ALIGN WITH STILLNESS AND VITALITY
“Stillness is the language of the future.” ~ Otto Scharmer
YOU WILL LEAVE A HIGH HOPES RETREAT THRILLED THAT YOU ATTENDED and FEELING YOU NOT ONLY HAVE YOUR LIFE BACK BUT LOOK FORWARD TO YOUR FUTURE IN NEW AND TRANSFORMED WAYS.
Holistic Wellness Retreats
heal · relax · replenish
High Hopes Retreat Centre offers deeply personalised wellness retreats in a quiet natural setting in Greyton, South Africa.
Each retreat is individually guided and designed to support rest, recovery, and reconnection.
A small, experienced team of therapists and facilitators care for you throughout your stay.
Established over 20 years ago.
A personalised retreat experience
Your retreat is shaped around your needs.
You are supported through a combination of therapeutic care, somatic practices, gentle movement, and restorative time in nature.
Therapies include counselling support, trauma release, body-based therapies – massage, somatic experiencing therapies, Access Bars and Reiki healing energy sessions – as well as Wim Hof and other breathwork sessions, yoga, tai chi, guided mountain and gentler nature walks, aromatherapy steaming, nervous system reset, and guided rest practices.
You will receive nutrient-dense plant-based meals prepared on site.
Everything is designed to support your system to settle, restore, and rebalance.
Begin your journey
What brings you here right now?
Restore
For burnout, exhaustion, stress, and nervous system overload.
Balance
For fatigue, digestive imbalance, and physical depletion.
Transform
For emotional healing, transition, and deeper inner work.
If you are unsure, we will guide you to the most supportive pathway.
Begin your journey
A quietly held experience
You are supported from arrival to departure by a small, dedicated team.
Care is attentive, personal, and responsive throughout your stay.
The intention is simple: to create the conditions for your system to soften and restore itself naturally.
Nature and setting
Set in the village of Greyton, surrounded by mountains, rivers, and open natural landscapes.
Walking trails, streams, waterfalls, and fynbos paths are directly accessible from the retreat.
Nature is an integral part of the healing experience.
What guests often experience
Deep rest and improved sleep
Reduced stress and internal tension
Emotional clarity and release
Increased energy and grounding
A renewed sense of self
Gentle emotional support
This is a trauma-informed, body-mind-spirit based retreat.
Emotional responses may naturally arise during your stay and are supported with care and professional guidance.
You are encouraged to communicate openly so your experience remains safe and appropriate for you.
21 years of experience
High Hopes Retreat Centre has supported guests from around the world for over two decades through personalised, health-and-emotional-recovery led retreats integrating therapeutic, somatic, and nutritional approaches.
Not sure where to begin?
We are happy to guide you personally.
Many guests begin with a short conversation so we can recommend the most supportive pathway.
Contact
Ange Craig
Programme Director & Counselling Psychologist
ange@highhopes.co.za
+27 60 828 0884
Location
Greyton, Western Cape, South Africa
Approximately 1.5 hours from Cape Town International Airport.
Four private garden-entrance rooms in a quiet mountain village setting, surrounded by exquisite nature and walking trails.
How DOES ONE HEAL?
The great news is, this is something we can train in. Yes, I said train. Because healing, from the root Latin word, “hal”, means to make whole.
And just like any training, we need guides, teachers, and we need to show up and be willing to, as Pema Chodron says, “Take the Good Medicine”. So what is the good medicine?…..
Through daily mindfulness practices, learning to read the codes and gestures of your own body, great nutrition, and practicing trauma release exercises, our nervous systems get out of cell danger response. They unfreeze and stop fighting or running. Our energy gets unlocked and becomes available for living life again rather than being locked into fear and anxiety. Our body’s immune system also becomes available to clear out toxins and pathogens. We start clearing a path and seeing a new future.
Two buzzwords that are on the lips of leading doctors, enlightened therapists, and cutting-edge scientists right now are “trauma” and “inflammation.” The most promising current research is talking about harnessing this power of our innate ability to heal from within to reverse even depression, panic disorders, fatigue, auto-immunity, cancer, heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, chronic stress, and other difficult conditions.
Global crisis after global crisis is calling our attention to find new solutions deep within ourselves. To limit the damage of this pandemic and to meet other new and future health challenges, we need to look after our nervous systems. In doing so, we also take great care of our immune systems. It’s a reassuring reminder that we have the power to take control of our well-being.
When I help myself, I also help my loved ones and my communities. Being the change that we want to see in the world, by healing ourselves, we create the ripple effect out of this new me. It’s a journey we take together, creating a sense of belonging and unity.
This emerging me, as I heal myself, is the most powerful tool I have to be a force for good in the world.
Beloved teacher, author, nun, and mother, Pema Chodron reminds us,
“The only reason we don’t open our hearts and minds to other people is that they trigger confusion in us that we don’t feel brave enough or sane enough to deal with. To the degree that we look clearly and compassionately at ourselves, we feel confident and fearless about looking into someone else’s eyes.”
―
Immunity lives within each individual cell, within all of the body’s systems, but also in our relationships, our finances, our spiritual connectivity, our intellectual health, our emotional wellbeing and in our environment. When we learn to sit with all parts of ourselves, when we touch all parts with listening and compassion, new possibilities open up.
Our primary focus at High Hopes is to help you to befriend your nervous system and to safeguard both your immediate and your long-term immunity. We do this by walking with you into gentle, powerful and loving daily habits through our comprehensive healing programmes.
A primary focus at High Hopes is on harnessing your brain’s natural neuro-plasticity for effective change. One of the core ways we do this is by teaching you how to heal your own maladaptive stress response.
Together with our healing therapies, you can reset your nervous system from hyper- or hypo-arousal, to balanced, engaged and healthy. Nutrition also plays a major role, along with nature and specific healing modalities.
Setting yourself on a path of calm and ease is like getting an inner trust fund which you can draw on for your whole life. This is something that we can each learn. But first, as teacher Jack Kornfield so skillfully puts it, “we have to be present to win”. It is our deep joy to help you win.
Contact FORM
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