants into my daily life at at such a different level through food and medicine and clothing. And, that really started at about, oh, I can't even remember. I think it was around nineteen or so, nineteen, twenty.
My mom started getting into medicinal plants and doing some online courses with, like, Rosemary Gladstar, and we were, you know, reading Susan Weeds, books and and just, getting into the plants.
And so she was in doing a lot more of the medicinals, and I just started reading in some of those books that you could eat some of those plants, and my whole life just kind of changed. I was like, like, oh my god. How come nobody ever told me this before? This is incredible.
And, and so it was just kind of this, this journey, you know, that was my path, you know, from that point on.
That's so lucky to have to start as a child and learning with your parents. That's exactly what I think a lot of people listening do with their kids now and and, you know, and then we do that with our kids. But I think a lot of folks listening probably didn't have parents who did that with them. So that's awesome.
Yeah. That's true. It's, you know, our our children definitely learn what we model and experience with them. And that experience with nature was you know, I had hip you know, back to the lander parents. And so we were we were like a half an hour drive to a town of two thousand and lived within a state park. And so it was very, very much intertwined with nature.
How do you how do you do that with Yeah.
I I want to, you know, share that with my child because I appreciate that and I do feel that it's a great, you know, move for the future and, that it is, you know, a necessary move.
So And and how do you share that with how do you share your passion then with your son?
How old is he now?
He is nine years old. Okay. And, yeah, I we share, you know, skills in the kitchen and processing and, you know, all the different steps that are involved in processing because that's a a real skill.
And, and then just our lifestyle the skills that we need to to do well in our lifestyle right now involve a lot of, like, mechanical things and, as well. And so those are those are also proving important for us right now. But the plants are always, part of our life, and and, yeah.
So since we're on the topic talking about that, like like, what, you know, you're out there and and you're you're you're sailing. You're going around they're going around the world. Do you have a what what do you what's this what's what's the journey you're on right now?
Well, the journey has been just fascinating.
It's been life changing.
I, for the first year, we were sailing pretty much consistently, really moving around. And then I looked at my family, and I said, I've gotta have some plants for a while. I've gotta feel the earth for a little while. And, so we found a place in Panama here that we loved, and we ended up staying. And and now we're getting ready to, head back north up to, Florida.
So we bought our boat in Florida and kind of circumnavigated around the the Eastern Caribbean over across through Curacao, Colombia, Panama. Now we're gonna work our way north, and we don't know exactly which way the wind is gonna blow for us. But, we're gonna, work on selling the boat, next next June before the hurricane season.
For the you know?
It's a good time to go.
Back to Hawaii and enjoy the fabulous, experience that we've had and, get our movie get our movie put together and and, really make that available for people to to see.
Is this movie involved you working with, is it more the sailing part of that adventure, or is it like is it learning or using wild foods on your, on those new places that you're going to? Or what what exactly?
Well, basically, I was sitting with my husband and wanted to, you know, we wanted to sail around the world, and I was like, wanna do a dot wanna do a film. And we got out to sailing, and we didn't realize how expensive it was and, you know, the challenges that we would have. And so we've decided to to change our plans from going around the world to just in the Caribbean. Mhmm.
And, I think, what we realized was that I had kind of been into the wild foods, but we were really looking as a couple at, like, how to design our daily lives in a different way. And so kind of the healing that was needed and was involved with, with that.
And so, we are incorporating wild foods into the the film, through showing skills.
Mhmm.
The film is about what skills, we need to learn to thrive on the planet in the year twenty sixty. So, basically, we're just looking fifty years in the future. And as we're sailing around, we're asking people, what trends do you feel are, you know, major trends that are gonna be shaping our future. And once we've identified those trends, how do we, really look at what skills we might need to thrive in that vision of the future?
And so, within the film, it's our personal stories.
And so, of course, I am personally teaching my son about wild foods, and therefore, you know, it's integrated into the film.
But it's a larger, docudrama, so it incorporates elements of the future and the past, to really tell a story and use storytelling. And we we love film. And so using the power of of storytelling to, kind of look at, what skills we might need and and basically our experience on the boat.
