14-Day Yoga Pilgrimage to Nepal
21st March – 3rd April 2020
With revisiting yoga teacher Alix Northup
This yoga pilgrimage to Nepal will begin at a beautifully located Tibetan Buddhist monastery in the area called Pharping, in the South Western corner of the Kathmandu Valley of Nepal. In this beautiful monastery, surrounded by rice fields and pine tree forest and with big views overlooking the Kathmandu Valley, is where our sessions of mediation and yoga will take place. After having settled in for the first few days, we continue our journey to Namo Buddha, another sacred site in the Kathmandu Valley. We stay at a lovely resort in the area of Namo Buddha where we can enjoy fresh vegetables from their organic farm. After spending a few days here, the pilgrimage journey continues to Phablu in the foothills of the Himalayas. We spend the first few days in Phablu, doing a one day hike up to a stunning Tibetan Buddhist onastery, tugged into the cliffside outside of Phablu.
After this, we begin our hike through the upper valleys of Solo until we reach the Buddhist nunnery on a hill nestled into pine tree forests and prayer flags. Here we spend three days, taking part in the lives of the nuns, before making a loop back to Phablu during our 6-day hike. If weather permits, we will get a glimpse of the majestic Himalayas from Phablu. The following day, we travel back toward Kathmandu Valley by flight if the weather permits. We spend the last days of the yoga pilgrimage in Boudha where we have a free day to do the last shopping and simply observe the people around the Boudha Stupa.
The yoga and meditation theme will be weaved into our days, both in Kathmandu and in the mountains, as we embark on an inner and outer journey through Nepal.
Introducing the Facilitators
Alix is based in Portland, Oregon, in the USA and offers group classes, private classes and workshops, specializing in yoga therapeutics and back care, both locally and internationally. A student over 20 years, Alix has been teaching yoga since 2007. She is registered with the yoga alliance at 500 hour level, and is also a licensed massage therapist. Her yoga classes combine elements of meditative practice from various traditions of yoga and conscious movement, with the intention of bringing mindfulness into the yoga experience, on and off the mat. Alix first visited Nepal a few years ago, and fell in love with the friendliness and the resilience of the Nepali people, and the beauty of the Himalayas.
To learn more about Alix Northup, please visit www.alixnorthup.com
– We are very excited to be facilitating this yoga pilgrimage again!
We start the day by exploring the inner experience of awakening in ourselves, as well as grounding our awareness into the body through yoga, and in the afternoon sessions we enhance the experience by becoming pilgrims and yogis. We explore the outer element of sacredness and the culture of awakening by visiting, and paying homage to the many sacred temples and shrines in the Kathmandu Valley.
- 8:00 – 9:00 Yoga
- 9:15 – 10:00 Breakfast
- 10:00 – 12:00 Morning philosophy session
- 12:00 – 1:00 Lunch
- 1:00 – 4:30 Visiting sacred sites & hiking in nature
- 7:00 – 8:00 Dinner
- 8:00 – 8:30 Evening meditation
Info on Meditation
There is no prerequisite for joining the yoga pilgrimage, or to have in-depth knowledge or experience with the practice of meditation. Simply, to have the wish to go deeper with one’s mind, and to have curiosity regarding its functions is enough. There is nothing religious about the practice of meditation, or to visit sacred places and shrines. In fact, there is nothing even Buddhist about it. The practice of meditation is simply a tool to bring your mind back to a place of naked awareness, to a place of basic space with yourself. In fact, it is simply put a technique with which to uncover all the layers of hope and fear, grasping and expectations that are all such strong habits of the mind. With the practice of meditation we can learn to come back to ourselves, and to become familiar with the groundless and raw quality of reality.
Info on Yoga
The yoga sessions will combine themes from the meditation practices along with carefully sequenced active and restorative poses, gentle unwinding movements, vinyasa, and breath work. Detailed alignment, experiential anatomy, sensory awareness, and mindfulness is emphasized to encourage deep listening and a compassionate understanding of one’s own mind-body with the overall intent of cultivating prajna (insight and wisdom) within the yoga experience on and off the mat. Classes are suitable for all levels and modifications of will be given as needed.