Italy 2020 Trail Running Retreat

This has been a long time coming. Back in 2003 when I was completely culture shocked by my experience in Montreal, we bought an old ruin of a shepherd's house in Northern Tuscany. It was so cheap we got the money out on our credit cards. 
Here it is, the year after we bought it. Before then you couldn't even see the house.

We went back every summer to build and finally, around 2009, ended up with this:

and we're still building! Last summer we put a roof on the barn - seriously? It's a huge stone structure but we thought we could do it and we did.

I've had a dream about this place for many years, that I want to share it with others and open up this beautiful spot as a retreat centre. We always had volunteers visiting, bartering their skills for board and lodging, so we're used to a crowd... but finally two years ago I hosted a women's healing retreat and it was wonderful!

This year, I am hosting a women's rest and recharge retreat (one spot left!), and for the first time we are hosting a Plant-Based Trail Runners Retreat! 

I am very lucky to have a great coach on board: Coach Kyle coaches runners around the world. He will be offering a one-on-one session with each runner, and of course will lead the daily trail runs and supervise strength work, stretching and other work (gratitude practice, breathing techniques, plant-based nutrition advice). I also have a guest yoga teacher joining us... the one and only Julia Gordon...here is what she has to say: 

"Hello runners and fellow adventurers! I am looking forward to meeting you all in the Tuscan hills!

About me: I completed my Yoga Teacher Training Program at Anamaya Yoga School in Costa Rica in 2016. I discovered my own practice in 2006 while completing a three year contemporary dance program and came to yoga with a passion for expressive movement. Over the years I have found that yoga helps me to maintain a sense of freedom in a fast paced world. By connecting to my body I remember my own strengths and individuality and feel more confident in my place in the world. In my class I’d like to invite people to do the same. During this retreat we can address specific concerns that come up for runners, but also focus on increasing a sense of openness and fluidity in the body in general. I will offer a mix of strength building asana and yin practice, as well as guided visualizations, that will have you up and running through this beautiful Italian landscape."

Our meals will be plant based and abundant. Our menu is designed by the chef at my very own cafe in Montreal, where we serve delicious vegan and vegetarian food. Accommodation is basic and shared, but comfortable and I guarantee you will sleep well. We have a million stars in the sky every night, and a night time silence broken only by the occasional scuffle of the boar roaming in the chestnut groves.

Are you into something different this summer? Challenge yourself! Come along and run with us! Visit us here!

Dreamchasing Trails

In 2003 my winter blues reached a breaking point and we decided to leave the city for the summer, use our savings to buy a piece of land in Italy, and start building. This is what we bought, the second year after that - when we first bought it, you couldn't even see the house because everything was so covered in greenery.

But I knew when I first stepped out of the car and breathed the clear air, and looked down into the valley and saw this:

that I was as home as I would ever be. Time passed and over the summers we made the house beautiful. Then we started working on the barn:

This fine structure is a drystone construction, with high beams and rafters, and an original thatched roof that had been covered with corrugated metal at some point. It housed animals, shepherds, resistance fighters, snakes, squirrels and other assorted creatures. We found in it many wine bottles, the old blown glass kind wrapped in straw, two army helmets (one German, one American..), lots of old shoes and garbage, and some religious postcards.

A few years ago we started work on it. I wanted to do some upper body work that summer, so I figured a good start would be hauling 20 cubic meters of dirt from where it was down to another terrace. After the dirt was hauled away, we started building a retaining wall or two,

And we ended up with these pretty terraces.

This summer we have to redo the roof. It's gotta be done. If we don't do it, it will fall in. Not a good idea. So, we have to take it down, remove the beams, then make a new roof. Don't worry, I'm not the master builder. There is actually someone in the picture who knows what he's doing. But I have built a couple of roofs with him, so I'm pretty handy with a cement mixer and all that.

This place contains some of my dreams. Not all of them, because I'm not that rooted in place. But I have plans to create a space up on the mountain where people can come and retreat. They can come and run, eat, think, create. Or just play nutball, which is played with unripe walnuts and a stick.