What are you what are you finding, these skills are, like, the people would need to know in that year, you know, fifty years from now or whatever? Like, what what what do you what's some what's some of couple of your conclusions that you're saying that we should know?
Well, we were recently at the University for Peace in Costa Rica. Mhmm. Once we decided that the around the world trip, wasn't going to happen for us at this time, we thought, my husband was familiar with a very cool university that, has master's programs that are all devoted to peace studies in some way.
And so they have two nations that are represented in their student body, and so we thought, wow. You know, we're asking people you know, we've been filming with the Kogi up in, you know, the the mountains in Colombia. We're filming with these amazing Rasta men and Dominica. You know, we've filmed in all of these fascinating places and have been asking similar questions. But here we have this, like, sample of people from all over the globe so that we could really kind of try and get that perspective in our film.
Mhmm.
And so what the, discussion groups, we led a forum that kind of talked about our project, and then we got all of the students who participated to gather together and, get into groups and really discuss what these trends were. And then their their group's way of dealing with those trends, what skills we would need. And I would say some of the overarching, things that have been coming up, not only from these students, but also from many other people, would be that, respect, is a major skill. So it's, kind of be it's kind of a value. It's like a character skill, but that in so many, fundamental levels, we have lost respect for ourselves, you know, person to person, nation to nation, for the Earth, and that respect was this this kind of key thing. So say, problem solving, something that was, you know, a human being a thousand years ago, you know, would need to be a good problem solver as well as somebody a thousand years in the future that at this core level.
You know, the technology, the climate change, you know, the big the big trends that are happening. So there's lots of different ways, different specific skills that people bring up that are related to those, but I think that's what we're still really formulating.
That's good news. Yeah.
I mean, because a lot of people would think you're gonna, you know, teach about, oh, we and it's probably true, you know, know about the plants around you and medicine and how to maybe survive and stuff. And then I love that you're saying, no. No. No.
No. We survival here of all of us means respect and these bigger picture types of things that we, yeah, we've lost. I mean, it's one thing to lose the knowledge of the plants that grow around you, and it's a whole entirely another thing, right, to lose the respect for ourselves. I mean, that really hit me when you said that.
I'm like, gosh. You're right.
That's incredible. Mhmm. Wow. Yeah. It's it's really been a great journey, John. I mean, it's really been fascinating to, you know, we were feeling so blessed to have the opportunity.
My grandfather passed away and left us exactly the money that we used to buy the boat. Now all of all the shit that breaks on the boat, we we we didn't we had a budget for it, but it ended up being more than we thought. But, anyways, we had a very, you know, amazing opportunity to do this trip, and we both really enjoy working while we're traveling. It just you know, both my husband and I had traveled a lot.
We wanted our son to experience that, And, you know, we wanted to homeschool. We wanted you know, the the boat is a fantastic model for sustainability.
Know, unfortunately for us, it isn't sustainable because of all the mechanized parts. You know? We always have the sails. You know? We can put them up.
So that's that's wonderful.
But, anyways, the, I wanna talk about I mean, something that really blew me away, when I saw you at the Medicine of the People event.
I don't know what to call it anymore. They don't like using the word conference and it's a thing, the medicine of the people.
Right. Gathering. Gathering. That's what I was asking. I've been using gathering. I didn't know either.
I don't know. I'm not aware of the branding yet.
So what what blew me away is that you're there. You you, it's great because you had a table there, and I was was like, Sonny, my gosh, I can't believe you're here. And you had medicinal clothing with you. I never heard of medicinal clothing. I mean, of course, you know, I've seen people die with certain things and all, but I never anyway, I'll let you talk about it. I'd like to know your history around this, how you got into fiber and the fiber arts and plants and all this sort of thing. I'm just gonna let you meander how you would like to on that topic.
Well, yeah. I brought, to the to the gathering, I brought, some medicinal clothing. And, you know, I really just, I'd love to get more people out there trying this and giving feedback because that's what we really need is, you know, is kind of current feedback, from people on on how it works.
And it's kind of, you know, it's like subtle energetics, used in a balanced, you know, kind of approach or plan to your to your health care strategy.
