Misty Mountain

The mountain was living up to it’s name when we woke up the next morning. Josh’s Uncle and Auntie on his mother's side live 7 hours on the train from Sydney and one hour in a car from a little town called Kempsey. Howard and Evelyn live and work at a health retreat and have been doing so for 16 years. It is a beautiful place set on a mountain of lush bush and soaring temperatures in the summer months. The retreat is focused on detoxing your body and educating on lifestyle change. Many people who come here are quite ill with cancer or other life-threatening illnesses but can go home with their body and mind well on the mend.

We were given a gorgeous, comfortable little cottage to stay in which was luckily for us just recently vacated by the last group of volunteers. We all had a delicious sleep on cozy beds after that uncomfortable night on the train.
After catching up over breakfast (a yummy cooked one!) we took a tour of the retreat. Howard then treated us to a steam bath (one of his duties here) which was a first for us. He stoked up a fire at the back of the building which pumped eucalyptus flavoured steam into the room we were sitting in with our togs on. The idea is that you sweat out toxins in the 40 plus wet heat and then you jump in the creek or have a cold shower for at least 30 seconds to close the pores of your skin and draw the blood to your inner organs where it is pushed outwards again when you return to the heat. It is recommended to repeat the process at least three times. This helps your body to build a strong immunity and releases toxins from your organs. I absolutely loved the heat but the children were shouting to get out in the beginning, though they soon grew accustomed to it. They enjoyed the jump in the creek more of course but kept coming back into the steam bath for another go.

The creek which runs meanders through the whole property

At the moment I’m writing this post in a 4WD as we are driving in very rough terrain through the seemingly endless thick tropical bush. (I thought I could multi-task today while in the car for a few hours as I won't have time to write tonight when there is internet.) We decided to spend the day visiting the previous location for the Misty Mountain retreat which is about 20km into the already remote forest. .

This is the view from the deck of one of the lodges that used to
hold the health seminars

The whole property is located on many acres of dense bush and you need a strong 4WD to manage the roads. There are various creek crossings with some steep banks that our vehicle eventually gave up on and we needed towing out of the river bed. (We were following behind Howard and Evelyn's truck.)  The CV joint looked like it gave up though thankfully we could still drive out albeit only with 2WD. Josh did a good job of managing the old truck even though he found it slightly stressful having to control a car slipping perilously close to steep banks and creeks. He did get some helpful tips from his 11-year-old cousin who is a confident driver of rough roads!

This Brahman Bull was checking us out when we arrived
back to the farmlands. I have never seen a cow like that before!

Tomorrow we are sadly leaving already. I definitely could have stayed on longer to learn some cooking skills from Evelyn who is a magnificent cook and to glean some knowledge about their healthy living. Evelyn said that they could do with a gardener for the kitchen and that I could come and stay to do a volunteer stint here! Maybe I could consider that for the future...