A sunny Sunday morning and my last day off in my yoga teacher training before I complete the course next weekend... I have just been for a massage that involved having Tibetan singing bowls placed on each chakra and hot herbal compresses on all my joints which was pretty blissful after 3 weeks of an average of four hours of yoga a day. My body feels pretty thankful for some attention. After a somewhat iffy start involving doing my back in during what I think was the first yoga session of the course (guessing that the lawnmover relatde back injury on [View Full Entry]

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And so back to Coromandel it was with my new found friend Hippie, a delightful man with an enourmous heart, magic ogre feet that rarely see shoes, a loud obxnoxious voice, twisted sense of humour and tendency towards uncouthness making him my perfect companion. Wilderlands is one of the oldest communes in New Zealand that's been going on since the 60s and encompasses wild bush, extensive vegetable gardens, orchards, a private beach, over a hundred hives, honey processing house, numerous self built homes, a sauna and communal hall. What was once someone's vision is now however coming to an e [View Full Entry]

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Kiwi Burn was magic. Almost ridiculously so. The magic started on the journey there when Roey and I stopped off on the way at a friend's house who lives on a festival site which previously was a plant nursery and so is full of magical mature trees and wooden stages and structures. I got really high and wandered around mesmerized by it all, tapping in to all the different energies and feeling so overwhelmed at how wonderful it is to be so sensitive and have that sensitivity heightened through weed and then NOT be in a city like London but be [View Full Entry]

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The night before leaving to Kiwiburn and I am sitting in Rowena’s living room eating toast with peanut butter and drinking a glass of wine while the crickets chirp outside. My soul is so in need of Kiwi burn. Months of not letting my hair down properly have taken their toll and a dose of debauchery, uncouth behaviour, dancing and frolicking and being around my kind of people is well and truly needed. I am over half way through my journey now, and for the first time have started thinking about home and thinking about the future. I have really started [View Full Entry]

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I arrived in Coromandel almost two weeks ago after taking a bus to Thames and then hitch-hiking from there up the peninsula, me and the hoop all orange and sparkly in the sunlight, both of us a sight to behold at the edge of the road, waiting for a ride....which was no problem at all to find. After a drive along the coast wit the velvet green mountains and rolling hills along side us, I was dropped off literally outside the herbal dispensary, my abode for the next month. I am slowly developing a real love for this country and its [View Full Entry]

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Who needs debauchery when you can wake up with the sun in your own little caravan, walk 5 minutes down the road to the beach and have a half an hour hoop followed by a skinny dip and all before breakfast? Not me it seems. Waiheke is a small island a 45 minute ferry ride away from Auckland and feels almost like it's own little country. It is full of idyllic little beaches, mangrove swamps, bush, and lots of holiday homes...almost 75% of the population disappear after the summer holidays. There is a real sense of community here though amongst the [View Full Entry]

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Hayfever at Christmas time is just wrong. So is listening to Elvis Presely singing Christmas duets with the sun shining outside. But then again the moon is upside down and the stars are inside out and and and...it's all rather confusing and peculiar. But it does remind you that you are living on a planet. In space. In a solar system. Galaxy. Universe. Rah. 'Tis a good thing I think. So my first chapter in New Zealand has come to an end and today I move on...and I'm excited. There have been some beautiful moments here at Herb Haven...spending time with [View Full Entry]

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A new country, a new continent, a new part of the planet. After having spent so long in a city like London building up constant barriers to protect myself it's a strange process letting myself unfold...peeling away layers, letting my surroundings under my skin. I suppose we humans are in constant interraction with our environment...we breathe in oxygen, we ingest nutrients and liquids, even our skin is semi-permeable, allowing certain substances from the external to the internal. But I've spent so long in denial of this, trying to block everything else out, the constant noise, distorted ene [View Full Entry]

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Sigh...* Life. 'Tis a funny thing eh? You trundle along one path, expecting one thing and it becomes apparent that life has different plans for you...I know this sounds completely ridiculous but I was most definitely not coming to India for adventures. Most certainly not. This was meant to be serious business. Work to do. Things to learn. Progress to be made. *Ahem* I seem to have spent a large portion of my life going on adventures, many of which I seemed to just find myself in and be helplessly drawn to, but a significant portion of which I actively [View Full Entry]

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I was awoken today in my hotel by the ubiquitous ringing of bells and mantra chanting. Laying in my bed, my good old stolen British airways blanket draped over me to protect me from frosty morning air I had to smile... not so many places in the world where you are woken up this way. I am starting to recognise many of the mantras, often find myself subconsciously humming them. Yesterday in our final ceremony at the Phool Chatti ashram where I stayed for the past week, we chanted one of them 108 times, sitting around a small fire, each with [View Full Entry]

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