20th Anniversary Vipassana Meditation Retreat 2026
Tudong – The Sacred Pilgrimage of Monastery to Monastery
This year marks a milestone: 20 years of our annual Vipassana retreat. To honor this special anniversary, we will embark on a journey that is rarely offered and deeply transformative – a Tudong pilgrimage, walking silently alongside monks and fellow practitioners from monastery to monastery.
The Buddha himself encouraged monks to live unattached, never staying in one place for more than a day, so the mind would remain free from comfort, routine, and dependency. This ancient tradition is still alive in Thailand, and now you are invited to experience it firsthand.
For 10 days, we will live simply, walk mindfully, and practice in complete silence. The conditions will be basic, the path unknown, and the silence profound. It will be both a challenge and a gift – stripping away distractions so the mind can awaken to its true strength and clarity.
This retreat is not just another meditation retreat. It is a rare opportunity to step into a living Buddhist tradition, to test the boundaries of your mind, and to celebrate two decades of shared practice and transformation with us.
Join us for this extraordinary journey.
A once-in-a-lifetime retreat, dedicated to freedom, silence, and awakening.
Since 2006 we have organised this Vipassana retreat. It is a perfect opportunity to begin your meditation practice, or will profoundly deepen your current practice. You will be tought by very revered monks. Christian and Anja are a unique bridge, making the ancient teachings very accessible for our western minds, weaving in neuroscience and psychology themes to make your experience as holistic as possible! Also Anjas deep and insightful Yoga classes make this retreat outstanding.
This 10 day event starts in Wat Pho Ban Nontan Monastery in Khon Kaen, which is one of the most famous monasteries in Thailand, renowned for its active meditation program.
Christian Carow is a former monk. He teaches much of the Vipassana Meditation. During the retreat, you will learn sitting, standing, walking and lying meditation. He makes it accessible to those new to meditation whilst leading those more experienced into a deeper practice. Teachings are also given by him, which are focused on developing deep wisdom and unconditional love in a very open and modern way.
Ajahn Somchai gives many of the Dhamma talks. He is one of the Directors of the second largest Buddhist university in Thailand, Abbot of the monastery, and arguably the best meditation teacher in Thailand.
Anja Carow is a former buddhist nun and long time Yoga teacher.
From start to finish, this is a fully immersive Thai Cultural experience. The deep contact with the living Thai buddhist community is a truly remarkable and heart opening encounter.
Really delve into your subconscious and start the hard work on yourself at this once in a lifetime retreat.
Sleeping: We provide mosquito nets, very thin mattresses, pillows and meditation clothes. Please bring anything else you think you may need to sleep comfortably.
Eating: You will be provided hopefully with two meals per day. On the walk, the food will be donated by the villagers. We will try to communicate that vegetarian meals is what we usually eat, but so far off the beaten track experience shows that vegetarianism is still not anything the villagers are familiar with. So you might have to be flexible.
Clothing: The meditation clothes are very thin so bring suitable underwear; and ladies please wear bras (sports bras work best) and underwear which are suitable for a monastery, these need to be plain (no patterns) and preferably dark or white coloured.
Essentials: Bring a water bottle, head torch, towel, and your personal toiletries. There is no toilet paper provided so please also bring this if you are not comfortable using the bum gun
Optional: ear plugs, eye covers, inflatable matress and cushion
The walking is traditionally done barefoot. So train your skin! But you are not forced to walk bare foot, so you can bring shoes.
Wat Pho Ban Nontan in Khon Kaen will host the retreat and this is where we will meet. Wat Pho is one of the oldest monasteries in Khon Kaen, the third largest city in Thailand. It is known as one of the leading monasteries for meditation and youth work. Ajahn Somchai received a prize from the queen of Thailand for his exceptional work in this field.
Men and women sleep usually in gender separated dorms. We will all have the equipment the monks are using on their pilgrimage: An umbrella with a mosquito net and a pillow. You want more compfort: Bring it!
The Meditation retreat is on donation basis. Minimum 170 Euro. You can cancel until 1 month before the retreat for a processing fee of 30 Euros. After that the full amount is charged.
90 Euros are your donation to the monastery.80 Euros are for the teachers and the organisation of the retreat. You have of course after the retreat the opportunity to donate more if you like. The Tudong requires a lot more for transport, vehicles, preperation etc. If you can the monastery will highly apprechiate further donations. At the end of each retreat, we will put out envelopes where you can donate more if you like.
– Food will be donated by the villagers in each monastery. We have no influence on any dietary or vegan/vegetarian options
– clean drinking water will be always available
– For your stay we ask you to remain in complete silence for 10 days.
– You will need to follow the 5 precepts at all times:
- not harming any living being
- not taking what was not given to you
- no lying
- no sexual misconduct
- no intoxicants
– Retreat language is English.
Arrive 10.03.2026 at 3:00pm
Finish 20.03.2026 at 2:00pm
What is Vipassana Meditation?
What partissipants say about the retreat
Teachers
Venerable Dr. Ajahn Somchai Kantasilo
Venerable Dr. Ajahn Somchai Kantasillo, Abbot of Wat Pho Monastery, Director of the Sangha College of the Mahachulalongkorn University, Khon Kaen, is a very innovative dharma teacher and initiator of the Mindfulness Eco Project.
He became a novice at the age of 15 and since then has stayed ordained. On his path he became a disciple and the successor of Long Po Poh, one of the great monks from the forest tradition. His teachings express his deep wisdom and knowledge of the scriptures and meditation practice. His wish is to support his disciples to wake up to their full potential.
Included as part of his teachings , he likes to take his disciples on retreats in nature, with very basic facilities to create a feeling of being closer to the environment. This can create a humble and strong mind. Being able to let go of comfort from the outer world helps us to turn inward and find our true nature; a liberated heart and mind. He goes beyond the “I, me, mine” self-centered thinking of the modern world, as it creates stressed feelings of separation and competition.
Christian Carow
Christian Carow was the owner of a successful marketing company, worked as an consultant and was an assistant in group psychotherapy before he decided to change his life very radical. He became a monk for one year in the Thai forest tradition under his teacher Ajahn Somchai Kantasillo. He has also studied alongside leading meditation teachers like Jack Kornfield, Thich Nhat Hanh and Fred von Allem.
Since 2006 he is leading meditation retreats in Thailand and Germany. He is the co-founder of the Mindfulness Project, a modern community, where he integrates Psychology, Neuroscience, Meditation, Yoga with new ways of holistic living. The project provides a unique learning experience for thousands of volunteers from around the world and has been life changing for a lot of them. His goal is to find a modern approach to contemplative practices in order to impact the personal, social and economic dimension of people towards a more fulfilling and sustainable life.
Anja Carow
Anja studied Sports and Biology and during her exam she had a spontaneous insight, that becoming a school teacher will not be her path and she decided to go to Aisa after finishing her study to learn meditation and ancient wisdom. Together with Christian she stumbled into a Thai monastery and the teachings had such an incredible impact, that she studied meditation and Yoga ever since. It became her driving force to teach these ancient wisdom to young people in a very alive and relatable way. Her laughter is so infectious and her Yoga classes become a deep dive into interreligious practises and wisdom.
She started her Yoga teacher training in the Himalayan Institute for 4 years and travels to Rishikesh, India to dive deeper into the wisdom of Yoga.