Fall Nevada City Foraging Campout

Campout Overview: What, Where, and When

Join us for a fun all-inclusive campout weekend filled with the fall foraged treasures of the Sierra Foothills, featuring acorns, bay nuts, plants, making natural sodas with wild yeasts and plants, weaving baskets from gourds and pine needles, and more!

Rosebud Ranch will be our home base for our weekend in Nevada City. They have a beautiful wooden bathhouse with hot showers, a cob wood-fired sauna, a fire pit with a stage for open mic (if you wish), and a shaded camping area. They are located just 5 minutes from the Hoyt Crossing of the glorious Yuba River, where you can swim in the limestone green waters to your heart’s content.

Three meals a day will be provided, which are a mix of foraged and farm-fresh ingredients.

Campout begins at 3pm on Thurs, and ends at 12 pm on Sunday, Oct 8-12th, 2026.

Campout Draft Schedule *

*All activities are optional - the schedule is a draft, the order of activities is subject to change

Thursday Oct 8

• 3pm: arrive and settle in, followed by dinner & evening community building activities

Friday Oct 9

• Breakfast

• Morning activity: Basket weaving

• Lunch

• Afternoon Activity: Basket weaving continued

• River time

• Dinner

• Evening Activity: Making wild sodas with wild yeast and foraged plants, sauna time

Sat Oct 10

• Breakfast

• Morning activity: Edible & medicinal walk

• Lunch featuring acorns and bay nuts

• Afternoon activity: Process acorns and bay nuts

• River time

• Dinner featuring acorns & bay nuts /natural sodas tasting party

• Evening activity: sauna time, open mic/music jam at the campfire

Sun Oct 11

• Breakfast

• Closing circle

• Pack up camp and depart by noon

• Go to the river again before going home?

Activities Descriptions

Making Wild Sodas led by Christopher

In this activity, participants will be utilizing the plants around them to create a wild herbal soda! Highly beneficial to the gut, these fermented beverages can easily be tailored to your own tastes and preferences. Limited only by your imagination, this is one of the easiest things to incorporate into one's diet and a great way to feel good about the drinks you consume! 

Edible & Medicinal Plant Walk led by Christopher

Walk through the forest with our botanists and herbalists to discover the diverse edible and medicinal plants that grow all around us. Our plant walks teach you how to identify and ethically harvest a wide variety of native and invasive plants, inspiring a sense of stewardship and a deeper connection to the land. You'll learn about their unique properties, traditional uses, and how to prepare them for food and medicine. We focus on a balanced approach, integrating both ecological science and traditional knowledge. Our classes are designed to awaken a sense of belonging within you, as you learn to recognize the natural pantry that exists right outside your door.

Basket Weaving with Gourds & Pine Needles led by Abeni

Join fiber artist Abeni to work with two ancient natural materials: gourds and pine needles. We’ll begin with an introduction to how gourds grow and their traditional uses as vessels and art. Together, we’ll scrub and clean our raw gourds, connecting directly to the preparation process.

Next, you'll learn the basics of pine needle weaving to embellish and transform your piece. Along the way, we’ll share the rich cultural contexts of these crafts from traditions around the world.

No prior experience is required for this beginner-friendly class. You’ll leave with a beautiful, finished, or nearly finished woven gourd and the skills to continue crafting at home. All materials are provided.

Acorns & Bay Nuts led by Christopher

Join us and learn the skills you’ll need to turn acorns into tasty treats. Our class teaches you how to harvest, process, and prepare them, including shelling, winnowing, and leaching. You'll get hands-on experience turning acorns into tasty treats like porridge and hummus. We'll also share the rich history of acorn use around the world. This class combines practical skills with cultural history and connection to the land. This class is seasonal and offered only in autumn, when the acorns fall from the trees.

Instructors/Retreat Staff

Abeni "Abi" Pierson [ahh-ben-knee] (she/her) is a California-based fiber artist and educator originally from the suburbs of Chicago. She studied fashion design at Columbia College in Chicago, but after witnessing the environmental harm and wastefulness of the fashion industry, she shifted her path toward more sustainable practices rooted in nature. Today, her work is dedicated to keeping the language of weaving alive and folk arts by teaching both youth and adults.

Christopher O'Maelmacasa (they/them) is a leading botanist and one of the most knowledgeable people about the Sierra Nevada region ecology! Christopher holds an MA in integrative ecology from UNR, is on the board of the Nevada Native Plant Society, and leads walks and workshops throughout the region, specializing in ethnobotany. Christopher is currently writing a comprehensive guide to edible and medicinal plants of the Sierra Nevada and is co-author of an upcoming book on California trees.

Carrie Staller (she/her) is the founder of Fork in the Path. She has a master’s degree in sustainability, a decade of experience foraging mushrooms, plants, and fruits in California, 9 years of teaching yoga, and a deep passion for building community and organizations. For the past decade and a half, she has been growing organizations and leading teams at experience design companies focused on human connection. She loves curating special, transformative classes and integrating best practices for adult learning.  She lives in Berkeley, CA, and wakes up every morning in gratitude for the land, her teachers, and this incredible team of educators and participants who are learning and growing together at Fork in the Path by cultivating deeper relationships with our beautiful and wondrous natural world. She hopes that by taking one of our classes, to create a little “fork in your path” that helps get you more connected to nature. When she’s not foraging, you can find her playing the drums.