But, anyways, my kind of personal experience with the with the medicinal clothing, my, grandmother, and grandfather and all their five children were living in Northern Algeria in the fifties. And, my grandma my auntie, my father's sister got sick, and, she was allergic to penicillin. And, there was a doctor, a medicine man, kind of bush doctor guy in Northern Algeria who was treating my auntie, for her illness and and really helped her out. And this guy was the kind of the family go to person for, all their medicine needs for their remaining years in Algeria.
And so, anyways, that's kind of like a cool, you know, past, you know, experience, family experience with it.
But I I, got into natural fibers, through a dream that I had to to make clothes out of nettles. And that was just kind of a it has a kind of a longer history of things, but I woke up one day and I had had a dream. And I was like, oh my gosh. I just I really this is what I need to do with nettle. And I looked for many months online to find, like, you know, where can you get nettles in quantity that actually is this something like this possible? And, so I took a trip up to Nepal and hiked for days into the mountains and met with the Kulung Dari tribe who are the only, you know, kind of active, you know, practicing culture, you know, around the nettles that I know of on the planet right now. And met them, met the plants, and I was like, this is just so rad.
I met a friend who, you know, was I've been sewing. I sewed all my son's clothes and quilts and stuff, but, you know, she was like a, you know, like a hip designer. And, so anyways, everything came together for me to start this this clothing company. I bought the the fiber, the raw fibers to make into to hair extensions and then bought, the fabric in large rolls and then had a group of women, in Topanga Canyon, California, which is where I was living at the time, sew, all the all the garments.
And so we put together this clothing line and, then kind of life happened for me. I got my television show, and then that ended, and I met my husband, and then I was living in Hawaii, and now I'm living on a sailboat. And it was just kind of one of these, like, house cleaning things here. I'd been paying on a storage unit for this fabulous clothing company, you know, for years, And I was like, this is I've gotta bring this to the people.
It's time. It was a little too ahead of its time, I think, prior to that. And, I wanted to do something new for the clothing line when I rereleased it, and the medicinal clothing was just really calling to me. I had thought about it for a few years, and it just felt really right.
And I you know, John, I don't I don't have a lot of people who've, worked with it. It isn't it's an over five thousand year old practice in Ayurveda, which is a branch of Ayurvedic medicine.
So it is a very old practice.
I haven't had time to really do the kind of, you know I mean, I love to research, but I don't have, you know, a lot of Internet time. It's just not my phase of life right now. Right.
Right.
But, you know, there's stuff about the Romans were dyeing their togas with medicinal plants, and there were, you know, people over here and people over there kind of doing it.
But it just felt really right for me to kind of bring it bring it out to people and, and kinda see what happens. So I'm really encouraging people, like, even if they're not buying something off of my clothing, line in our medicinal clothing collection, to to practice, you know, in their own bioregion.
You know, go to a thrift store and go to the walk section and and, find something or, you know, just use your existing closet.
And, think about, you know, if you're working with medicines, if you have, you know, a plant that also is a natural dye, colorfast dye, to, you know, think about it as a as another modality in healing.
And our skin is our largest organ.
And, you know, I'd really love to see people wearing instead of, you know, satin panties, you know, wearing, you know, naturally dyed, garments for their for their intimate apparel or, you know, tank tops. Things that are close to the skin, I think, are great and, also things that, you know, you can just it's it's about setting intention for me.
And, and so, anyways, I do I really do believe in in the power of the medicinal clothing, and, I just really look forward to more people doing it so that we can, you know, start to get feedback from other people.
What's an example like well, let's just say nettle, a garment dyed with nettle. You know, what's an example of of something, you know, with intention that someone might wear that for to help with?
I mean, what comes to mind is, like, arthritis maybe or, you know, something Mhmm.
Yeah. Exactly. Oh, really?
So just to clarify for folks listening, the signature fabric of the clothing line Right.
For Savage Designs is is wild nettle. That's hand harvested, hand spun, handwoven.
And so many of our you know, the majority of our garments have are made of wild nettle. But for the medicinal clothing collection, I started with, US grown and US manufactured organic cotton clothing. Mhmm. And then I, made my large vats of medicinal plant dyes.