What I love to do there is to run on the trails. I have been running in the mountains since I was young. I love the feeling of my breath, my legs, I love taking in the air and the sights, the sound of my feet on the ground...

But you don't have to run. You can slowly walk up the hill, to the abandoned village, then take a left and go to the fixed-up house, or follow the road past the evergreen grove and past the house and then follow the bend which takes you up further, where there are often deer, and the best St John's Wort on the mountain. Then straight, and up and up and up, until you reach the logging patch, and then you go further and further and further, up and up, until you reach the ridge where you can look down - you are at about 1000 m above sea level now .... and running this trail is such a pleasure. You're sweaty and breathing hard. All around you is green, peace, and the sound of the mountain's breath. 

Life on the mountain is good. It's understood that you mind your own business. The road is treacherous and not for the weak-hearted. Occasionally a hiker passes by, or a cyclist, or a Scout. Often lost. It's quiet at night, and sometimes the whole mountain is lost in a cloud and the wind howls up from the valley.

There are buzzards in the sky, cuckoos in the spring; wild boar, deer, badgers, porcupines, snakes, lizards, all sort of bugs, honey bees... scorpions ... wild flowers everywhere, cherries, plums, apples, medicinal herbs of all varieties, mushrooms poisonous and otherwise. Nature is present, and thriving, as it does.

The green heals my soul. Running the trails on my mountain, I find peace from the human world, where cowardice and selfishness are fast becoming desirable attributes. Wordsworth wrote over 100 years ago:

"The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;—
Little we see in Nature that is ours"

Yes, we are getting and spending, and wasting ourselves. We imagine that busyness is constructive and useful, but it's not. It is much better to be consciously not busy; to have time to look around at the world, and to look deep inside yourself.

Don't be too busy to go for a run.
Don't be too busy to lend a hand to someone in need, even if it's inconvenient.
Don't be too busy to spend time with your child.
Don't be too busy to spend time with your lover.
Don't be too busy to give a friend some time.
Don't be too busy to cook supper, to eat with others, to feed yourself.
Don't be too busy to make the world a better place.
Don't be too busy to do hard things. It is the stuff of life, and it centers us in this marvellous world.

Work in Progress aka Life

In 2003, I was done with city life. We were living in Montreal, not a huge city, but big enough, dirty enough and fast-paced enough to qualify as a big city. Life was fast, cold, busy. We decided to take some of our savings, and borrow some, and buy a ruin in Northern Italy that we could fix up and maybe one day live in. We had experience: we raised four children, renovated an old stone farmhouse, and ran a small subsistence farm in the previous chapter of our lives.

We've lives our lives following our dreams. Sometimes they turned into nightmares, mostly not. We've been poor, rich, and in between. We've been lonely, together, with and without children. Now we have five grown sons and perhaps another chapter is opening.

In any case, our mountain hideaway is a big part of our lives, and it's always been part of other peoples' lives too. This past summer, we hosted our first "work-in-progress" retreat. It was a great success! It was a healing retreat for women, and we learned how to stop and let life happen. It was about fun, playing, resting, eating and drinking, hiking, and being ourselves.

This year, 2019, we have a huge building project! Our land has two stone structures on it. We've fixed up the small one:

and now we have to get to work on the bigger one!

This is the barn. It's a huge, beautiful stone structure with a giant corrugated iron roof, that was put up many years ago to cover the original thatch. The roof has to come down, the beams have to be replaced, and we have to put a new roof on that baby.

So no retreats planned this summer. But if anyone out there loves to build and you want to come and visit for a while? Come on down! 

Next summer, though, I have three fantastic retreats planned. I'm inviting eight women to come and learn how to rest. I'm inviting eight experienced trail runners who want to master trail running in these mountains ... 

and I'm inviting eight women runners who want to learn about running trails, in a safe and fun environment, with an experienced running coach.

Drop me a line if you're interested in any of these activities - more details and dates to come!

Work In Progress!

Beach day!

Sage Sticks