Retreats

Voici les détails pour notre weekend de retraite près de Gérardmer.  Les Gites de l'Etang.

Here is some registration information for our weekend retreat in April 2024, in the Vosges near Gérardmer:  http://lesgitesdeletang.fr/yoga.html      https://www.facebook.com/asanasyogavosges/

385/person pour le weekend vendredi-dimanche 12-14 avril, 2024.  Price includes large private room, all your meals and yoga.  Price does not include transfer.  385 if paid by January 30.  400 euros afterward based on availability.

How to get there?

Train to Épinal.  We arrive early afternoon Friday.  20 euros for a transfer van to the village of Champraday (round-trip).

Yoga and Mediation Friday evening, Saturday morning/evening and Sunday morning.  

Also available are guided forest or lake walks and hikes to the waterfall.

A massage can be reserved in advance, or you can simply come for the quiet and presence of nature all around with your favorite book.

Your yoga retreat is designed to meet you exactly where you are and offer what you need.  Maximum 10 people.

See you soon, on the mat?  Or a terrace or garden?

Namaste,

Michelle

Annual Summer Yoga Retreats 

 History:

July 10-17  2010     Milos

July  9-16   2011      Milos

Sept 10-17, 2013 Milos
Aug 31- Sept 6, 2014  Milos
May 17-24, 2015     Sintra

Aug 30-Sept 5, 2015  Milos
Aug, 7-14, 2016 Sintra
Aug 8-15, 2018  Corfu

June 3-10, 2019 Amorgos

May 20-27, 2023 Milos

Amorgos, Greece, June 3-10, 2019   

À mon tour de vous adresser un grand merci pour ces 5 magnifiques journées en votre compagnie. 
La fantastique énergie et l'accueil chaleureux de ce super groupe ainsi que la pratique de haute voltige enseignée par notre chère Michelle m'ont fait énormément de bien. Alors je me suis mise chaque jour à répéter quelques postures depuis mon retour.

Ca y est, je ne peux plus me passer du yoga !  Maud

 

Pour moi-aussi, ce fut une semaine très enrichissante...et une première expérience inoubliable ! Je me sens en pleine forme et reboostée, aussi bien physiquement que mentalement 
Merci à Michelle pour ses cours si inspirants, pour ce chemin parcouru ensemble, les beaux messages partagés... tout cela me donne très envie de poursuivre et d'essayer d'aller au-delà de mes limites ! Yes, we can !!

 

Françoise
Merci à tous pour la compagnie, la bonne humeur, les échanges, la musique... Que de bons moments et de chouettes souvenirs !

Chers tous,
C’était une superbe semaine tous ensemble . Je ferme les yeux et j’y suis encore .  Olga

Bonjour à toutes les yogis et notre yogi musicien/auteur/compositeur :)
Merci, merci, merci ! 
Même si je n'ai passé que 2 jours et demi sur le tapis, je me sens transformée également. 
Merci Michelle, pour cette ouverture d'esprit et d'âme et à très vite sur le tapis. 
J'aimerais que nous continuions cette belle expérience en se tenant au courant d'activités de yoga de manière régulière.
Cours de cuisine végétarienne, vegan, stages tutti quanti ! 
A bientôt,   Caroline 

Merci pour l'énergie de cette super semaine, les moments partagés sur les tapis, et pas seulement, nos échanges sympathiques, les chansons, les fous rires ... Je suis rentrée ressourcée, transformée, et j'en avais grandement besoin.   Merci Michelle d' avoir rendue possible cette retreat, merci pour toute l'organisation et ton enseignement attentif pour nous faire grandir sur le chemin du yoga.   Andreea

How does it feel to be back home??
The sun still shines here, but nice energy of your group is missing.  Petra

 

Retreat 2015

Praia Pequena 6 min walk, Praia Grande 7 min walk

Rates based on double occupancy include yoga twice a day.  Large breakfast and a lunch pack for your optional sport activities (sport activities rates available.  Surfing, mountain biking, please see me.)

Rooms have ocean views and so does our yoga room which has 24hr access.  Also on site:  pool, gardens, common kitchen, outdoor bbq area.  720€ for the week based on double occupancy.  Price does does not include airfare or airport transfer.  A cab shared is quite inexpensive and can be arranged.   Rate includes breakfast and picnic lunch.

