Mind-Body All-Women’s Mountain Retreat

The connection between our body and the land is essential for our health and our healing.

Our bodies have evolved over billions of years with the earth as intricate, interconnected entities. There is deep, inherited wisdom within them just as there is within the land.

Our bodies carry the memories and stories of our life, even if we don't remember.

Our sensations, emotions, and symptoms are the messengers of these stories.

Come learn how to listen more deeply to the intelligence of nature and your body through immersion in the wilderness and exploration through somatic and mind-body practices. 

You'll leave this immersion with a deeper connection to self, to nature, and make impactful shifts in your own journey of healing —whatever that looks like for you! 

  • Dates: August 14-19, 2023 (Monday - Saturday)

  • Location: High Divide Traverse, Baker-Snoqualmie NF, WA

  • Cost:

  • Guides: Julie Ann Holder (wilderness/Mountain guide) & Demi Fair (somatic experiencing practitioner)

  • Mode of travel: Backpacking with intention and presence

  • Women and anyone identifying as a woman is welcome to apply!

Meet Your Guides

Demi Fair

After struggling with IBS, anxiety, and obsessive thinking all her life, Demi began exploring the connection between her mind and body at a young age. This path brought her to many different healing modalities as an attempt to find relief from her symptoms.

Since university, Demi has been obsessed with the human-nature relationship and particularly the relationship between body and earth. After designing a concentration titled “Body, Earth, and the Arts”, in which she studied somatic psychology, human ecology, and creative expression, she set off to travel the world for six years. She explored the vast mountain ranges and cultures of the earth, while also exploring the complexities of her inner world. Nature, and especially the mountains, became a place of deep medicine, powerful insight, and significant healing.

After 15 years of working to heal her symptoms she was brought back to her roots in the mind-body connection. Learning how to listen to her body, trust her intuition, understand her nervous system, and process chronic and traumatic stress was the game changer.

Now Demi runs Trust Your Gut, a business that blends her embodied wisdom, foundation as a nutritional therapist, and current training in Somatic Experiencing. She supports those struggling with chronic gut-brain symptoms unlock the language of their body, gain new levels of awareness around what their symptoms are telling them, & make impactful shifts in their healing and quality of life.

Julie Ann Holder

LOGISTICS:

Getting here:

The nearest airport is Bellingham International Airport and SeaTac International Airport is an hour and a half by car. You can get to Bellingham from SeaTac fairly easily by taking the Link Light Rail from the airport and then hopping on either an Amtrak train or bus to Bellingham. Depending on your travel arrangements, your chosen stop in Bellingham may differ.

Prior to the retreat, we will be sending out communication with all participants and if you are traveling from out of state, you may be able to find a ride, or share the cost of renting a car with someone else on the program. As a program, the guides cannot drive you to the trailhead. However, carpooling is strongly encouraged.

Travel Plans:

Please do not book a flight for the last day of the course. We do our best to get you out of the field and back to the trailhead with plenty of daylight to arrive at your next accomodation, but things happen, and having an evening of buffer time will make you much happier out on the trail. In addition, sometimes everyone decides to go out and share a meal as a course closing, and it’s nice to have some flexibility for this sort of thing.

For other FAQ’s, like equipment, expectations, rental gear, and culture of the course, please view the FAQ page linked below.

Sample Itinerary:

Demi will be facilitating the Somatic Experiencing Element of the course throughout each day/evening. This sample itinerary is here to give you a sense of the spaciousness you will have to just ‘be.’

  • Day 1: Meet at REI in Bellingham, Drive to the trailhead, Hike up to Excelsior Ridge (4.3 mi, + 3,500’) and make camp.

  • Day 2: Enjoy camp and nearby trail destinations.

  • Day 3: Move camp along the High Divide (4.9 mi, + 1,260’).

  • Day 4: Enjoy camp and nearby trail destinations.

  • Day 5: Move camp to Yellow Aster Butte zone (2.6 mi, + 850’, - 1100’). Option to continue up Tommy Hoi peak.

  • Day 6: Depart via Yellow Aster Butte Trail (4.11 mi, - 2,600’).

Sample Equipment List: (list is not all inclusive)

- Backpack (45-70 liters)

- Comfortable hiking shoes

- Stove

- Fuel

- Food appropriate for 6 days

- Water filtration

- Gloves

- Adequate layers

- Tent shelter and sleep system adequate for summer alpine camping (30F bag or warmer)

Cost includes:

  • Guiding, Instruction, additional online course components in the form of video recordings, and access to a library of resources (LNT, Ecology, Historical Accounts of Washington). Group safety gear if necessary (tarps).

  • Leave No Trace Awareness Course Certificate

Cost does not include:

  • Transportation, gear, food, airfare, lodging, additional permitting fees, or parking fees.