Playa Viva

In researching where on the globe to bring our guests, Declan and I carefully consider our collective carbon footprint. We look at retreats help to sustain the community, where the meals we eat are plant-rich, grown and gathered locally, where the environment is protected from over-development and/or where owners and locals are working to foster greener practices that not only support the communities that are affected by tourism, but that our travel there actually helps the local population in an eco-conscious way. 

It’s not always easy to do this, but it is important to us personally, especially as Dragonfly offers several international retreats a year now, including our 4th annual retreat to India this winter, where the retreat supports 30 local families from the revenue of our visit, our group trip to Ireland this coming April, where we will travel a section of The Wild Atlantic Way, a glorious and carefully protected section of Ireland’s coastline, and our second trip to Mexico this coming Fall.

You might ask, why Mexico for a second year? It would be an understatement to say that Declan and I fell in love with Mexico this past November. The colors, the food, the temperature, the water, the people… as we were getting on the plane to journey home, we were already planning our next visit! And this year, we have the most special place to share with you! Here it comes!!!

Nestled between the sparkling waters of Mexico’s Pacific coast and the majestic Sierra Madre Mountains is Playa Viva, a 200-acre eco-retreat situated on a mile of pristine and private beach, where for the past ten years, the owners have dedicated their efforts to preserving the beach, the estuary teeming with birds, and an incredible turtle sanctuary where they have helped over 400,000 turtles make it into the sea!! They are dedicated to the local community by supporting the education of girls and women, hiring and teaching locals to care for their organic farms and educate them in regenerative agriculture, to collect and care for turtle eggs and hatchlings on site in their turtle sanctuary, and to hire locals from the nearby town to steward their retreat center. For the past two years, Katie has been corresponding with the owners and making plans to take you here on retreat. It is truly a magical place.

We are incredibly proud and beyond excited to announce our 2019 fall retreat to Playa Viva, Mexico. Here s a recent post from the retreat itself about the effect of our travel on community, conscious consumption, environmental action, global warming, and green travel. Playa Viva Blog Post. We hope you will join us! Space is limited to 12 rooms, each of which opens to miles and miles of untouched beach and endless sky where we will eat beautiful organic food grown on site, visit local coffee and cacao farms, relax on the beach or beside the gorgeous pool, go surfing if you like, and to practice yoga in the amazing open-air studio that allows us to connect with nature and all of its elements. 

For more information, visit our Mexico 2019 Retreat page. Rates and registration coming soon!