Spirit of Samhain – Witchcraft Retreat 2025

📍 Bend of Ivy Lodge, Blue Ridge Mountains, North Carolina
📅 October 29 – November 2, 2025
🕯️ Five luscious days of ritual, reflection, and deep ancestral magic — held in sacred land beneath a Blue Ridge sky.

Enchantment Awaits in the Blue Ridge Mountains

Autumn’s breath thickens here. In the folds of the Blue Ridge Mountains, the world softens and sharpens all at once — leaves glow like embers, silence hums like a spell waiting to land. And in the heart of this hush, something stirs with velvet intention: the Spirit of Samhain.

This samhain retreat doesn’t lure you away from life — it draws you deeper into the marrow of it. Rituals rise at dawn, incense curls along forest paths, and your story begins to loosen in the throat. Shadow work isn’t whispered or hidden. It’s invited to dance. Not dissected — devoured. With grace. With grit. With the kind of hush that only lives between drumbeats and firelight.

Every step on this land remembers something. You can feel it — the pulse of ancestral connection under your soles. The pull toward the bone-deep knowing that only comes when witches gather at season’s edge.

Call it a portal. Call it homecoming. Or simply call it what it is: the Witches New Year rising.

The lodge waits. The mountain breathes. And the veil? Darling, it’s already listening.

Inside the Retreat: Rituals, Realignment, and Radiance

The Spirit of Samhain unfolds like a ritual in motion — intimate, elemental, and layered with intention from dawn to starlight. This isn’t an event that happens to you. It happens through you.

Each day begins in quiet reverence, as the sun spills its first breath across the mountains. In the sanctuary room at Bend of Ivy Lodge, guided breathwork and soul-grounding rituals set the tone. From there, the current deepens. Forest trails become sacred pathways. Circles open under the boughs. And you’ll find yourself swept into the rhythm of the land — barefoot, breathless, utterly awake.

The retreat offers bonfire rituals at dusk, where flame and intention mingle under the darkening sky. Tarot readings by candlelight speak to soul threads you didn’t know you’d tangled. And each evening, the ancestral ceremonies take shape — quiet, potent, cloaked in reverence and rosemary smoke.

Throughout the experience, you’ll receive a personalized altar gift, crafted to hold your energy and intentions beyond the retreat itself. The silence of the woods becomes its own kind of mirror, where even the trees seem to listen. One night, you’ll be invited into a forest meditation lit only by the flicker of lanterns and the hush of your own breath.

Retreat leaders weave each element of this witchcraft retreat with precision and grace — drawing from ancestral lineages, elemental wisdom, and their own lived devotion to the turning of the wheel.

This is the Spirit of Samhain in full embodiment — sacred, shadowed, and utterly luminous.

The Spirit of Samhain as a Spiritual Portal

The name itself stirs something ancient — Spirit of Samhain. It curls on the tongue like a charm, heavy with memory, humming with consequence. Say it aloud in the Blue Ridge Mountains North Carolina, and the wind changes shape to listen.

This is where soul meets season. Where the past doesn’t haunt — it guides. Under this October sky, you don’t just honour your lineage. You step into it. With every ritual carved into the hours, the veil thins around you and within you.

In the circle, shadow work becomes more than reflection — it becomes communion. Not everything that rises will ask for healing. Some truths want nothing but witness. Some wounds prefer moonlight to medicine.

And still, you show up.

Your feet will trace sacred paths that have felt this rhythm before. Candles burn for names you whisper. Salt touches skin. Smoke finds its way into the seams of your voice. Here, ancestral connection isn’t a metaphor — it’s breath. Heat. Pulse. The quiet ache that comes when something older than language stirs behind your ribs.

All of it swells toward a singular threshold: the Witches New Year. No confetti. No clocks. Just intention, steeped in stillness, rising like mist through the trees.

This is the Spirit of Samhain when it opens fully. And once it does, nothing inside you stays dormant.

The Sacred Setting: Bend of Ivy and the Blue Ridge Veil

The land doesn’t whisper here — it summons. Every root at Bend of Ivy curls with purpose, every breeze through the trees carries breath from older worlds. You don’t arrive. You’re called.

Tucked into the wild elegance of the Blue Ridge Mountains, this sanctuary wraps its arms around the Spirit of Samhain and doesn’t let go. The landscape moves with its own rhythm — forest, fire, and the kind of hush that sinks into your bones before you realise you’ve stopped speaking.

The stone circle waits in silence, worn smooth by bare feet and intention. The firepit, half-hidden in ivy and reverence, crackles with more than heat. And when night folds down over the land, the starlight doesn’t just shine — it gathers. Around the lodge. Around the altar. Around you.

The land itself becomes part of the ritual — soft earth, open sky, moss-draped doorways between what you thought you needed and what you came here to remember.

