When the weather forecast promised a weekend of sunshine and Indian summer a couple of weeks ago, I turned to my Meetup app on Friday evening to check if there was anything I could tag along to spontaneously. There was indeed: The Outdoor Adventure Club offered an interesting mix of activities in a day: Hiking, meditation and wine tastings.
Meetup is a social network where people can create or join groups to hang out and do activities together. Our group of eleven met at about half past eight at London Euston to catch a train to Berkhamsted to start our hike. Berkhamsted is just about a 40-minute train ride north-west of London Euston, so not far at all, but it makes for a proper little getaway nevertheless.
The 16-km hike wasn’t very challenging but absolutely enjoyable as we were passing through forests with colourful, autumnal leaves, alongside green meadows, some of them flocked with lots of sheep, and through little villages with charming houses. We were heading towards Great Gaddesden and through Frithsden, one of these scenic and laid-back townships in England. Firthsden features not only a nice pub but also a very pretty little winery, and the plan was to stop there for a short visit on the way back, in case we were still sufficiently early to get back to Berkhamsted before sunset.
Our mid-way point was the Amaravati Buddhist Monastery – a live-in Buddhist Monastery established in 1984, where we were supposed to do the meditation. The resident community consists of monks (bhikkhus), nuns (siladhara), and male and female postulants who live in accordance with strict traditional codes of celibacy, together with a volunteer support staff and visitors.
I had no idea what to expect, other than, that we were supposed to have a two-hour mediation session here. We entered the monastery via the Stupa field behind the monastery and got there just in time for lunch. All of us had packed lunches but it turned out that a large buffet of various dishes was already waiting for us in the kitchen. First, the monks and postulants in their orange, brown and white robes served themselves, followed by other residents of the monastery. Finally, a monk sitting on the floor in front of the room invited other visitors like us to join. By that time, some dishes were running low but overall, there was still more than enough left for us. The buffet consisted of various, very delicious vegan and vegetarian vegetable curries, stews and roasted vegetables, rice and wraps, as well as different deserts and cakes. Having anticipated eating my takeaway sandwich, I could not believe my luck.
As we were finishing our lunches, a little Chinese man with long white hair entered the room and asked us if we could help them put some letters into envelopes. I thought a bit of good karma couldn’t hurt, and since the meditation wasn’t due to start until about an hour later, some of us followed the man into a yellow house, where some people were already gathered around a table, nodding at us with encouraging smiles and bringing in more chairs. For the next hour, I found myself putting invitations to the Kathina Festival on 18 November 2018 into envelopes and stamping them. While doing this, the little Chinese man kept insisting I wasn’t placing the stamp correctly, adding an almost comical element to the entire scenery.
The meditation session normally takes place in the main temple, but today, there was a choice of two: A silent meditation in the main temple and a guided meditation in Sala, the room where we had lunch. I went to the guided meditation, which started with a monk giving us more information about meditation techniques and ways to avoid thinking too much during meditation. This happens a lot when you’re really trying to empty your mind: The more you try not to think about anything, the more thoughts seem to come into your head. I really enjoyed the silence in the room as I was sat on the floor in the rays of sunlight that came through the window, and I actually managed to keep my mind relatively still. After about 20 minutes, the monk hit a singing bowl as a sign for us to move out of the room for a so-called walking mediation.
Now this was something I’d never tried before, and it was a bit of a surreal but at the same time a very pleasant experience. Just like we were told during the sitting meditation to simply focus on our breathing and sitting still, the walking mediation was about walking consciously, while staying present in the moment and not thinking about anything else. Since there were quite a few people in the grounds, walking aimlessly about, some with their eyes closed, some with their shoes off, I couldn’t help but feel like I’m in and amongst sleepwalkers. Nevertheless, it was very relaxing to walk around slowly in the sunshine while listening to the wind rustling in the trees, noticing details such as little lines of spider webs that covered the grass and glistened in the sun, and not really thinking of anything else.
I may have been a little too relaxed after all this meditating as I promptly nodded off when we were back in the room to conclude the session with another short sitting meditation. We left right after the session and made it just in time to the Frithsden Winery to sample a tasting of four wonderful wines from Italy, Slovenia and India. Sadly, the winery’s own produce has sold out for this year, but visitors can expect the wines from this year to be available as from March next year. Sparkling wines will already be available as from next week again.
