StoneWind Facilities
StoneWind Institute, situated on StoneWind Retreat's 160 acre mountain top campus in Arkansas' beautiful Boston Mountains, is located midway between Fayetteville and Ft. Smith in the northwest corner of the state. Institute attendees can stay in any of StoneWind Retreat's seven fully furnished, elegantly appointed Yurt Cabins, conveniently equipped for long or short stays with complete kitchens, central heat/air, washer/dryers, and 709sf of living area. The Cabins are built on 40'x40' private decks (some with hot tubs), all with elegant amenities and panoramic views of the mountains. In addition there is a yurt Teaching/Meditation Center on the banks of StonCara Lagoon, a 1500sf North Lodge with teaching and treatment areas, and a main Office within the old Red Barn. The 160 acre campus includes walking trails, natural and man made stone gardens, ponds, woods, and picnic areas with ancient stone tables and benches, plus 30,000 acres of Ozark National Forest just across our western fence. From the earth friendly yurt environments to our mountain views and natural surroundings, StoneWind is the perfect setting for a healing and learning retreat.
StoneWind's Yurt Cabins are available in two configurations: the Deluxe Yurt Cabin with Hot Tub and the Vacation Yurt Cabin without a hot tub. The basic size and design of both types of cabin is identical, with the same elegant furniture and amenities and the same size deck with mountain views.
Deluxe Yurt Cabins have all the features described above plus a hot tub outside on the deck, privacy screening, wonderful mountain views for your pleasure, and a picturesque ravine just off the tub area. Nothing compares to basquing in warm water under an inky blanket of night with only the moon and starlight above--the way it used to be before light pollution.
Vacation Yurt Cabins have the same furnishings and amenities as the Deluxe Yurt Cabins. While they do not have hot tubs, the view of deer, sunsets, and stars from the decks are just as amazing. All our Yurt Cabins invite you to enjoy the beauty of the woods and mountains in the comfort of elegant surroundings. Deck tables with woven chairs overlook the mountains providing the perfect spot for a leisurely breakfast, a romantic sunset dinner, or a place to surf the internet on your laptop.
Classes are offered on a regular basis in the teaching facilities, with students free to commute or stay in the cabins for a weekend, a week, a month, or longer. StoneWind Retreat makes the Yurt Cabins available to those enrolled in Institute classes or coming to the Wellness Center at special Institute rates when anyone is attending an Institute class, Special Event, or Intensive package. Those who are simply looking for a place to get away for a healing rest can enjoy the comforts of StoneWind's yurt cabins through StoneWind Retreat, which is open to Guests year round.
Students and Guests are invited to stroll gravel walking trails to stone meditation gardens, sit on million year old boulders, green with moss, white with lichen, watch deer graze our fields while hawks, owls, and the occassional eagle glide overhead. Or you can take one of the many grass pathways that meander through the fields, past ponds, stone tables and benches, circling back to the residences. If you feel adventuresome, leave the beaten path and cross our western fence into the wilderness of the Ozark National Forest for a day hike or go a few miles north on I-540 to Devil's Den State Park and hike miles of prepared hiking trails. In the evenings, come home to spectacular sunsets from StonCara Lagoon or from the vantage point of your own private deck.
The main Teaching/Meditation Center is open evenings and between classes as a quiet place to meditate, and each of the Yurt Cabins is designed for optimum peace and quiet for meditation and study. There are lending libraries in the Office and the North Lodge with books, magazines, DVD's, Videos, and CD's on a range of topics related to holistic healing, methaphysical topics, and entertainment..
Living the "Unplugged" Life on StoneWind's mountain
Each Yurt is specifically designed to support the teaching and healing mission of StoneWind Institute, which means the usual noisy, disruptive and interruptive devices are simply not here or no longer allowed to be noisy and disruptive. For instance, the phones in the yurts do not receive incoming calls, although you can call out. All major cell phones work well on the mountain--but we encourage you to turn your cell phone off and put it in a drawer while you are here. You will find radios, CD players, and new televisions with DVDs and VCRs in each Yurt, and a rich lending library of audio/visual materials related to Institute programs and to general entertainment (or as we say it, Soul Food, Mind Food, and Junk Food), but there are no connections to cable or network TV. Our signature tees say it all: "Take back your life. Turn off the TV." For confirmed news addicts who find cold turkey too painful, NPR comes in loud and clear with great indepth reporting on all the day's events.
"Unplugged," Yes. Unconnected, "No." Each yurt has wireless internet, which means with a WIFI Laptop you can surf the Net anytime. If you are not WIFI-Lap equipped or don't want to lug it, you can pick up email at one of the computers in the main office or from the computer in the North Lodge training area.
Bottom line: there are important lessons to be learned about ourselves, each other, healing, Nature, the world, but those lessons can only be learned in the silence of the individual heart. Next to potable Water, Silence is the most precious and the most scarce commodity in our world. It is the Gold Standard at StoneWind. Our mountain shares its beauty, its energies, its stones, its messges with us, but we must be able to listen with the quiet attention lost everywhere else beneath the unceasing din of our technological world.
At StoneWind, we listen.
