Day Away

The monastery in Vallerjmo hosts day and weekend retreats all the time, and I finally had a schedule free enough to make the drive over to spend a day with the monks. I'm sort of in awe that a monastery was built in such a strange place and wouldn't have thought it would be so ideal, but the desert provides a magical backdrop for a day of meditation and prayer.
The monks own the valley and have made it an oasis in the hills. The lands are quite large. I'm not sure how many acres the monastery stretches for, but the valley goes back quite a way into the surrounding hills and each part has been carefully tended. There are shady groves, an artifical pond and multiple outbuildings for housing and workshops.
I made an earlier trip here to check out the wildlife. No, not the monks. The greenery is a destinatino for migrating birds of all types, and I've hiked around the hills before looking for native species. They have woodpeckers, red-wing blackbirds, mockingbirds, hummingbirds, sparrows and ravens. Of course, this still is the high desert, so they have their share of snakes and lizards as well. I've seen lizards, but no snakes yet.

This day retreat got me hooked into the whole experience. They start out with a lesson and then the group has leave to walk around the grounds in meditation. A noon bell summons everyone to communion (Catholic, so I just watched), and then lunch. The food is fantastic. Monks know how to cook and eat very well. I'm sure the picturesque ideal is to have monks sup on simple fare of raw vegetables and hard bread but these guys know what they're doing. We had soup and sandwiches; but what soup! And what sandwiches!
After the meal, there is another lesson and then another walk around the hillside. I could have gone further up the paths to check out this cool "Stations of the Cross" trail, but essentially ran out of time. It's hard to imagine that so much of a day can be taken up by just walking around outside, but there is something very special about the monastery. It's a time for quiet reflection and recharging one's spiritual batteries.