And so one of the dyes that I chose for this two thousand twelve collection, there's three colors that I did, three different, you know, color medicines, is the, nettle.
And so I was using the above ground parts of nettle, and, there it's a specific species that I was harvesting in the California Northern California area.
And, there has been some recent, you know, kind of work with, nettles in that specific area. So I always find that interesting. You know, it just gets more and more kind of bioregionally specific, although nettles are, you know, pretty worldwide.
So, anyways, the its particular use in osteoarthritis, they were calling it. You know? But, yes, we can just speak in the more generalized term of arthritis. And so, one of the, very few, research articles that we have is the, done in India at an Ayurvedic medicine, hospital. And they're supported by a much larger university in southern India India, which is where this tradition is is from. And so they were showing that people who were, using these medicinally dyed items, were able to transfer that medicine through the skin because it was treating things like arthritis instead of just something, that was topically on the skin like, eczema or psoriasis.
So, anyways, the arthritis was, the plants that they were using in India, which are different from the nettles, but just to kind of speak to that that idea of the medicine moving through the through the skin, We're we're treating the arthritis. So, anyways, yeah, nettles, I think, the great one to really think of when wearing the medicinal clothing is for arthritis, and it is such an incredibly, I mean, I don't know what my you know, what what the technical term of chronic would be, but, you know, we've got very large amounts of people, particularly in the US, let alone worldwide who have arthritis in some form or another. So, you know, subtle, you know, energy.
This is, you know, dealing with kind of chronic issues. You know? It's another modality is the way that I see it.
Another modality in an alternative health care plan for someone, as a potential, you know, way of of there, like, another plan example that you you worked with dye wise? Or Yeah.
We just recently, what is it, Two or three days ago, we released our second color in our collection, and, that is coyote brush, which is has been used, by Native Americans in California, where the plant is native to.
It's also found in Southern Oregon, but it's a very, very common shrub called coyote brush that is that is, used been used historically and, currently, by practitioners in the treatment of, skin inflammation.
So this is a great one for the eczema and psoriasis.
Like to keep it general for, you know, the skin inflammation, but the eczema and the psoriasis, I think are a great application.
And, again, getting back to that, those folks in, India and the research that they've done, on the use of medicinal clothing, that they had a lot of great success with the plants that they were using for eczema.
Mhmm.
So I have something came into mind when you're, you know, talking about this. And if a person is using, you know, they get into this and, I mean, it's a very fascinating idea and and and things that, you know, this medicinal cloth with medicinal clothing. Is this something you would you would, like, you know, do you have to just dye it once and those clothing work for a while like that, like, dermally, do you think?
Or does it have to be re re I typically tell people people five washes and then re dye if you're using for medicinal purposes.
So the dyes are colorfast in the shirts that I sell, in my online boutique. Mhmm. But, you know, if you're looking for the medicinal effects, I would, you know, roughly say that every time you do wash the garment, you're going to want to wash it in cold water with a real gentle soap and then line dry it. Something that I do with everybody who buys something from my my clothing company. You get a a bamboo clothespin.
I really wanna, you know, encourage people to line dry their items. You get a bag of nettle tea, and you get a bamboo nettle, styling comb.
Nice.
So, anyways, you would line dry the clothing in a shady area.
And then, you know, I would say, like, up to five five washes. When you receive the clothes, you'll you know, you would open up the package, and the smell is really powerful. Wow.
So but, anyways, that's kind of what I'm telling people. You know, I've been playing around with these things for a while, but that's what I'm really kind of reaching out for people, and this is why I am grateful for the opportunity to have this interview with you. And, you know, hopefully, this gets out to other plant people. You know, I'd love to really just get other people's, perspectives on these.
You know? Is it five washes? Is it ten washes? What are they finding? You know?
Because I think all of our experiences are, you know, always different.
And, so And, and so, savage designs dot net is you're you're able to, work all this.
You know, you're you're you're sailing, and you're able to run same time. Like, you are amazing. How do you do this? I can't seem to leave my house. Business, it's always like a team. Yeah.
