Into the Dark: A Retreat of Presence and Possibility 14- 21 January 2026 Kinvara, Ireland

Come into presence with the gifts and wisdom of the dark, on the threshold of Samhain, the season of winter, and the awakening of Imbolc, a fire festival honoring Brigid, hearth-tender, creative muse and keeper of the sacred flame. 

An intimate community will gather in my home on the wild west coast of Ireland to be present with the dark, held in flickering light of flame and hearth, ensconced in silence with space to create. **  

Each day will begin with simple ritual and stillness in community.  The day will be yours to devote to a creative project with silence encouraged in the house when not intentionally gathered in community. 

You can intersperse your devotional work with a walk into the village or to the sea to receive inspiration from the elements ( and tea + cake!).  We will venture out together on a few occasions to swim in the winter sea, to walk in a sleeping forest and to listen to the songs of a sacred spring.  Otherwise we will be based at home in our creative residency.

In the evenings we come together for dinner and quiet conversation, then we will share time at the hearth to offer a bit of work from the day (writing, art, other inspirations).  We will close the day with a Compline practice before we begin again.

I will offer a herbal consultation for body and spirit to you at the beginning of the week and customize a tea blend and a variety of other potions to support your creative devotion for the week and beyond.

Offer what you are able: $1,350- $1,800/ Euro 1,100- 1,500

Includes lodging (everyone will have their own bedroom, most ensuite) in a cozy Irish home just outside the seaside village of Kinvara County Galway, transport on arrival and departure day, self-catered breakfast, all dinners, ritual and ritual supplies, herbal consultation for body and spirit and custom herbal tea.  Also includes a few brief outings, close to home.

Does not include airfare or lunch or any additional transportation.

To hold your spot, please send a $500 non-refundable deposit via Venmo (@Tonja-Reichley) or PayPal HERE and a brief email (tonjareichley@gmail.com) describing the project you hope to devote to during the week.  The remaining balance is due by 1 January 2026.

**Space to create as in time to create; the space in my home does not allow for an art studio so this residency is best for smaller visual art projects, writing etc.

Death Reverence in Ireland: The Samhain Threshold

16-23 October 2026

Our Irish ancestors walked with death in a way that has dramatically changed in modernity.  An understanding of how we as humans have honored death through the ages and how we have grieved, can offer wisdom for living, dying and grieving in these times.

Join us for a unique and reflective pilgrimage in the west of Ireland, held over the Samhain threshold, a time when the ancestors are close at hand and the lessons they carry for us are revealed in the land and sacred places.  We will gather to  deepen into the wisdom and traditions that these people have honored through the mists of time.  We will visit ancient neolithic sites of ceremony and burial.  We will visit a workhouse, where people often went to die, in hopes of a proper burial.  We will  learn about waking traditions and banshees, keening practices, and herbs and trees that carry us through these threshold times of death and grief.  We will ally an Irish goddess as a death guide for this time and beyond. 

Please note this is not a retreat to focus on your own grief process although we certainly will be delving into how our modern approach to death and grief is not serving us and discuss ways to honor these essential life transitions by learning from our ancestors.

Investment: $1,995.00 ($200 single supplement, if you wish to have your own bedroom and bathroom)

INCLUDED: Accommodation in traditional Irish home, with shared bedroom and bath (if you prefer to stay offsite in a local B&B, be in touch and we can offer more details and pricing)..  We will be staying in Kinvara, a quaint seaside village in southwest County Galway with cafes, pubs, traditional music, craft shops and more.  Single occupancy en-suite available upon request for an additional single supplement fee of $200.  Self-catered breakfast will be included and one other meal per day (either lunch or dinner).  Also included: designated ground transportation within Ireland, site entrance fees, guides and ritual supplies.

 NOT INCLUDED: Airfare and travel expenses to Ireland.  We will collect you on the arrival date in Galway City (if you fly into Dublin you can take a coach to Galway) or Shannon Airport.  Also not included: travel insurance, one meal per day, dessert, all drinks including alcohol. 

To register, please send a $500 non-refundable (transferable) deposit to Tonja via Venmo or www.paypal.me/tonjareichley and the completed Tour Conditions registration: Click HERE.

This is an intimate community and limited to 8 participants.

Proposed Daily Itinerary (subject to change):

Day 1: Arrivals and collection at Shannon Airport or Galway Coach Station (for those coming from Dublin). We will get settled into our home for the week and have time for a rest, a walk to the sea or into the village. In the liminal light, we will have our opening ritual at the hearth and on the land who will be holding us this week.

Day 2.  After a slow start to the day and a morning ritual to meet our death guides, we will venture into the mystical Burren landscape where we will visit a sacred Neolithic site for rites of passage and death rituals. We will honor one of our death guides, Sheela na gig, in her native place, at an ancient Celtic church then visit a Celtic monastic site for grave rubbings.  We will honor the death of the day at a beach, collecting hag stones and watching the sunset before a life-nourishing feast at a local seafood restaurant.

Day 3: . We will greet the new day in sacred circle before we traverse into the misty wilds of the Burren, visiting a hidden sacred spring and collecting holy water.  We will chant with ancient echoes in an abbey and harvest herbs from the hedgerows.  We will close the day, the death of the day which is also the beginning, in our ancient Celtic way of being, at the hearth with Compline.

Day 4: We travel the short distance to Brigit’s Garden to explore the amazing Celtic Festival-themed gardens dedicated to this Goddess and Saint of Healing, midwife to life and to death, the first one to invoke the keen.  Then we journey into the blue mists, bogs and stark beauty of Connemara.  We will seek healing, honoring grief with the ebb and flow of life and death, from the sea and perhaps take a baptismal dip into her waters.  

Day 5: After our ritual to begin the day, invoking our death guides, we will visit a woodland burial site in the shadow of the burial place of  one of our death guides, Maeve, Goddess of Sovereignty.  We will then visit a  place that has manufactured clay pipes, a token of Irish wakes and we will journey together to the place of an Irish workhouse and learn about the history of this shadow-side of our Irish ancestors and why they would have desperately sought these places.  We will have a quiet evening at home to integrate the gifts and wisdom of the week.

Day 6:  We will greet the new day in sacred circle before we traverse to the wild edges where we will visit a pilgrimage place and a grotto/ sacred spring/ holy well that holds healing for the living and the dead.  We will add our lights to the candles that are lit here to honor the dead.   We will gather at the hearth in the evening to have conversation with an Irish friend who has kept funeral and waking rites alive to this day.

Day 7:  Gathering at the hearth, we begin the day together with our death guides.  We spiral out into the turas to  explore hidden beaches, fairy forts, sacred springs and keen to the Earth,awakening ancient rhythms within and without.  We will walk a labyrinth overlooking the wild sea and embody the cycles of life and death. We will find ourselves in the deepening dark and reflecting the wisdom of the Earth as she prepares for her death cycle.  We will return home for a closing feast prepared in community!

 Day 8:  Departures.  Ever changed how we can live deeper, remembering how death has been revered by our ancestors and in that how we can ever live more fully in this life.