Taraloka Retreat Centre — Bettisfield, UK

Buddhist retreat centre for women on seven acres in the Welsh Borders

In the 1980s more and more women were becoming interested in Buddhism and in deepening their practice within the Triratna Buddhist Community, then known as the FWBO. There were men's retreat centres and mixed ones, but no space women practitioners could call their own. A few women, led by Sanghadevi, made it happen, and thousands of people contributed to the grassroots fundraising. In 1985 they bought Cornhill Farm, a run-down farmhouse with seven acres of land. Ratnasuri, another of the founding members, looked at the semi-derelict property and said, in the centre's own telling, 'It's got potential!' The first retreats were held in the white farmhouse. A living room became the shrine room, and everyone crowded into a couple of rooms to sleep on mattresses on the floor. The name came with it: Taraloka, Tara's Realm, after Green Tara, whose compassion steps out into the world while she stays rooted in meditation. Over the following years the farm outbuildings were converted through the time, energy and money of many women. Some of them broke up concrete cattle troughs with jack-hammers, in what is now the lounge, and others laid floors and nailed tiles on the roofs. That tradition continues in Taraloka's work retreats, and a residential community has held responsibility for the project throughout. Sangharakshita carried out ordinations here in the 1980s. Today the centre welcomes just under a thousand retreatants a year. Introductory weekends need no experience. Open retreats include meditation instruction and periods of silence. Retreats for Triratna Regulars and Mitras go further into meditation and silence. The land that was an intensively farmed field in 1985 now has woodlands, ponds and wildflower meadows, with great crested newts in spring. It sits on the Llangollen canal, one field from the Whixall Moss nature reserve. Food on retreat is 100% vegan and a wood pellet boiler heats the buildings.

Traditions: Triratna Buddhism, Mindfulness of Breathing, Metta Bhavana, Sevenfold Puja, Green Tara practice, Chanting

Programs: Introductory Weekend: Kindness, Buddhism: A Path to Freedom, Winter Oasis, Metta, Movement and Music, Entering the Mandala of Tara: Intensive Meditation Retreat, Silent Weekend, Taraloka Arts Residency, Work retreats