We are continually inspired by vintage travel posters, postcards and photographs. When we were rebranding last year, these tokens were our main inspiration. Not only for the color and type, but for the memory they provoke. We wanted to share with you a collection of a few from some of the locations we are visiting this year. Hope you enjoy and tha it inspires you to travel somewhere with us in the future!
Our EPM team are avid readers and we wanted to share with you what we are currently into. We would love to hear back from you any suggestions. We want to make this a place we can share and exchange ideas, so comment away!
We always love catching up on their journal for recipes, informative articles, city guides and so much more. On the blog this week we wanted to share a super simple face mask you can make at home with ingredients you probably already have on hand. Enjoy and take some time to pamper yourself naturally with ease.
We are looking forward to several retreats in Tuscany this year and thought we would highlight some of the charming Italian towns we visit while there. (Our Itinerary changes depending on the retreat and time of year but this will give you some insight into the region.)
We are so excited to introduce to those of you who don’t already know her, our newest collaborator for our yoga + self care + cuisine retreat in Tuscany, Amy Commander! Amy has been friends with our founder Erin for many years and after last years Puglia retreat (Amy is also half of Boxerina) they have finally found the perfect collaboration in Tuscany.
We are getting so excited to return to one of our favorite fall destinations: VENICE!!! We go in the fall for several reasons: we avoid the heat and humidity that would be unpleasant for a city that is primarily explored by walking, we avoid the huge crowds that block the narrow winding streets of the city, and we get the beautiful fall light and possibility of Acqua Alta photography. (More on that later!)
“I do want to thank you again for planning and offering this lovely trip. It was so enjoyable on many levels and everyone here was so easy to be with. It was a fabulous vacation, one of my best! Our host Julian was most knowledgable, kind and engaging. His knowledge of history, art and culture was quite enlightening. I recommend the trip to anyone... ”
If you have been following us for a while, you know that as a part of our Give Back program, we sponsor a student through the Croatian Scholarship Fund. Our scholarship funds all go to one particular student, Erika, who is just the best source of inspiration and joy to our team. She updates us from time to time on her life, and she is the embodiment of what we believe adds up to a full life.
Today’s guest post is one that makes us SO happy! We recently saw that some of our past guests from the US all gathered for a mini-retreat on their own to reconnect as friends, do some yoga and enjoy an enticing location in Palm Springs, CA. One of the things we love most about our retreats is that people from all over the world get to meet other guests who, despite being different ages, nationalities and backgrounds, have similar interests and life philosophies. While we always stress that our retreats are chances to go inward and restore yourself, an added bonus is often the surprising friendships that are formed.
As many of you know, a portion of the profits from the retreats we run go to charitable organizations in the areas we visit, and our Give Back partner for our Marrakesh, Morocco retreats is Project Soar. A non-profit with a mission to empower teenage girls in the developing world, Project Soar is “based off the 5 Pillars of Empowerment, which embody our beliefs that every girl should have the opportunity to know her Value, Voice, Body, Rights and Path.”
When I was 19, I fell in love with an Indie Kate Winslet film called Hideous Kinky. It was about a young English woman who moves with her two small daughters to Morocco and gets lost in the soul of the place. I watched it over and over, taking in the colorful souks, the music, the sufi poetry, the vast desert and mountain landscapes, pink city walls shaded with orange blossoms and roses and silver pots of sweet mint tea.
We just got back from our annual time in Bali, and it was just as refreshing as we expected. We always find the culture and people to be a breath of fresh air.
While in Bali, we were able to visit Threads of Life, our Give Back partner for the location. (For our retreats, we donate a portion of our proceeds to local non-profits to offset our traveler footprint and engage with the community we are visiting.)
We love getting the word out about other companies and people out there doing good. That’s why we started this ‘Karma Connections’ blog series. Today we get to share with you about MAKEMERRY, created by one of our EAT.PRAY.MOVE guests, Dr. Katie Deming, a radiation oncologist. MAKEMERRY is the first line of soft, stylish, sexy intimates meticulously designed to provide pain-free support after surgery, during radiation, and beyond.
Earlier this month we wrapped up a really unique and wonderful time in Venice over our New Year’s retreat - the perfect melding of adventure and tranquility. While it’s true that Venice is a bustling city, full of art and color and life, it’s also true that in winter, it’s incredibly peaceful and quiet. It’s the perfect time to explore and see the city as it’s meant to be seen. And, as we found out, it’s an ideal setting for transitioning out of one year and entering another with clear minds.
Thirteen years. Twenty countries. Countless more to go.
The more I travel, the more it becomes apparent to me that it is in my DNA. As a kid, I loved going on trips – whether a staycation to a nearby hotel or a warm weather getaway to escape the Midwest winters. Despite my love of travel, the first time I left the country was in my late 20s. A year or so later, I decided that I was going to visit a new country every year until something got in my way.
Hello everyone! We hope your winter is off to a lovely start and your holidays have been full of love. We decided this year would be a great time to start our first ever gift guide for the holiday season! While retreats are great, our ultimate goal is to provide tools that might bring mindfulness and presence to your everyday lives. So we have compiled a list of things that really continue the theme of finding focus and calm in the chaos of life, whether it's using yoga, rituals, meditation, art or manifesting your goals. There are even some ways to bring the smells and textures of world travels into your home. Now is a great time to start looking toward the new year and cultivating habits that help you ground yourself and bring possibility. We hope you enjoy it!
We are back with our Traveler Testimony series, where we talk to past guests about their experiences on retreat! This time, we talked to Deborah, who is based in Southern California. She is a PR professional who has worked in entertainment, book publishing and tech. Deborah has not only joined us on three retreats (Marrakesh, Bali and Spain), but she has lived all over the US, including New York and Seattle. We wanted to know more about what led her to join us for her travels.
As many of you know, our Give Back partner for our Croatia retreats is the Croatian Scholarship Fund. We were lucky to sponsor a student named Erika, and we never fail to be delighted by her joy and energy for life. She recently sent us an update, so we wanted to share what she’s been up to and what it looks like to give back to someone who is doing good in the world. Erika embodies what we at EPM believe creates a full life: her love of travel, movement, relationships, time in nature, meaningful work and giving to others always inspire us.
We want to be able to offer something to our guests when they aren’t on retreat, so we are committed to bringing you offerings from our retreat leaders to bring you some extra sources of grounding, creativity, energy, and more. First up, we have Jen Carter, who often leads our Mindful Movement retreats with yoga and meditation.
You may remember from our past posts, one of our past guests and collaborators is Rupi Sood, the curator of international arts and culture publication J’AIPUR Journal, an international arts and culture publication telling East-meets-West stories about people and places that inspire. They have a mission to observe, listen and contemplate, an idea that we fully support here at EPM.
We are so happy to share this article from The New York Times profiling Maryam Montague, owner of Peacock Pavilions and founder of Project Soar, a non-profit that offers girls academic support, empowerment coaching, health education, sports and arts classes. Project Soar has been our Give Back partner for Marrakesh for years now, and we are so happy to see it getting this coverage.
At EAT.PRAY.MOVE, we have all had the common experience that travel is not just vacation and frivolity—travel in its nature is an act of mindfulness. Many dismiss travel as a selfish or frivolous act, a yin and mindless activity in our lives. We couldn’t disagree more—travel is an active experience for the mind, one that challenges and changes people. While many people join our retreats because they know yoga to be a tool for presence, energy, meditation and expansion, what we hope they go away with is the knowledge that travel, too, can be a conduit for all of these things.
We just announced our new Venice New Year retreat, and along with that exciting news, we have decided on a Give Back partner for our retreat: Save Venice.