And, I mean, I, am getting ready to head out to some very remote islands, and we're going computerless for a few months.
And so my mom, is on customer service. She's granny granny customer service, and then I've got everything savage. You know, it's really the only way that I could do a business from so far away is that it's automated. And so I have, you know, everything really automated, for the orders that come in.
You know, if there's any returns or people have questions, specifically, you know, there's an active, email address that my mom, will be answering. And then I have different posts from blogs to Facebook that I've done up ahead of time, and then I also have somebody else monitoring our Facebook page. So I'm hoping that, even from a boat far away, I can be sending loving energy to Savage's Signs and that it can stay afloat by itself without me for a bit.
Well, you and you're, you know, you're just doing r and d right now. You're just going out and, you know, doing, you know, learning what's what's the next line of clothing. So that's just that's important.
Yeah. I'm doing research, man.
I'm doing research and development.
Straight up jungle when deep.
You never know what plant you're gonna find.
What? You never know what plant you're gonna find to die with next.
Oh, yeah. But No. I've been having fun. There's a there's I I couldn't believe it. I walked into this little shop, to ask the woman the time, and it was cool. She I'd wanted to kind of see her before we leave here. And, she had just gotten this book in on natural dyeing, from the Darien.
Mhmm. And we're headed to, like, that border between Panama and Colombia right now. And so those that's some of the plants that are in that book, I'll have access to here in a few weeks. So Wow. I'm really excited. It was a great score on a book.
Nice. And so you can folks can look at the clothing line there and also, the hair wraps you mentioned too there too?
The what?
The wraps for the hair you said, you you mentioned earlier, do you sell those there too?
Yeah. Okay. We have an online store. If you just go to savage designs dot net Yeah. You can click on store.
And within there, there's a catalog, and we have clothing, but we also have these jungly dreads, which we call them, and they're, wild nettle. It's the raw nettle before it's hand spun and woven. So it's kind of this this raw hair looking, fiber that we've designed into all kinds of different things. We also have, singing bowls and musical instruments from, the high elevation, Himalayas. And we have a few, kind of home interior things like metal, placemats, and table runners. And so a few odds and ends also, but most mostly clothing. And so, yeah, you can find that all online, and we keep an active, Facebook page as well as Pinterest.
And, yeah.
Cool.
So, you know, you're making this film now Mhmm. But a lot of folks, may have not heard about your television show, and that is on, like, Fios, Dish, and another network too. Right?
So how do folks find out about the TV? I'd say about the Actually, before we say how, like how did that come about? I mean, that's pretty amazing that you're, you know, are able to get on, you know, mainstream TV here and bring wild foods. Like how did that happen and how was that received?
I was like you said at the beginning of the show, I was doing the two hundred and fifty mile diet, you know, with folks up in Northern Minnesota. I was working at a tribal college, and I was just like, oh my gosh. I wanna do a wild food cooking show. And, anyways, there was not really an opportunity for that around there. So I would I was like, well, I'm moving to LA.
That's where you're supposed to go, right, if you wanna do a TV show.
Yeah. That's where Amanda McKay Crawford was.
My son and, moved to LA, Topanga Canyon. And, you know, I got a job within a couple weeks working for the state park service, and I just started doing wild food workshops on the weekends.
And I was like, well, I'm just gonna start working towards my dream, and I started doing YouTube videos.
And so I just was having fun doing YouTube videos, and I just got a call one day from a producer in Texas who was like, well, we pitched this show and they like it, but they don't want any, you know, meat in there. And so we're like, well, maybe we could do wild foods and we found you. And I'm like, well, that's just great. I've been waiting for you to call. And within, like, two weeks, I had flown to, to Dallas.
No. Yeah. That's where it was.
To Dallas, Fort Worth area and, you know, signed a contract with them. And, I mean, it it just happened really, really quickly.
So It's it's a kind of ongoing for a year Oh, yeah.
Living in an RV as we traveled through, like, seventeen states filming, twenty episodes on wild foods, you know, that are common or, abundantly available, throughout, you know, many of them throughout the world.
So yeah.
Is this That's how that started.
