Crete - Triopetra, June 9-16

Arriving at Triopetra beach in the south of Crete by car from Heraklion, the retreatants began to assemble on Saturday. The stunning silence and remoteness of this place is colored by the jewel-tones of the water and sense-apprehending geology of the landscape. It kind of catches your breath for the first couple of days.
The first week of this trip is focussed in a retreat setting largely on practice, during which time there are morning and evening practices and optional evening meditation, approximately 5 hours a day of practice opportunity. I really enjoyed sharing the fascinating and tumultuous history of Crete with the retreatants on our first day together, marked by an abrasive sandstorm that threatened to drive us away from the beach! There was a wild windstorm for the first two days of our stay at Triopetra, winds strong enough to blow you right off of the stairwell to the Yoga room overlooking the ocean, challenging our early morning motor coordination! It calmed down after two days but was a potent harbinger of other global-warming influenced oddities in the weather patterns for Greece that included a thunderstorm at the beginning of June and a broiling heatwave at the end of the month.
During the first week after making a couple of excursions to see the harbour town of Rethymno and traditional local village of Spili, we all learned to cherish the pristine calm of Triopetra, even those of us who were yearning to "do" things while on retreat. We had no idea how relaxed we had become there until we left briefly to other places, only to return gratefully.
There was a small group for the first week and we enjoyed each other's company tremendously, it seems fair to say! I enjoyed the diversity in age ranges represented by our group, and each person's background brings something so unique to the group experience. Yet, all of that diversity melts as the essence of each radiant person within unfolds as we slow down, connect in the practice, and appreciate the unbidden gifts and power of nature to restore and heal (and occasionally chapping us with Sun).
There was a great local taverna nearby to enjoy traditional Greek food at, and some opted to go out at night here to enjoy music and company of the locals...and the famous hammocks of the Cretan beach life...
During the first week we covered a lot of ground experientially and academically in our Yoga study, learning about Samkhya and Ayurveda in a workshop where the participants took a self-quiz to learn about their doshas, or constitutional balance. We then did an asana practice based on the effects that posture and pranayama has on each of the doshas. There was also a two-part workshop on subtle anatomy on separate afternoons. It is amazing how time can go by so quickly and slowly at the same time in a setting like this. For me, as the facilitator, I feel so much happening...then there is the spare couple of hours to go down to the water and dance in the tides, and lay out on the beach, and dissolve the sense of time altogether...and then more practice...and getting to see the deepening layers of the beauty inside of people emerging together.