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| Hello everyone,
Has anyone heard of a yoga cruise? I know cruises are a little corny but to me they sound great, especially themed cruises. Well, I've never been on a cruise before and since I live in the desert I think it would be nice to do yoga outside in the fresh sea air and stop at interesting places along the way.
Wouldn't it be sooo cooool to have a big yoga conference, like the yoga journal conference, on a ship as big as the LoveBoat and all the activities were yoga-minded and the food really healthy and yummy? |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 8442
    
| Fifi - they sound great to me. I have known people who went on other themed cruises and loved them. For me, it would have to be Iyengar yoga, but others would enjoy a mixture of styles, I'm sure. |
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| THAT is an excellent idea!
I've only been on 2 cruises, and frankly I was too young to fully appreciate it. I do remember the first day out the boat rocking ever so slightly, but that seemed to be the only time it happened. Would make our practice rather entertaining, eh?
Wonder what the Midnight Buffet would serve. |
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| kinda hard to do yoga when you underway but i still think its a good idea |
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| I've seen a few yoga cruises advertised when surfing the web. A large cruise ship is supposed to be pretty stable so except in bad conditions I imagine it wouldn't be a problem.
I've tried asana and meditation a few times on a boat about 120ft, it's quite interesting. Obviously seated poses are easier! I also once watched someone doing sun sals on the back of a 48ft boat that was flying along (too close to the engines for my taste.)
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 8442
| I have done asana on a 35 foot sailboat at anchor. It is really fun but you do have to be aware of balance issues and plan appropriately. Military chick has the experience of the big boats  |
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| Oh wow! People are replying to my fantasy post. I hadn't thought about the waves. Good point. Ok, maybe I'll just take a cruise to somewhere sandy and beachy where I can practice yoga in the sand.
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| maybe you can have different type of worshops why you are underway like Planetary Yantra Painting and also have kirtans. oh yeah and vegan/vegetaria meals, etc.. i would defintely be interested in something like that |
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| On my yoga cruise the cuisine would be mucho delicimoso, with plenty of vegan options. Instead of the crappy Vegas-style entertainment we'd have someone like Krishna Das. And a dijerdido (sp?) night at sea. Saunas, massage, tai qi, acupuncture and meditation. Cyndi can give cooking lessons on the prommenade and teach us how to make beets yummy. Of course, there should be a variety of yoga styles so people can try everything if they want. Nap time will be encouraged. |
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| I wanna take naps and play the diggerido too! |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 1738
Location: right where I'm supposed to be | I just returned form a 8 day cruise and the yoga class was difficult to say the least. Balance poses were very straining on the ankles. I personally think the instructor should have excluded the balance poses. even laying in savasana was a little much as the boat has a constant rocking motion.
I didn't enjoy my yoga on board.
Mish |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 5098
Location: Somewhere in the Mountains of Western NC | Mishoga,
What type of ship were you on?? I would think a bigger cruise ship would be easier than a smaller one....I guess it would depend on your tolerance to balance. My ex's brother could NEVER stay on a boat without getting totally sick. They used to go deep sea fishing in the gulf. It's so funny to hear their stories.
Anyway, being on a ship with yoga people sounds more appealing to me than the other types of cruises I've been hearing about lately....the ones where people go missing and/or overboard either due to being robbed, drunk...or whatever. I can just see Fifi wanting to practice her Standing Bow on the front of the ship (what do you call that??) after having a couple of Martini's,  |
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| mishoga - 2006-07-08 1:07 PM
I just returned form a 8 day cruise and the yoga class was difficult to say the least. Balance poses were very straining on the ankles. I personally think the instructor should have excluded the balance poses. even laying in savasana was a little much as the boat has a constant rocking motion.
I didn't enjoy my yoga on board.
I was wondering where you were. I think I'd like to try it at least once. I'm sure you right that the rocking makes things a bit more difficult, but the challenge might make it more interesting. |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 1738
Location: right where I'm supposed to be | Cyndi, I was on a big boat, Carnival. I do not have the tendency to get motion sickness but I did have it on this cruise and the yoga class definitely made it worse. Plus the studio was freezing. Even the instructor was lsoing balance and kept reaching back placing her fingers on the mirror for support. I had all intention of taking this instructor's class throughout the cruise but I guess something pulled me away. I went into the gym for the next three days and followed my own practice (still with difficulty) Gave up after that and stuck to the treadmill, holding on the rails the whole time. I was so looking forward to these classes. I was a little disappointed (Did I spell that correct?) It was generic yoga, no depth or expertise.
GJ, it was challenging to balance when the boat was moving. It was a packed class. It was interesting watching others trying to balance, especially since there were first time yoga students in the class. I wanted to correct alignment on some so bad but I would never step on another instructor's class. I find a lot of instructor's become annoyed if you correct and align their students.
Mish |
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| I suppose with all the rocking, a yoga cruise is not the ideal situation. Ok, land yoga it is. On the beach in Belize or Costa Rica. 
I think doing yoga in sand might be challenging, too.
Does anyone look at the 2 women doing yoga on the beach on the yoga.com homepage? They're doing yoga on sand - and very well, I might add.
