WHAT GUESTS SAY
Being here now is like being nowhere. It’s so very much about being in the moment and paying attention. All the safaris we’ve been on have all been different. You see different animals doing different things, and how easy it is to miss something. We’ve experienced something so unique and exceptional. It’s a bonding experience and memories that you share with people that you don’t have with anyone else in your life. Anca from London.
For myself, I’m going to be living high for the next couple of weeks – it’s going to be hard to get back to reality… I came here, first for the safari as it was my first time in Kenya. On top of that, I’ve had this wonderful experience with yoga, which has been absolutely mind blowing. The retreat was about pushing boundaries. Suddenly you are out of our comfort zone in the middle of the wild, with all of these animals around you. I remember feeling this fear in the beginning and every day, the longer I stayed here, the more comfortable and respectful became. We are surrounded by humans. Now we are in the animal’s territory. Just switching that has been a really interesting perspective. Nicolai from Munich.
What do you mean we are going to leave? We could just stay here forever! You come out of a very hectic life, running from one thing to the next, very much prefrontal planning, rationalizing, doing one thing after the next… constantly. The trip has been very grounding. There is something about being in this kind of nature that is extremely humbling. We live in cities, we are in control, we have everything arranged and you come out here and it forces you to breathe slower. Breathing slows you down and makes all of your little worries and plans slightly less important which allows you to come back into your body and spirit and profoundly reconnect. Cecilie from London.
This holiday has been just on time because of the growth of all of us together. Normal holidays and suddenly the holiday has gone and it's Friday time to go – but not on this trip – or this holiday has been too eternal for too long. I’ve been touched by something here, by what we’ve built. It’s us and Julie guiding us, enriched by the animals, the welcoming guides. From level zero to level advanced, we have all grown. I came here for a yoga experience and to discover Kenya. The way Julie explained things and I advanced in one week and I have never reached in a year of yoga in Paris. I cannot explain, you feel you can trust in yourself. Raul from Paris.
Everything was very well planned and still with a feeling of spontaneity and surprise moments. I can't think of anything that could have been improved. This was definitely the best retreat we've been to and top experience of traveling. It was a truly amazing experience and the yoga enhanced it even more. Heidi from Sweden.
A very true moment. A privilege within this wildlife and see all these animals. I feel very lucky to have experienced these special moments. Beautiful landscapes are very peaceful. With our busy lives, we forget we can be happy. We build a story around our life, a character, and sometimes we disconnect from the simple things, like being outside, connecting with nature. We forget it's very easy to feel well, and sometimes we need to go out of these crazy lives and come back to the basics. This trip is allowing us to understand, being so busy with my work it’s been difficult and being in nature chilling has been very good for me. Everything was very new for me, I was expecting to see animals and beautiful landscapes. But it was above my expectations for sure. I’m very grateful for all those moments. Thomas from Lisbon.
Today was very special for me. The first thing in my mind was not really a moment, but the feeling I had - the rhythm of the day. It’s in the air and everything was flowing and there were good positive vibes. I really liked walking in nature, not having a car around me, and just walking and just being in nature and I felt very vulnerable. A very nice feeling actually that we don’t feel that very often.
It’s kind of important to remember who you are in this world, and that kind of strong feeling is good to process them and realize that you are living these kinds of things and you are very small in this huge animal wild world. And that you are part of it of course too. Those are the two best moments of my really magical day. I was kind of in a huge bubble and I was feeling so vulnerable.
I felt the same way every day, very small but still fitting in – pretty magical. I forgot about everything else and it was just me and the wildness and the nature and the animals because I was just exploring everything around me. It was like me facing them and searching for them and I wanted to see them and to feel them. I don’t know how long I sat there. It was very intense. It was very magical. Very good feelings. I’m a small part of all of this – but I am still part of it. This place you have a right to be here but it's still not yours either, it's part of something bigger. You are part of something big, it's ok to be here but appreciate it too. It’s not just you so be grateful and feel vulnerable because it’s not only you.
I live in a big European capital city, it's not at all like these moments, chill and the time never stops there. Here the time stopped a lot for me. Refocus on essentials and know that you can be your own, you are in control of what you are doing, but a part of a big thing. I don't know if that makes sense, it's that feeling that is unexplainable. In my daily life I can’t feel it because of the rush, so when I feel it in those moments. I was in another African country last year and this African vibe got into me and I may come back every year – because it's important for me to feel these things and refocus and rebalance. Don’t get too dizzy and appreciate it - you own the place but it's not yours either. Maylis from Lisbon.
WHAT LEADERS SAY
TSR has exceeded all my expectations….
I’m sitting here really in the middle of Kenya Lewa Wilderness and this yoga retreat that I’ve done in collaboration with TSR has exceeded all my expectations. There really are no words to describe this past week and I will get quite emotional.
I’ve been a yoga teacher for 15 years and I’ve run so many retreats, I could count them on all 10 toes and 10 fingers but nothing compares to this experience. It is a once in a lifetime experience and Lewa is the most beautiful spectacular place I think in the entire world.
In collaboration with TSR, they made me feel safe and secure, especially as a teacher, coming over here I’ve never been to Kenya before. They planned everything meticulously. And same with Lewa everything was done so perfectly, it’s almost unbelievable how perfect everything was done. And the yoga wasn’t too bad either.
