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Marsala

Marsala

When I visited France in 2023, I felt a strong impulse to visit Italy. Cannes is only a couple hours from the border of Italy, and a lot of Italians live in the south of France. The impulse didn’t subside after returning home from France, and during my three months in Guatemala in early 2024, I began to plan my return to Italy.

Antigua

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The French Riviera

Cannes

My first visit to Europe was a 2-week vacation with my ex-husband 14 years ago. We spent a week in Italy and a week in Spain, and it was my first time ever leaving the country. I learned a lot on that trip, and I’d thought about returning many times, but hadn’t mainly because of the cost.

Goa

Toward the end 2022 while I was in Progreso, Mexico, I realized that I had become quite disconnected from my spiritual practices since the pandemic hit in early 2020. I had abruptly stopped teaching yoga, which for six years had been a grounding force that kept me rooted in my yoga and meditation practices.

Panchakarma

During my stay at Preksha Yoga, I decided to do a consultation with the Ayurvedic doctor who worked on the premises. She did a comprehensive analysis of my doshas to give me an understanding of what was out of balance in my body. Her recommendation was that I do a personalized version of Panchakarma. Panchakarma is an intense Ayurvedic detoxification process made up of five parts: vamana (purging by vomiting induced by ayurvedic medication), virechana (purging induced by herbal laxatives), basti (ayurvedic enema treatments), nasya (cleansing of the nasal passages), and raktamokshan (therapeutic bloodletting using leeches).

Oaxaca

Oaxaca City

In 2022, I had the opportunity to spend six months in Mexico, split into two trips. The first trip lasted four months, and I spent the first two weeks in Oaxaca, and the remainder in Chiapas. I began my trip to Mexico on December 31, 2021, after one of the most challenging years of my life. Not only was I navigating the changes and challenges along with the rest of the world that the pandemic brought, but I also finished my master’s program, started a new business, and put my 16-year-old dog to sleep. And it all came to a head in December of 2021.

Chiapas

San Cristobal de Las Casas

I finally boarded my bus to San Cristobal and prepared myself for a 14-hour ride. I did my best to sleep, but we stopped every hour which would wake me up as soon as I’d get relaxed enough to finally doze off. After a very long night, I arrived in San Cristobal around 7:30am the next morning. I was delighted to see that I had phone service again and called an Uber to take me to the Airbnb I had booked a few days prior. I checked into my Airbnb and began to get settled. I was exhausted but also hungry, so I headed out to get some breakfast and supplies before lying down for a nap.

Progreso

After returning home from my 4-month trip in Mexico during the first part of 2022, I knew I wanted to return in the fall. I decided not to return to San Cristobal, mainly because things fell apart between Yajaira and me a few weeks after I left Mexico, but also because I wanted to do more exploring. I had been interested in visiting Mérida, Yucatan for some time, and had heard really great things about it.

Lake Atitlan

My first international trip after the pandemic was a 10-day self-retreat in Guatemala in May of 2021. I had been wanting to visit Guatemala since 2015 when I tried to host a yoga retreat with a fellow yoga teacher at Lake Atitlan. However, no matter how hard we tried, we could not get a single person to sign up for the retreat. I’ve led many yoga retreats during my teaching career and have never had that much trouble getting people to sign up. International retreats are naturally more difficult to fill because of the cost and time commitment, but I think this one was particularly difficult because of the location. Guatemala has a bad rap because of violence and cartel activity. Many people I’ve talked to have preconceived fears about the safety of traveling there. But for some reason I’ve always been drawn to visit, and after doing some research, I found that there are several places that are safe for travelers.

Antigua

After my week of self-care at Lake Atitlan, I headed to Antigua for three days. I had been loosely looking for a place to study Spanish in the future, and I had read that Guatemala was a good place to learn. Guatemalan Spanish is said to be clearer and easier to understand than some of the other Spanish speaking countries. I had also read that Antigua was one of the safer places in Guatemala for tourists, and therefore had a substantial expat population. So I decided to get a feel for the city and see if it would be a place where I’d want to return to spend more time in the future.