Doing yoga in a cold room is on my list of 10 Most Aggravating Things in Life. |
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Location: London, England | Hi P,
What kind of ship are you on? Do you think the navy would hire out an aircraft carrier-I'm feeling a little queezy at the thought of anything smaller  |
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Veteran
Posts: 258
| Yoga in the sand
I just returned from a one month stay in a very remote beach of a faraway, tiny island, 17 hours by boat from my home (impossible to do standing postures on this specific boat…), where together with my husband we often go and stay as much as possible in our tiny tend, away from electricity, mobile phones, cars, buildings, shoes, clothes and even bathing suits. Every evening when the cool shade of the high rock on the right side is falling on the beach, comes the time for our hatha yoga practice. Standing postures feel different when done on the sand. It can be dangerous and you have to be really careful with your feet and soles. But when the feet sink deeper inside the sand, you feel that mother earth is holding your ankles in a very safe and comfortable way and the standing postures become somehow more comfortable and relaxed. You can also use the sand to form all sorts of props, cushions, bolsters, holes for the head for supported shoulderstand etc etc. Looking upwards while in shoulderstand, you may suddenly see hawks flying veeeeeeery very high in the sky. And the inverted upside down view of the sea and the sky while in handstand or in prasarita padottanasana is such a wonderful, surrealistic image ! It remains in you eyes looong after you’ve gone out of the posture. Concentrating on your breath also feels different, when your breath is resonating with the waves. And above all, the wonderful scent of the sea ozone fills your lungs in such a therapeutic way when you do pranayama ! I very much enjoy hatha yoga in such conditions. I am certainly not referring to any of those crowded “commercial” beaches where people may be showing off their muscles or their expensive bathing suits. But this type of “back-to-nature vacations” in remote, natural places are a good chance to practice as long as you like and really feel united with everything around you. Then you open your eyes from savasana and you find out that one more night with it’s clear stars and it’s milky way has fallen on “your” beach... One last swim in the silver waters to wash from the sand and let’s make a fire to prepare dinner.
This yoga-cruise thread gave me the chance to share all these, now that I ‘ve got the “back-in-the-city-blues”. But then on the other hand… back in my living-room-yoga, I once again appreciate few forgotten simple things like: Ooooh, how nice ! How clean! No more insects, no more flies trying to “explore” my asana… no sand in my ears and eyes and finally, a straight, real wall for my handstand !!
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 1738
Location: right where I'm supposed to be | I love doing yoga on the beach. Whenever I travel and there is a beach within walking distance I wake as the sun is breaking the horizon. I love the sounds of the water breaking on shore, the warm, yet cool breeze, the feel of the cool sand, the smell,...... It's one of my favorite places to practice. I feel so calm and peaceful. And you are so right that you can't help but feel connnected and one with the earth. Very grounded.
Makes me wish there was a beach nearby! 
Mish
Edited by mishoga 2006-07-10 7:46 AM
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 5098
Location: Somewhere in the Mountains of Western NC | That's it, If I ever decide to do any kind of Yoga vacation, Costa Rica it will be for me. Although, that tiny little island for a month sounds heavenly,  |
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Veteran
Posts: 258
| Cindy I read you like bees and that you have behives.
So, here is one more storry about that tiny island: one day while we were in that beach my husband suddenly heared a strange buz, turned his head and there was one round, flying "thing", flying over the rocks, a whole swarm of bees that looked like one living creature. They "checked" our "home" and then they dissapeared behind the high rock. I got a little bit worried. The next day the villagers of the sole village one our walk from our beach told us that this specific year, spring was very "wild" and bees had somehow gotten very iritated and dangerous. So they adviced us that once you meet such a swarm in a footpath, you should imidiatelly fall down (in savasana) so that they don't get cought in your hair (like Tom Robin's, Bingo Bijama), and bite you all over... I got a little bit scared with this... this didn't sound at all heavenly... to me. But then, when I finished practissing that same evening, I thought that for us... who do aums, (=who speak the language of bees) this cannot be dangerous, they won't hurt us !! And yes indeed, it is a heavenly tiny island, only tooooooo far away from you, in the south of the Aegian Sea. |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 5098
Location: Somewhere in the Mountains of Western NC | Hey Kristi,
That's an interesting story. That would be called a swarm. Actually, when bees are swarming like that, they are the least dangerous. It's so cool to watch them, they look like a football and its really neat to see how they stay connected. In the wintertime, they form a small cluster like this inside their nest. They can stay that way for days and days, fanning themselves generating enough heat to stay alive. Anyway, it is when they are protecting their home filled with honey that they get to be on the aggressive side. In some parts of the world, and now even in our southern states and in California, the Africanized Honey Bee has spread. They are like the nastiest of the bees and very difficult to work with. I have a suit that is Africanized bee proof. With my regular work gloves, I've actually had bees literally heat my gloves up trying to sting me. My bees are gentle Italian bees....but, not so gentle when I'm robbing the hive. The reason people most likely get stung during a swarm would be because they freak out, run away and start waving their arms around...bees do not like sudden movements, they like it when you are calm and not afraid. If you were to stand in a perfectly still Tadasana, the cluster/swarm would breeze right through you...like a breath of fresh air,
As for that tiny island, I suppose one could get there by plane or boat??? |
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Yoga cruise