This is where the Spirit of Samhain settles into the soil. And once you’ve felt it — wild, warm, and waiting — you’ll never be satisfied with surface again.

Extend Your Stay: Magical Places to Visit Nearby

When the Spirit of Samhain draws to a close, the season has curled itself around your bones and the fires have burned low at Bend of Ivy Lodge, the world outside the circle begins to beckon — not as a distraction, but as a continuation.

You’re already opened. So let the land tempt you further.

✨ Craggy Gardens lies just twenty minutes away, a high-altitude dreamscape of wind-woven trails and ancient rhododendron roots. Mist coils like spirit smoke across the ridgeline, and every step feels like you’re walking through a spell half-spoken.
✨ Mount Mitchell State Park rises beyond — the tallest peak in the East. There’s power in that height. Stillness. Something sacred. If you need to cast something skyward, this is where you go.
✨ And if the forest has given all it can, wander into Downtown Asheville — tarot cafés, offbeat bookstores, herbal apothecaries tucked behind ivy, and street corners where fiddle songs flirt with incense.

🛍️ Asheville Pagan Supply is a witch’s treasure chest — altar tools, bone charms, local spellcraft, and a community altar that’s humming with Samhain breath.
🌿 Shoji Spa & Retreat? Oh, yes. Soak in cedar tubs beneath forest canopy while the mountain exhales around you. A ritual of its own — skin, steam, stillness.

🥗 Early Girl Eatery is nourishment dressed in biscuits and roasted roots. You’ll find locals, laughter, and the kind of food that feels like home after deep magic.
🍻 Bhramari Brewing Co. crafts herb-laced brews that taste like a hedge witch’s love letter. Cozy, intimate, and lightly enchanted.

This isn’t a tourist trail. It’s a post-ritual pilgrimage. Everything here hums in the same key as the Blue Ridge Mountains North Carolina — grounded, enchanted, and just a little wild around the edges.

You came for Spirit of Samhain.
But the land? The land came for you.

How to Join the Spirit of Samhain

If you’ve made it this far, you already feel it. That low hum beneath your ribs? That’s Spirit of Samhain calling your name — not in whispers, but in rhythm.

Booking your place isn’t just logistics. It’s a declaration. You’re stepping across a threshold and into five nights of elemental fire, forest rituals, and the kind of transformation you won’t find on a screen. It begins the moment you say yes.

The retreat unfolds at Bend of Ivy Lodge, nestled deep in the Blue Ridge Mountains, where everything — from the wind in the trees to the curve of the candlelight — holds sacred intent. You’ll choose from lodging tiers designed to suit your comfort and your magic. Shared rooms for sisterhood and laughter. Private spaces for solitude and silence. All of it held in ceremony.

What’s included? Everything you need and nothing you don’t.
Rituals. Workshops. Nourishing meals made with seasonal ingredients. Daily gatherings under sky and stars. A personal altar offering. And the pulse of Spirit of Samhain winding through every firelit hour.

You’ll be welcomed into a spiritual community of witches, seekers, and sensitives — all drawn by the same current of intention. No dogma. No ego. Just presence, practice, and transformation in real time.

This is the work. The mystery. The rewilding.
And it starts when you say yes to Spirit of Samhain.

FAQs + Travel Notes

How do I get to Spirit of Samhain at Bend of Ivy?
The journey to Bend of Ivy is part of the magic. Most travellers fly into Asheville Regional Airport — just 35 minutes from the lodge. From there, follow winding backroads into the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains North Carolina, where the air begins to shift and the edges blur. You’ll receive detailed directions once registered, including nearby accommodation options for early arrivals.

What should I bring?
Pack with intention. A journal. Layers for cool mountain evenings. Ritual items that feel sacred to you — stones, herbs, divination tools. Comfortable clothes for forest walking, candlelit gatherings, and silent meditation. And perhaps one piece of clothing that feels like a spell.

What’s the weather like in late October?
Autumn in the Blue Ridge Mountains North Carolina is a sacred mood. Days are crisp and golden, hovering around 15°C (59°F). Nights slip into something cooler — expect 5–7°C (41–45°F) under star-heavy skies. Bring warmth, softness, and outerwear you can lay on the grass in.

Is there a payment plan available?
Yes — flexible payment options are offered to honour where you are in your journey. Just select the instalment plan at checkout or reach out directly through the retreat’s booking portal.

Is the retreat accessible?
The terrain is natural, uneven in some areas, and the main spaces at Bend of Ivy include stairs and gravel paths. If you have accessibility needs, contact the organisers to explore what accommodations can be made.

Do I need travel insurance?
It’s recommended — especially for international travellers or those booking flights well in advance. Let protection be part of your ritual prep.

Is this right for me?
If the words Spirit of Samhain make something flutter beneath your ribs… then you already know.

Find out more at: EVENT WEBSITE

For more Witchcraft retreats, explore GlobalMBS.com/events