Mabon 2001 Newsletter Review: GATEWAY2001 gathering Wyrmwood

The GATEWAY2001 gathering in Canberra on the Australia Day long-weekend was absolutely fantastic ! I think we had about 50 people, some who had travelled as far away as Brisbane ! The workshops went well, with the Greenman workshop, the naked women's workshop, the men/women's sweat lodge (with great respect to the American Indian tradition), and the earth-healing workshops getting the most response. The aeromancy ritual was awesome!, and although I didn't make it to the Celtic midsummer rite (due to having fun in the sweat lodge), I didn't mind too much. We had a lot of fun drumming and firedancing around the fire on the Saturday night (lucky the fireban was lifted !). Hopefully we'll have more drummers next year!

There were many more workshops that I would have liked to have gone to, but with so much happening, difficult decisions had to be made. It was also great catching up with old friends who I hadn't seen in ages, and making new friends. We had a large amount of rain on the Friday night, which gave everything a cleansed feeling. Fortunately, those without waterproof tents found dry bedding in the farmhouse. It certainly was a relief from the heat.

I thought that for the first Gateway, Mitakuye Oyasin has done an excellent job. There's going to be another one next year, and I reckon it will be AWESOME ! Their homepage is http://home.graffiti.net/mitakuyeoyasin/ although it may be a few months before details about the next Gateway will be up. Why not bookmark the site for future reference?!

See you at GATEWAY2002 !!!

blessings, Wyrmwood