The Refuge
17th-20th March
“There is human time, and there is wild time”
~ Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Women Who Run with the Wolves
This is such a simple offering that it needs little explanation. Simple but profound. We are inviting you to do what humans have been doing for thousands of generations: to join together in community on wild country and learn with and from nature, and with and from each other.
Over three days and three nights we will weave a container of earth-based community through learning and practicing earth skills and crafts, ecological literacy and deep nature connection practices, storytelling, song and solo reflective time.
Nature is a teacher, a healer, a muse. A human community that comes together to honour and explore our relationship with the other-than-human-world is a deeply regenerative experience. And we need it in these times. We need time to take a breath out, to walk barefoot on the earth, to switch from clock time to earth time and listen to the rhythm of deep time, elemental time, cyclical time.
The riverbank grove in which we will gather is special country. This is the ancestral lands of the Taungarang people, with bold granite boulders, soft silky moss and water so clean we can drink straight from it.
This is where we come to fill our cup, so we may offer ourselves back to the land as vessels for play, creativity and deep listening.
Sit spots, fire-by-friction, sacred council, natural movement, crafts, solo wandering are some of the ways we’ll spend our days. This is more than just spending time in nature. We are engaging in age-old practices that awaken our animal bodies and ancestral sensitivities, our innate curiosity and awe for the beings we share this planet with.
Don’t underestimate what three days away from the hustle and bustle can do. At the end of our days together, don’t be surprised if you feel more ready to step back into commitment to work, family and community, carrying this quiet time with you as a gift to others.
Who is this program for?
This program is for anyone and everyone (age 15 plus) who seeks nourishing time on the land in community. Whether you are brand new to nature connection or a seasoned sit-spotter, you are warmly welcomed into our fire circle. Babes in arms welcome.
Facilitators:
Claire Dunn
Claire Dunn is a writer, speaker, barefoot explorer, rewilding facilitator and founder of Nature’s Apprentice. Claire is passionate about human rewilding and believes that a reclaiming of our ecological selves and belonging is key to regenerating wildness on the planet. For the last 15 years, Claire has been facilitating individuals to dive deeply into the mysteries of nature and psyche through the pathways of deep nature connection, ancestral earth skills, deep ecology, ecopsychology, soulcentric nature-based practice, village building, dance, ceremony and contemporary wilderness rites-of-passage. Claire is the author of memoir My Year Without Matches, which tells the story of her year living wild. Her recently released memoir Rewilding the Urban Soul explores how we might embody wild consciousness within a modern city context. Claire lives in Melbourne where she lovingly tends her garden, community and her own wild heart.
Daniel Amrein
Daniel (Dan) Amrein is a carpenter-builder and father of two living in the village of Warburton in the Yarra Valley. Dan’s first Vision Quest was at the age of 16 in the Lakota tradition, and since then the ceremony has been a powerful consistent thread and guiding principle in his life, both as Quester, and Guide.
Dan is passionate about the power of earth-based ceremony in its different forms as a tool for healing and growth. You will often find him running long distances, tending his garden, baking bread, tracking the trails of his mountain home, and spending sweet time with his partner and co-guide Claire.
Emily Coats
Emily has been working at Nature's Apprentice for over a year and is committed to sharing with the world her passion for deep nature connection, ancestral skills, and soulcentric nature practices including Vision Quest. She has studied at Tom Brown Jnr's Tracker School and with bird language experts Jon Young and Andrew Turbill. Emily is also a dancer and experimenting with weaving movement and nature connection practices together.
When she is not beavering away at Nature’s Apprentice work, Emily loves to escape to the bush and sink into Deep Time, practice her skills and apprentice to the mysteries of the wilds.
Testimonials for Nature’s Apprentice Rewilding Programs:
“This course has truly changed me. The way I carry myself in the world, relating to nature certainly but also to people even in a built environment. I feel included in a privileged community, a tribe connected to and cradled by the natural world.”
— 2021 Participant
Program info:
The program will be held on wild land in the Strathbogie Ranges, 2.5 hours north of Melbourne.
Accommodation is tent camping.
No previous experience is required.
Arrival 1pm on Friday 17th March. Program will finish 1pm on Monday 20th March. Please talk to us if you can’t make the entire program.
Healthy, mostly organic vegetarian meals will be provided for dinners. Please BYO breakfast, lunch and snacks. We will provide milks and teas.
Cost:
The cost of the 4 day program includes all evening meals, curriculum and materials. Please BYO breakfast, lunch, snacks, and tent/sleeping equipment.
Early bird (before February 26th): $430.00
Full price: $490.00
Registration has closed for this event.
Cancellation Policy
Up until one week before the program begins (Fri 10th March), if you cancel you will be refunded, minus a $50 fee. After Fri 10th, we cannot offer any refunds, except in exceptional circumstances. If you can no longer attend, you can also onsell your ticket at no cost.