My friend, Deirdre and I are planning our return trip
to Cloona. Last December, we booked into
the Cloona Health Retreat in Co. Mayo for a week. What we really wanted was time together in a
pampered environment and this was a compromise between India and no money.
On the Saturday before, I took the train from Cork to
Dublin and attended a Blake/McCarthy family re-union in the Carlton Hotel. I stayed overnight with my cousin, Fiona. To my surprise Fiona knew about Cloona: she
had been there before and her husband had been four times.
That’s the extraordinary thing about Cloona, it does
not advertise: it’s all word of
mouth. Out of the 12 guests during my
week there, nine had been before; they make it part of their annual routine.
Back to Fiona, “Cloona is a place for reflection,” she
said, “you’re not supposed to go with a friend.” I shrugged.
I asked her what she liked about it, “It’s hard,” she said, “but by the
end of the week, I always feel different. I can’t explain it and I don’t want
to because your experience will be different from mine. But I’d be interested to know what you
think.
The following day, Deirdre and I met up at Heuston station and
boarded the train to Westport. The
train journey is over four hours yet the train to Cork is two and half; as the
crow flies, Westport is closer to Dublin than Cork.
The train was packed with people returning home
from their Christmas shopping; Brown
Thomas, Hollister and Abercrombie
bags filled the overhead compartment and in between the seats. The air hummed with chat and laughter and the
minute the train set off, the other passengers started to eat. Everybody seemed to have a picnic. We hadn’t brought anything and went looking
for the dining car. We met two women standing
by one of the exit doors as they waited to disembark at the next station who told
us there was a vending machine in the last carriage but to access it you had to
wait until the train stopped at the station, get off and hop back on
again. But they warned us it was risky:
you could either be stuck in that carriage until the train stopped again or
worse, be left behind. We decided not to
bother and were about to turn back when one of them said, “Here, I bought these
sandwiches in Heuston but never got around to opening them,” and she handed me
a triple decker pack with chicken, mayo and stuffing. The other woman, immediately the other woman pulled
out a bottle of Coke from her shoulder bag, “This hasn’t been opened either,
you’re welcome to it.”
We were met by taxi at Westport station driven by Mary. At Cloona, we made ourselves comfortable
in the lounge and as other people arrived, we introduced ourselves. When we were all present, Dara, the director
of the retreat explained, “Life is all about making decisions. It’s not the big decisions that determine
your life but the little ones you make every day. All decisions are made in your gut. If your digestion is not working properly
then you tend to make poor decisions. When
it is working properly you make the right decisions. Hence the term ‘gut
instinct.’”
For breakfast we had choice of either apples or
oranges or both, lunch was soup and salad and ‘dinner’ consisted of dried figs,
kiwis and bananas. On first rising in
the morning, we drank two large glasses of tepid water. Wait for ten minutes because as Dara
explained that is how long it takes for water to pass through your gut,
followed by a shot of wheatgrass which is sweet but disgusting, and got more
disgusting as the week went on. Wait a
further 20 minutes for the wheatgrass to shuttle through your gut and then you
feast on the apples and oranges.
Breakfast was followed by hour and a half of gentle yoga,
so soothing there was always someone snoring at the end of it. After
lunch, it was a walk with Dara in the prettiest countryside I have ever seen,
it reminded me of scenes from Postman Pat
when he does his rounds. Dara taught us
how to walk. “Imagine your pelvis is a
bowl,” he said, “brimming with water.
When you walk up the hill you tilt your pelvis up as if to keep the bowl
level to stop the water spilling and when you walk down you do the opposite.” It
was difficult and it looked strange. 12 high
visibility vests following their leader with pelvises tilted, passing motorists
gave us wide berth.
After dinner, we had the sauna-time, my favourite part
of the day. The idea is to relax in the
steaming heat for ten minutes, then hop into the brain-freezing, ice-cold
showers for as long as you can stand it – it’s difficult not to scream – but
then you have that delicious moment back into the sauna hut as you feel the
heat seep into your bones.
As the week went on and we all got to know each other,
our inhibitions melted away. Shuffling
around in dressing gowns and slippers became the norm. Deirdre found a weighing scales. Big excitement. We lined up to weigh ourselves. Everyone has gained exactly four lbs. We asked Dara for an explanation, “You came
here dehydrated, now you’re rehydrated.”
It was hard to hide the disappointment.
With all the fruit, salad and water we were consuming, it would have
been nice to have lost something!
To be fair, we were never actually hungry but food fantasies
plagued us all. We escaped into Westport for half an hour on Wednesday
afternoon; I nearly cried as we passed steamy café windows and saw cosy little
pensioners settling down to pots of tea and slices of apple pie. Deirdre wanted to visit the health food store
and as she chatted to the cashier, I spotted chocolate and nut power balls on
the counter. “Would they be allowed?” I
ask Deirdre, “they’re only little.” The
cashier looked at me horrified, “If Dara knew I sold you those he’d kill me!”
We meditated every morning - before the tepid water
and wheatgrass - and evening, right before bed with Guy, the Buddhist. He taught us laughter yoga. Completely fake at first but the lunacy of it
eventually catches on and the laughter becomes real. “Your mind does not know that your body is
faking it,” he said, “but it releases the happiness hormones anyway.” Fake it until you become it.”
Dara brought in therapists and we could sign up to
whatever we liked. Since we paid the
therapists directly, they were excellent.
I chose, on Fiona’s recommendation, Declan for the deep tissue massage; he
was just what I needed. Deirdre went for
the Tibetan bowls and said it was amazing.
Suzie, from Dublin also tried the bowls and described it “like the best
orgasm you ever had multiplied by 100.” Nuala
emerged from the bowls sobbing but smiling and said, “I’ve made my decision.” Gavin
read my horoscope; he told me I was leading too comfortable a life and to
embrace my fiery side.
Fiona was right, I did feel different. My taste buds sharpened; as the week went on fruit tasted sweeter. My body felt clean and strong; this in turn boosted my confidence and mental clarity. It was a revelation to me that that fruit
could constitute a meal. I learned that
there are other ways to comfort yourself other than food. After all my lusting after coffee and cake,
I felt a disdain for sugary foods and found myself gravitating to the good
stuff.
Over Christmas I ate what I liked and actually lost 1
lb!!! On Christmas day, I did make
myself a cup of coffee but it tasted toxic and bitter. It
wasn’t until the following April, trying out a new café with my friend, Carmel that I allowed
myself a ‘flat white’ coffee. It was
exquisite. I keep it to one day.
Deirdre and I are going back this December. It’s an odd time to take a break, right
before Christmas, but after last year’s experience it works for me. I sailed through the craziness of Christmas, the
January blues didn’t touch me and I still had enough good will to spend a week
with my mother in February.
Going back
is a must: those Tibetan bowls……...
