The Gratitude Vietnam Retreat Venue Blog

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(3 days, 3 nights) from $400 Dear Friends, We’re delighted to share with you the second of our upcoming retreats: a mindful mini-break designed to provide a weekend of stillness and peace in the midst of daily-stresses. Press pause on your busy life, step out of ‘auto-pilot’ and join us for an immersive and gentle weekend of living in mindful awareness. Through self-inquiry, guided activities, yoga and meditation, discover the benefits of ‘being present’ and give yourself pe

Dear friends, We are delighted to share with you the new-look Gratitude Vietnam retreat venue website! If you would like to just have a look, visit https://gratitudevietnam.com, but if you have a little time and would be happy to feedback as you browse, please click here and follow the instructions given (all comments are completely anonymous). As with everything, we value your feedback and will use your comments to make improvements! Now that we are up and running, we would

Dear friends, We’re delighted to announce visiting practitioner Rj Noble, who will be leading sound bowl Level 1 and 2 singing bowl training workshops here in August and September. Having experienced 1:1 sessions, group sound meditation journeys and training with Rj, I can personally highly recommend him and am thrilled that he is able to join us! 29th August – 2nd September (3 Days, 4 Nights) from $500 Every sound is a vibration and every living cell responds directly to vi

3-11 August 2019 (7 days, 8 nights) Dear friends, We’re thrilled to share with you the next of our upcoming retreats – a Yoga Fun Holiday! About the retreat Enjoy the perfect balance of relaxation, yoga and meditation with memorable cultural experiences. With twice-daily yoga and evening meditation, combined with a fun-packed week of Vietnamese cookery, lantern making, excursions and a trip to the beautiful An Bang beach, you’ll leave feeling recharged, refreshed and energise

Dear Friends, After six weeks of building work, the yoga sala structure now has a traditionally crafted coconut leaf roof, and the garden a bamboo fence! The natural materials used have transformed the space from an industrial-looking shell into a tranquil oasis, in keeping with the gentle rustling of the palm-trees beyond. Despite having a deliciously refreshing breeze, making it the coolest spot in the villa, we’re now having ceiling fans, sound system, lighting and plug s

11-15 July 2019 (4 days, 4 nights) Dear Friends, As promised, we are happy to announce the first retreat to be held at Gratitude Vietnam. Reiki is a modality we are both passionate about, and one that has brought change to our daily lives as we continue to practice the philosophy and embody Reiki as a way of life. Bookings are now open for our Reiki 1 Training, at a special discounted rate as our opening retreat. Book Now About the retreat and training Immerse yourself with

Dear Friends, We are delighted to have received the news that the villa itself is now licensed as a ‘Tourist Villa’, which means that legally, we are operational! Following a major leak earlier in the week that set us back a few days, we are now back on track; adding details to the rooms, tidying some ‘interesting’ finishes on some of the building and finalising the website. Hesitantly, (as this is Vietnam, and we’re very used to unexpected delay!) we would like to announce

Dear Friends, The past two weeks have disappeared in a blur of ‘doing’ as we’ve been preparing the villa ready to open at the beginning of July! We have been promising photographs, and we’re thrilled to share a selection of ‘the details’ – room photographs will follow soon, we promise! The Villa The Pool The Sunset Balcony and ‘Bar’ The Room Details The Meditation Space and Snug Last night, we welcomed a group of friends from Hoi An for the first time! After a tour of the vi

Dear Friends, It’s been a sweltering week here in Hoi An – at 38°C (100.4°F), even Hannah who normally only sweats from her nose, has been wringing out her plait as she works around the villa! She wouldn’t let me share the photograph of her at work, so have included one of her with our loyal therapy dog, Poppet, who we belatedly discovered is actually of the male variety! We are amazed at how much has been achieved since we last blogged. Sample curtains are now up, beautifu