How how can people see those? And are they on DVD or, like, you know, like for those without those networks? Cause I don't have DISH or Fios, I'd love to see it. I've never seen them. So I mean, I've seen your I've seen your I've seen all your YouTube videos, you know, and you can easily find you on YouTube but Uh-huh. Yeah.
But I never seen it.
No. It's a little bit of a bummer.
You know, I'd really love to try and convince the network to, you know, to to either do it in DVD themselves or for you know, to give us the rights to to to just make them available to people.
Yeah. Currently, you can only watch the television series on television through DISH Network, Verizon, Fios, or Frontier.
Although I know that they've recently signed a really large contract within the Washington DC, Philadelphia, New York, kind of this big swath of larger cities on the East Coast also having more access to the show. Mhmm.
So, anyways, that's, that's where we're at with with with viewing it. I don't I haven't had a TV in years myself, John. I don't I don't get to watch my own show, but it's out there. And, so, you know, call up a friend or, you know, if you know?
Or write the network or, you know, if you wanna see it because it is a really high production quality. We have very, very, very low budget, but it doesn't really show. I think my, my producer director did a great job. We had a great team of about eight people that we traveled with to to get it done. And, so I think that the the level is really high and, you know, it goes through some some really great plants, and it's not just for folks in the US. I think, you know, many of them are, you know, could be seen by a larger audience.
Right. Right. Well, okay. Well, I hope we get more of those and get DVDs or something at some point and we'll make sure everyone knows about them, you know?
Yeah, so yeah but definitely folks go and just put Sunny Savage in on YouTube in the search bar there, and you can see lots of her stuff there.
Let's see.
Well, what, what where do you, you know, where do you see yourself in all these adventures that you're on right now and where do you see yourself in another year from now?
Well, gosh. What month are we? November? November. First of November.
I think back on back on Maui, back in Hawaii. You know, hopefully, we'll have, sold our boat. We don't know if we're gonna, you know, have to live on the boat for a long time while we try and sell it.
That could put us on the on the East Coast of the US.
But the general flow is moving towards, just living in a wonderful little jungle shack on the side of a hill in Maui and farming and, just working hard, just editing, editing, editing our film and really, getting our we're we're trying to put out a curriculum that also goes with the film. Film. We don't wanna put pressure on ourselves.
Yeah. Right.
You know, we wanna put a curriculum that goes with the film as well.
So, we really wanna charge that for a year and and and get that out to folks because it's got a real current, you know, kind of feel to it with all the people we've been talking to as we've been sailing around.
So that's kind of the plan, just farming and, doing kind of unique custom medicinal clothing pieces in Hawaii and, working with the dye plants there, you know, the continued, you know, use of the wild foods and and farming and and editing and homeschooling and What a what a story your son will have.
I mean, you know, sometimes I look at my kids compared to a lot of the other kids around, like, and I go, wow. What a cool life my kids have been. Gosh. It's like your son's all over the place and learning all that stuff. It's amazing. What a lucky little lucky little guy he is.
Yeah. Yeah. He's lucky.
He sure is.
He's a great kid.
I'm really blessed.
Yeah. Yeah. It's, that's great. Did they do did, they go out for Halloween in, in Panama to do anything? What did they do for Day of the Dead?
You know, I wanted to, make sure he had something special that he was doing. And, we had some issues with the boat yesterday afternoon, and he started to feel a little sick. And so the day kind of went on and on, and we made it to town later on, but I got him all dressed up. I painted these rad tattoos all over his face, and we even bought hair gel.
And then he was like, I don't wanna do it. And he like crossed his arms and he wiped it all off his face and he slicked his hair back down. And so then I, I put on a bunch of, I wove tons of nettle into my hair and put all this crazy stuff on my face. And we went to town and I bought him some candy.
And Right.
But nobody in Panama, you know, really dresses up Right.
Very much. There are quite a few I saw a few people around town who had a who had a few things, but we basically just cruised town. We did a trip to town, which is always a big deal. And, yeah, just kinda had a mellow mellow evening.
That's awesome.
