Recent guest Clinton Curtis wrote this blog post about his recent stay at Opossum Creek with his family.
My wife and I created a ritual this year – coinciding with the Chinese New Year we would escape to a secluded location in the mountains with our two daughters to reflect on our lives and plan for the year ahead. Theoretically, we could have done this at home, but to retreat from our daily routines and familiar surroundings added energy and excitement to the process.
We rented a cabin at Opossum Creek Retreat where the stars pierce the ink black sky at night and the only distractions are the wildlife and the gurgling stream.
To some, it may seem like a lot of effort to pack and drive to an offsite location for such an event, but many fortune 500 companies send their employees great distances for such ‘offsite’ meetings because of the unencumbered creativity that ensues. For us, however, the trip from our home to the woodland sanctuary of OCR is all of seven miles!
To describe this phenomenon we’ve borrowed the term ‘staycation’ from the 1970’s book Your Money or Your Life. Our staycation has been even better than expected. We have welcomed the Year of the Dragon in fine fashion, nestled in the tree branches of the eastern woods we love so much.
Our cabin exemplified simplicity and royalty simultaneously, and dipping into the hot tub in midwinter added an element of the mystical.
Our family found a wonderful harmony at OCR and a quiet ability to fulfill our goals. As I mentioned, we have created a ritual, and we plan to return to Opossum Creek Retreat in 2013 to bring in the Year of the Snake!