Dear Friends, It’s been go, go, go, since we last blogged about our journey towards creating our beautiful retreat venue! Yesterday, the villa was a hive of activity with a team of six completing a deep clean throughout, electricians installing emergency lighting, many deliveries, two measurements and quotes for curtains, and painters decorating the spa. The pool, with the backdrop of our landlady’s artwork, is now fully cleaned and ready to use, and we’re looking forward to

Dear Friends, As we frantically navigate the inevitably delayed finish of the villa, and ready it for photographs to be taken from Friday, we have encountered a day of balance. Balance of frustration and gratitude in equal measures! A day trip to DaNang is never really something we look forward to, as it means leaving our quiet bubble of happiness in Hoi An, however it had to be done! The electronics and cash-and-carry trip was productive, but the mission to get a VAT receipt

Dear Friends, We’ve had a fabulous week of meeting with like-minded people in the Hoi-An Community, whether in person or online! Having enjoyed a thoroughly geeky conversation about the polyvagal theory, somatic healing and gratitude as a practice (not an attitude!), we’d like to share with you our ‘top picks’ of books we will keep in our wellness library at the villa that explain the body-mind connection 1. The Body Keeps the Score: Mind Brain and Body in the Transformation

A year ago, I was rushing headlong to the end of a two year contract. I had signed the contract to save for a new life, start a business and leave the safety of the institution of education I had been happily ensconced in since starting school at the age of five. These two years felt like a life-sentence, yet when they had passed, it felt as though the time had run away in a flash! The impact of this perplexingly contextual perception of time during this period has stayed

Dear Friends, Since signing the final villa contract last Monday, everything has stepped up a gear! The licence to build the yoga sala has just come through, the pool is filled with water, and we’ve completed the (slightly dreaded) trip to Danang to test and order mattresses and bedding. The mattress decision was a quick one! Those of you familiar with the cultural predilection for hard beds in Asia will be delighted to hear that they are Western-style, fully sprung, and th

Dear Friends, We hope you are well and enjoyed the Spring Break if you had one, and indulged on some lovely chocolate! The past few weeks have been a test of resolve and patience as we’ve negotiated (and renegotiated!) the design of the yoga sala in order to gain a permit to build! We are however at a point where everyone involved seems to be happy, and we now just need the government to approve the build, which we are told should be straightforward and relatively quick. In

Dear Friends, This week we would like to share with you an unusual item that we will stock at the villa for the delight of all guests – Azenja! Alcohol is not something we had prioritised on our sourcing list, however we decided very early on that we would have wine, beer and a selection of spirits available. Having attended some fairly ‘militant’ retreats, and experienced enforced restriction of caffeine, alcohol, meat and other, sometimes seemingly arbitrary rules, whilst

Dear Friends, We are thrilled to share with you the first of our soft furnishings, handmade by the Hmong people of Hoa Binh Province in Northern Vietnam! Thanks to the warm support of Keith and Huong at Villagecraft Planet in Hoi An, we now have stunning bespoke Indigo Batik bed-runners and cushions to compliment the traditional architecture of the villa. The photographs below were taken step-by-step by the artisans as they created the beautiful decor, so that we could shar

Dear Friends, It’s been a hectic few weeks since we last blogged! The day after signing the contract for the ‘plan A’ land, we discovered that it was literally not worth the paper it was written on! To cut a long and complicated story short, we are still hoping the land will become available in the long term, but for now, have negotiated and signed for the ‘plan B’ land on the other side of the villa. Subsequently, we are delighted to announce that we have signed the depos

Dear Friends, Finally, the news we have been bursting to share! On Saturday 17th November, the day after arriving in Hoi An and the primary reason for such a swift departure from Phu Quoc, we viewed the most stunning villa. Still in the full swing of construction, we instantly fell in love with the antiquated architecture, location and feel of this beautiful building. Located in a quiet residential area on Cam Nam island, and only a 10 minute bike ride from the UNESCO Ancien