We’d wake up at 530 in the morning, we’d be in the jeeps by 6. We’d go on a 2/3 hour game drive depending on what we saw. We’d come back for a quick breakfast and we would do a 90 min / 2 hour practice. After that practice followed by delicious lunch, some downtime, every evening before dinner was different.
This is a perfect example of sundowner drinks we hiked here, we hiked for an hour through the bush with three extraordinary guides. We saw rhinos, we passed by elephant’s zebras, safe of course in the hands of the guides to arrive at something that I didn't even know could exist. We walked this in noble silence everyday was magnificent and tremendous.
It’s very hard for me to articulate into words how spectacular this retreat was because of the hands-on approach of The Safari Retreat. And I cannot wait to do it again next year. We’ve already booked the dates! I’m ready to come back next year! And it looks like I’ll be teaching on two retreats with TSR next year.
I want to end with when I became a yoga teacher 15 years ago I remember being asked why are you becoming a teacher – and the answer is the same today as it was then – that I don’t’ want anybody to ever feel as bad as I felt about myself in the past and yoga has given me the tools to feel confidence and find strength and be empowered – so to teach what I love it’s not just about the asana there are so many limbs within yoga and that’s why I created whole self yoga because it's all about the entire self – physical emotional mental and energetic body – its about your whole self and healing your whole self. To be able to bring my whole self here to this incredible landscape with wonderful people who also want to grow and find that courage and be empowered just like I wanted to be – it’s the most wonderful job in the world to have.
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Julie Montagu - Feb 2022
My time in Kenya has been hard to describe…
My time in Kenya has been hard to describe as there have been so many impressions that it will probably take not only days but many months to process. All I can say is I’m grateful and forever changed. The beauty of Kenya is not only breathtaking but transformative. We were lucky enough to mix the yoga practice with the exquisite backdrop of the Kenyan wilderness. It was a time we will never forget.
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Laruga Glaser, March 2022
It takes your breath away.
I definitely feel at my happiest when I’m in nature, when I can just be myself, I like to breathe fresh air. I like to move naturally, part of my job is observing how animals move with grace and ease and then how I observe how humans move with such clunkiness and awkwardness and lack of ease, I get a lot of my pleasure from seeing how we have gone so wrong as humans when I see how gracefully animals move.
It’s not about things that we humans produce, the answer is all around us all in nature, just watching, listening and just being. And doing what comes naturally in nature. And one thing as a Pilates teacher, Joseph Pilates was a genius, observed as animals moved, a lot of moves are moved after animals, the elephant the cat the snake that twists and moves with grace. How does that look like an elephant because we have lost that natural ability to love. It takes a lot of effort for it to look like an elephant or a snake twisting. It’s about being outside and exercising and being outside. For me that sums it up, being outside that is the answer.
I’ll tell you one thing that nearly every single person on this planet has forgotten how to do and that is to breathe. It’s the very first act that you do and the very last, yet my word is that we do not use our lungs and we do not breathe.
If you can’t breathe everything else falls away. You will be stale. Joseph Pilates says you wring out every single atom of air until you breath stops, and so you can then naturally inhale into every little space in your lungs that you have been given. Breath is the one thing that none of us do -it is so powerful – it calms your nervous system. Coming here – what does it do – it takes your breath away. We swam in that amazing crystal blue pool and you jump in the first thing you do, it takes your breath away.
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Victoria Hodgson, January 2022
Suddenly, I’m here in the bush.
Suddenly, I’m here in the bush. There is nowhere else to be. It’s where you feel good. When you get in the bush, everything settles. One layer after the other releases and the tensions disappear and you are just here. We haven’t been using our phones, it feels good being just here. Doing one activity after the other is being in the present moment fully. Travel feeds you and feeds me for sure. I can’t explain why it's something you feel inside.
We haven’t been using our phones, it feels good being just here. Doing one activity after the other is being in the present moment fully. When we arrived, we didn’t know each other but after a couple of days, we had a group of friends.
The people you meet the food, it gives you strength and then you come back home and you are stronger, because the food was different, take another type of vitamin you have been missing for a long time. It’s like suddenly you, like you have a magic vitamin and you are full of beans and you are keen for life again.
As humans we spend a lot of time running after something, more money, more job, your neighbours car, after this I'll be happy, when I have a kid I’ll be happy. If I get this job, when I retire I’ll be happy. Or as the older generation, when I retire, I'll do what you do.
Stop running after something you don’t know what it is and your always running and most of the time everything is already here, and your not stopping to seeing the things around you it’s a shame everything is there everything you need is around you and if you are super unhappy, isn’t cool, you need to figure out the blessing you already have around you and stop running after things because you;ll never be happy if you keep running your whole life.
If you think it's your 30s or 40s, it’s a state of mind, and if you don’t get out of it you’ll never be satisfied. I find coming outside spending more time outside, spend more time outside and rhythm with the seasons and the climate gives you a better chance to feel good and to understand your physical and mental and heart.
Connecting with other people, plants and animals is the only way to be satisfied in the long term.
Melissa Brown - February 2022
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