So, before you know, since we got a few minutes here, I I guess I you know, just thinking about a lot of people you never know when they're listening to this show. Maybe it's their first time listening. Maybe it's their first time hearing about wild foods and wild plants.
In your journeys, what are a few of your favorite, wild plants as far as what and and wild foods dishes that you've made with them, like, from your journey and from your show or just in life or whatever? Because I I wanted to know that from you because I'm like, what does Sunny Savage do? What does she make?
Well, it's just kind of like every day, you know, it's you got that foraging eye. So, I mean, one day you might have one little berry or something that you harvested or, you know, the next day you might have, oh my god. I gotta process twenty bags of stuff. Oh my gosh.
But, I mean, yeah, I had some lemongrass tea that I had harvested, you know, this morning, and I made some green bananas that are, you know, bananas are kind of feral around here.
Green bananas in a soup and, you know, for me, the tropics are really new and eating with the wild, eating with the season, eating, you know, whatever that is in a you know, we're like in the tropics where it rains, like, year round, you know, like the high humid tropics. It's kinda the same year round. But, anyways, just, wow. I mean, it's such a huge question. I I know. I've had so many favorite things along the way.
I've had to totally, you know, change with no refrigeration and high humid, high, you know, there's we just deal with a lot of things for our food, the way we do food. But, I'm trying to think. I mean, I just recently found the Juniper Americana. I had found the tree before, but I just recently got the dye.
So I guess that's not food even though I have heard that the fruits, when they're fully ripe I did only read this in one resource, so I don't know. But the the fruits are also edible, apparently, when they're, like, really overripe or something. I don't know.
But, yeah, that's been a real exciting plant for me to find. They call it jaguar or the tattoo plant.
And, I yeah, John. John. I don't know. You gotta give me more.
Well, you know, well, I'm just thinking when when I get it from think of, like, some of my favorite wild foods, I am like, oh my gosh.
I so love, saguaro cactus fruits. I mean, they're such a, like, delicacy.
Like, you don't get to harvest very many, and I don't want people to be out there, like Yeah.
Yeah.
Going to Arizona for them.
But I would stay there for you to see my wow, what a blessing.
Like, amazing. I'm so grateful I got to have gotten to eat them in my life.
And, what else?
Yeah. I've got it's really hard to find greens in the tropics, so there's a few little greens that I always get really excited when I can harvest greens in the wild around here.
Some little It sounds like it sounds like from you and your perspective, being someone who has done so much with wild foods that you're and and you sound so in the moment, I think the answer for anyone wondering that kind of stuff is, like, well, just look outside.
What's the season right now? Where are we? Because even in the dead of winter in, in, you know, Vermont, you can Mhmm. Walk out and and make pine needle tea.
You know? Mhmm. You know, or maybe find some rose hips, left over on a bush and do something with those. So, I mean, from you know, I never really had this perspective, you know, before from just talking to you. You're just so in the moment where you're going or traveling. You just kinda walk out in this, like, alright, well, what food is available at the moment? And just learn kinda season by season.
Mhmm. That's such the great advice. You know? It's just changing your lens. You know, it's like you you have a lens for the natural world and you're just looking at what's around you.
What what is, you know, available in abundance, and figure out how to use it. You know? Just figure out how to use it. And if you need to process it to store it because you live in Vermont, then, you know, food processing is you know, get get practicing that and get get used to thinking about food and planning for food.
So yeah. I mean, whether it even be beans, you know, and you put them in and you're, you know, I'm soaking my beans, you know, days before or so anyways, that food processing, but, yeah, it's just looking at the natural environment with a different lens. What's what's available? What's abundant?
And, eating with with your bioregion, with your, you know, what what's what's what's right there.
I love that, especially coming from a a film a film maker like yourself changing your lens. Could it be more could it be more appropriate?
Yeah. Yep. Excellent.
So, let's see.
We talked about savage designs dot net, and that's where you go check out the clothing and sunny savage dot com to kinda learn a bit about you and also to link to various things. Is the sailing movie dot com, that's with a v in the URL URL, the sailing movie dot com. Is that kind of like do you have a do do you blog there or, like, you know, like, like, like, how can people, kinda keep up with the the recent adventures if they're, you know, wherever you're at?
