RETREATS
When the question is what comes next.
DATES
THE INVITATION
The right time to pause is always somewhere ahead of you. When the project is finished, when the kids are older, when things get slightly less busy than they are this week. The conditions feel like the thing standing between you and rest, so you wait for them to improve, and they don’t, and you wait anyway. The part nobody mentions is that the waiting is the avoidance. To stop is to go quiet, and to go quiet is to be left alone with yourself, which is the one appointment all the busyness has been quietly arranging for you to miss.
Once the effort quiets, what’s left is awareness and peace that were present all along. You have not been away from it. You have simply been too busy looking for it elsewhere.
AT A GLANCE
DURATION
4, 6 or 7 days
GROUP SIZE
Max 8 guests
LOCATION
Cederberg
FOOD
Plant-based
No Coffee · No alcohol
THE FORMATS
The silence runs through the whole day, broken only by your daily check-in with Daria. Outside that, you do not speak. What changes between the formats is not the silence. It is how long you stay inside it. The silence is more than not speaking. No reading, no music, no devices, nothing brought in to fill the gaps. Just you, the practice, and a journal if you want one.
compact · 4 days
The short pause
longer passage · 6 or 7 days
The deeper dive
It is time to meet discomfort and stop negotiating with your thoughts. Time to notice what you’ve been avoiding. All formats follow the same rhythm. What shifts is how long you stay in the silence.
THE APPROACH
Sit still. Meditate. Stargaze. Journal. Let silence guide you.
1
2
The body has been keeping score of everything the mind filed under ‘deal with it later’. You feel it in the held breath, the braced jaw, the tense shoulders. It asks you to feel where it lives, and to stay there long enough, so something can complete. Most people do not realise how much they have been carrying until they put it down.
3
Twenty minutes in natural surroundings begins to lower cortisol. Forty minutes measurably reduces the brain activity responsible for rumination. In the Cederberg, the nights are dark enough that within a few days your circadian rhythm begins returning to its natural setting. Your body does not need to be convinced.
WHAT A DAY LOOKS LIKE
Enough structure to feel held. Enough space to breathe.
We could give you the timetable. The wake-up, the sitting hours, the gap after brunch. But the need to know the shape of the day before you arrive is the very thing you came to put down. The rhythm changes with the season.
MORNING
MIDDAY
AFTERNOON
EVENING
YOUR GUIDE
SOMATIC EXPERIENCING PRACTITIONER · MINDFULNESS TEACHER · FOUNDER
“My first 48-hour silent retreat cracked everything open. It didn’t fix me. It unmasked me. Silence taught me how to stay. How to stop trying. And how to trust what’s already here.”
She left a career that looked correct from the outside and felt increasingly wrong from the inside. Trained in Somatic Experiencing, certified mindfulness teacher under Martin Aylward, breathwork trained with Dan Brulé.
Daria does not help you get on top of your life. She sits with you while you discover you were never as far behind as you thought.
WHAT GUESTS SAY
WHAT DOES IT COST
All prices include accommodation, all meals, all practices, and guided stargazing. No hidden charges. Never more than eight guests, often fewer.
CANVAS AND TIMBER
Built from canvas and timber, which means the valley comes through the walls. Wind, water, first light. The simplest of the three, and the closest you can sleep to the land.
4 DAYS
6 DAYS
7 DAYS
Solo
R19,500
R22,500
R28,500
Double
R29,400
R32,000
R39,500
wood and glass
Built from wood and glass, set between the rocks. Floor-to-ceiling windows put the valley in the room with you. The one most people picture when they imagine the place.
4 DAYS
6 DAYS
7 DAYS
Solo
R26,100
R27,500
R34,900
Double
R35,400
R39,000
R48,500
Cederberg rock
Built from Cederberg rock, set closest to the river. A separate bedroom, its own lounge, and a large outdoor space that is yours alone. The most private of the three.
4 DAYS
6 DAYS
7 DAYS
Solo
R28,200
R32,000
R39,500
Double
R40,800
R45,000
R56,400
Reserve My place
A 50% deposit confirms your place. You can pay upfront or in instalments.
If you are not committed to making a reservation yet and have some questions, contact us here.