The Journey and the Arrival

I spent a lovely Saturday evening savoring champagne, cocktails, Chinese food and cuddles before my departure to a pretty basic and organic farmhouse yoga retreat in Villamartin, Andalucia for the next three weeks. I woke up on Sunday morning, excited, nervous and totally unsure of what to expect. I am definitely the kind of person who likes to jump headfirst into things without really thinking about it, and as the departure time was creeping forward I began to freak out a little. What if I'm completely rubbish compared to everyone else?……what if I don't meet anyone I can get on with?….what happens if its freezing and I brought all the wrong clothes?….what happens if it was all a big internet scam and Im going to arrive and it doesn't exist?!!! haha!!

With all these thoughts in mind, I managed to persuade (not that much persuasion was needed) my man to join me in a scandalous Chinese brunch from the previous night's left overs so I could fill up even more on BBQ pork ribs, chilli chicken and beef noodles….hmmm yum!!! We enjoyed it to the max and I am sure "Chunch"…chinese/brunch geddit??!!…will be the next big thing!

When the time came to say goodbye to civilization, when I attempted to lift my suitcase, I realized I had perhaps jammed it slightly too full as I was traveling Ryan Air and by goodness do we all know that overweight baggage just does not go down well with them!!!! I then hurriedly threw a load of stuff out of my suitcase and began to panic. This was exactly the time when I needed my Pranayama breathing, which of course in my stressed out mood did not happen, hence the up and coming "training". Anyway, once I had pulled out the bathroom scales to check the weight and thrown half of my wardrobe around poor Andrew's bedroom, I was ready to go!!!

Arrived at Stansted in no time, thanks to a rather good driver and an extremely fast car, so took a minute to breathe whilst standing in the bag drop queue!

So all was going smoothly and after a quick and VERY naughty stop in Kurt Geiger and possibly purchasing some very nice new boots in the sale, I boarded the plane. In between episodes of Gossip Girl, which I downloaded to watch over the next few weeks, not that it seems Im going to have much spare time, I also read a few paragraphs of my "Explaining Yoga Asanas" book, which is a seriously tough read, hence going back to Gossip Girl shortly after.

I had been emailing another student of the course before we left, as she was getting the same flight as me. I asked her how would I recognize her, she said I'm carrying a blue Hommel bag. I kept my eyes peeled and eventually saw her at the luggage collection point. Luckily, she was lovely and relieved to have someone else to accompany her to the retreat, as neither of us had any odea what to expect. She also did not have any idea where it was and only told me that when we were sitting in the rental car about to drive there!!!! YIKES!!! So, I did the dreaded deed of turning on data roaming abroad to find out where the hell we were going!! Anyway, my navagational skills won out and we met one of the guys from the retreat at the meeting place and he took us to the retreat. We went down dirt roads and through pot holes, over stones and we were thinking, how can there be anything even be up here??!!! Then, we got to the gates and the drive for Surylila Retreat Centre and omg it is beautiful!!! There are two big buildings with dorms in both, right on the top of a mountain, castle ruins to explore all over and plenty of beautiful hikes to do. Because we arrived so late, everyone was already in bed, so like theives in the night we snuck in to our dorm and jumped straight into bed. By this time it was 12pm and we had to be up at 6am for meditation!! So I went straight to zzzzzzzzz!!

Needless to say, I am already thoroughly enjoying the whole experience and the excitement of doing something so spontaneous and beneficial for myself. I think when someone chooses to go on a teacher training course, they are somewhere in their life where they are ready to take a risk, to change their lives in some way, I know I feel that way!!! And to meet so many different people at such important stages of their lives, as I am is truly inspiring.

I will however keep u updated on my first day of training and the future hereon.

Goodnight for now and speak to u tomorrowwwww

Namaste ;) xxx