Yeah. Well, I would say that our Internet, situation has not allowed us to really, like, develop the sailing movie dot com to its full potential. I would see it as being, like, a total, like, transmedia kind of site in the future. You know, we've got a lot of musician friends who are donating free music to the site from discussion boards on these different trends that are happening.
Like, it's gonna be a pretty rockin' sight. But right now, we just don't have the ability to kind of keep it up to date. So if people really want to, keep up to to date with our sailing adventure, you know, Facebook is the current. You know?
That's kind of the one stop check-in for us that we can communicate with friends and family and and folks who are interested.
But please do visit the website because not only is it beautiful, there is content that is starting to develop on there, including, like, an education page where, you know, we're really hoping to get different educators to different institutions, to individuals who are, you know, contributing their thoughts, opinions, or curriculum on what kind of skills, we need to learn for the future. And so I think some really exciting stuff will shape up on there along with the great music and and, other stuff. So, yeah, for folks who are really wanting the current event, like, we're on Facebook. On Facebook. And there's a Savage Designs Facebook page. There's a Sunny Savage Facebook there's a Sunny Savage fan page, which I post, you know, more of the wild food stuff on.
There's the savage designs. There's the jungly dreads for the natural, nettle hair extensions. And then there's the, sailing movie, also.
So because that you can update from your phone.
I mean, we were on we were on Facebook right at probably in each other's phones or something. The other day, you're in a boat in down there in the where you are way down south there, and I'm way up in Arizona. And you want me to open a hotel shuttle van, and we're going back.
This little Internet stick that sometimes works. It's not working today, so I'm I'm at the Internet cafe, and we don't really can't do a lot of Skype from it. But we recently, you know, kind of got Internet on our boat, which is awesome because we, also got enough solar panels finally to have some energy freedom. You know, our budget our energy budget got a little bigger. So, anyways yeah.
What's one let's leave it with this before we say goodbye. One, you know, in the recent months and the work you're doing now, like revelation or moment that you've had something that's kind of been a bit transformative and, you know, like I said, it's changed your lens.
I don't wanna put you on the spot there, but anything come to mind?
Oh, well, I would say our time with the Kogi in Colombia was really powerful for me.
And there was a mama that we spent a few weeks with, and he was in his nineties.
And the first eighteen years of his life, he lived in a cave and was never exposed to, sunlight, only starlight, moonlight. Only allowed to go outside of the cave in the evenings for stargazing and was also on many other protocols such as not eating salt for eighteen years, etcetera. So this was a pretty, like, profound dude. And he told me that, you know, the situation on our planet right now is just a little problem with the sun and the moon and some larger stuff going on in the universe and that it'll pass and, you know, things would be alright.
Because, the larger message from the COGIE, is one of, you know, very, severe warnings for humans on the earth right now that we are destroying ourselves and our planet. And so, you know, when you find somebody who's got something hopeful to say, within the larger picture of, you know, a pretty, I don't know what you would call it. You know, there's a lot of, stuff out there that says we're we're facing some really serious challenges on the planet right now. So, anyways, when you find that hopeful person, like, that guy, you know, it really stuck with me.
And so that would be a highlight.
Well, that is changing your lens because it's changing your lens towards staying positive and doing great work for the world and, you know, looking for the positive message and the skills and everything we need to do to work together and have that respect that you were talking about earlier.
And, so, you know, Sonny, it's been an amazing adventure just hearing about your life. I mean, it's totally inspiring, and you're just an amazing, you know, role model for all of us to get out and follow your passions, your visions, your dreams, and do positive work for the world, change that lens. So thank you so much for joining us today, Sunny.
Thank you, John. I feel really honored, and thank you for your great work. Yeehaw.
Herb Mentor Radio on HerbMentor.com is a production of LearningHerbs.com.
Visit LearningHerbs.com for free herbal lessons including Herb Mentor news, home remedy secrets, and supermarket herbalism. You'll You'll also find the herbal medicine making kit and our board game Wildcraft.
Herb Mentor Radio. Copyright LearningHerbs.com. All rights reserved.
Thanks so much for listening.
