AMANAPipa Edition

AMANA is the first retreat by Vai con (C)alma dedicated to women only: seven full days in Pipa, on Brazil's Northeast coast, for women who feel absorbed by routine and want to find their way back to themselves. It brings together surf, yoga, dance, art therapy, sound healing, an ice bath and a cacao ceremony, and each of these practices is here for a reason, not to fill a schedule. This is not a closed, silent retreat. It is a living experience. You go out, you walk the village, you eat in the street, you dance, and you feel this place by day and by night.

Pipa is a fishing village that became one of the most beautiful places on the Brazilian coast without losing its own pace. Red cliffs falling into the sea, beaches that change shape with the tide, and dolphins that come close enough to the break that you can watch them from the water while you wait for the next wave. During the day, the sound is the ocean. At night, the village fills with music, food and people from everywhere. We chose Pipa because Brazil has an energy that no brochure explains, you feel it on your skin, and also because the same week that gives you silence in the morning, gives you back joy at night.

AMANA is for women who wake up, get through the day and reach the evening without knowing where they went. For those who already know they need to stop, but cannot do it alone at home. For those who want to travel solo for the first time and would rather have the safety of a small group and two guides who made that same crossing. No previous surf experience is needed, no yoga, nothing. All levels are welcome. What is asked of you is openness and the willingness to take the leap.

It is also worth saying what AMANA is not, because that saves everyone's time. It is not a silent retreat of closed introspection: here you talk, you dance and you go out. It is not a standard tourist package, with a full itinerary and no care behind it. And it is not a wellness product promising a miracle in seven days. What the week delivers is real, and that is exactly why it is possible.

Three things distinguish AMANA from a retreat that could happen anywhere in the world. The first is the real Brazil: surfing with dolphins, learning samba from people who dance samba, eating tropical food made fresh, spending a free evening in the village. You are never just inside a room. The second is that every activity has intention: yoga works on presence, surf works on balance and courage, dance works on the body, cacao and breath work on what is inside. The third is that the week was designed for women who arrive alone. The group is never more than ten women, and no one is left out.

You arrive, meet the guides and the group. And from there, the days find their own rhythm. Some mornings you are up early for the water, others you sleep in and join later. You can take part in every practice or step back and rest, walk the cliffs, sit by the ocean, or simply do nothing for a while. There is structure here, but no pressure. AMANA gives you seven days to find out what your own pace actually feels like.

AMANA is guided from beginning to end by Gisella and Oriana, the two founders of Vai con (C)alma Retreats. Both left a fast, demanding life to build another one, closer to themselves and to nature, and the retreat comes out of that crossing, not out of a business idea. Gisella has spent more than twenty years following the sun, works with water sports and yoga, and knows Pipa from the inside. Oriana was a manager in China and in Barcelona before finding her holistic path, and today she works with art therapy, cacao and the creation of retreats. You are not handed to a rotating team: it is the two of them, the whole time.