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Blog post from Lionel Pailloncy



I am traveling from Budapest, and I have been trough Beograd and Athens the last ten days. I am sitting outside, on the boat from Piraeus to the Cyclades. There is not a single cloud out there. I am in the center of something incredible. Imagine yourself in the center of a ball. Two hemispheres are connected: one is the magnificent blue sea below your feet and the other one, a lighter blue, the clear sky where the sun is leading you. With such an intense perspective, I feel somehow connected with the nature and the elements.

The horizon line is smooth, and in few hours I will reach Milos, the final destination of my journey, and the beginning of the yoga retreat I have been looking for. I still have in my pocket the original leaflet, which I found in the Centre de Yoga du Marais, with the beautiful pictures and attractive program. Picture it, a small group of students, here for meditation and practice twice a day in splendid raw places, by the sea and embracing nature for sunrise and sunshine. What will I get from it?  How long will I keep the benefits of it?  Questions are on my mind, but I am confident about them.  Few hours on the boat and then, the island appears, le voyage ne fait que commencer.

May 2014, Paris

I remember clearly the week spent on Milos, in Greece.  Every now and then, when I think of it, I smile.  It reminds me the beautiful places I went to practice yoga in the evening, or just the mornings chanting with devoted yogis to greet the sun in its race around our heads. 

Yoga always has been a positive answer to me, for everyday quandaries.  As a sensitive person, it is important for me to share time with the same.  In Milos, I had a memorable time with the best instructor I could ask for, but also harmonious students. It's all about balance, isn't it?

During seven days, yoga was in the center of my mind. Practicing it twice a day was enough to calm my mind, and from the chaos, to look for the benefits from yoga.

Milos is a valuable place to me. I'll always cherish the memories of it. Those seven days were nothing but a deep immersion inside myself, a job I should have done earlier. In the Cyclades, I had the security to deal with the work to do.

Some years later, I know for sure that it is not far from me, even right now.  My senses are taking me there as often as I like to think about it.  It is as if I took a photo of the positive energy there, and, like a memorable photo I'd like to keep for myself, I often go back to it, to feel warm, calm, and happy.

I am grateful for Michelle for taking me there.

Aom.
Lionel Pailloncy

 2011 - 2013

2010

Shooting Stars and Flying Fish

Around our daily yoga practice of greeting the sun at 6:30am, just before the sunrises, we see the gold of the sun illumine the craggy rocks of the hill in front of us.  As the gold deepens the little goat on the hill bleats us a good morning.  The roosters crow in the distance and the soft breeze of the morning caresses our skin and cools us as we warm up our muscles.  As our senses open up in our practice we hear the gentle movement of the waves on the beach below.  This is how a typical morning begins on the yoga retreat on the island of Milos.  By the time we move out of savansa the sun is higher and we are ready for breakfast on the shady patio.  After that the day is ours to swim, to relax, to read or to join a field trip we schedule to explore the island.

A must is a boat trip around the island with scheduled stops to jump off and swim and snorkel through caves and rest on isolated beaches reachable only by boat.  The boat tour lasts all day with a scheduled stop on the island of Kimolos for lunch and more exploration to the island's little churches, a climb up the volcanos and a look at the wild horses.  Back on the boat speeding to the next cove we see flying fish and Lionel in our group even spots a sea turtle!  Afterward you are so invigorated, an evening practice is thoroughly wished for.  In the evening we practice facing the sea.  The sun sets to our left.  We are shaded and cool and after savasana ready for evening rest and  dinner at one of islands' most reputable restaurants, a 3 minute walk away with a sweeping view of the sea and the moon and stars.  

Late night you lie on your back as you did when you were a child and see the Milky Way so bright and so close to you it feels a few kilometers away.  These are nights in Milos, full of light from the sky.  Shooting stars are not a rare sight.  A new moon gave us a full night of possiblities to see them.

Alternatives to a typical day is yoga on the beach on a raised platform where you practice gazing out to the horizon where sea meets sky.  One of the field trips includes a trip to an evening practice at Sarakiniko.   Sarakiniko is a geological marvel.  The locals call it the moon scape as the area was formed by lava that cooled to a brilliant white and formed craters and coves.  An evening trip and practice allows you to appreciate the brilliance without the glare to the eyes during mid-day.  Here you can also swim, jump off cliffs into the cobalt blue Aegean.  I jumped!

Our practices allowed us to stretch the limits we had of ourselves, to face the walls we put up when we think we can't do more and stay in our usual habits.   A yoga retreat helps remind us these limitations are put up by us, that we put our minds in this place.   With our breath we move these walls a little further away to be carried away on the soft breeze that surrounds us.