Paojilhuasca Amazonian Medicine Camp • Retreat Center
Treating:
PTSD
Addiction
Suicidal Ideation
Mind Expansion
Anxiety
Relationship Difficulties
Eating Disorders
Depression
Utilizing:
Ayahuasca
San Pedro Cactus
Ra'peh Tobacco
Bufo
Kambo
Yopo
mambe'
Versalles 16004, Iquitos 16004, Peru
Remote sessions are available via:
Nurturing Healing, Embracing Traditions, Transforming Lives, and Living in nature.
Founded in 2018 by Don Gardel, a highly respected curandero, and Fabrizio Beverina, a biomedical researcher with a passion for traditional medicine, Paojilhuasca Amazonian Medicine Center represents the fusion of ancient wisdom, contemporary healing, and scientific research.
Paojilhuasca's mission is profound: to democratize the healing potential of Amazonian medicines, specifically Kambo and Ayahuasca. Deeply moved by the transformative power of these plant medicines, the founders envisioned a space where individuals from all walks of life can access these sacred healing practices.
Don Gardel and Fabrizio have crafted the living facilities with careful intention, emphasizing simplicity and immersion in nature and offering a space that strikes a harmonious balance between solitude and community living. They have chosen to prioritize affordability, as they do not see healing as a luxury but a universal right.
Research is at the heart of Paojilhuasca's approach. The center emphasizes continuous learning and teaching, recognizing the importance of communal preparation of medicines during retreats. This commitment ensures a shared understanding of the healing journey. They are currently collaborating with a master's student to conduct a study on PTSD, and the results have already been positive. They are currently seeking funding for this study in order to provide everything for free to the participants. Please let them know if you would like to participate in this study.
Paojilhuasca critiques the conventional Western approach of extracting active compounds from Amazonian plants and turning the contents into synthetic drugs. Instead, the center embraces the holistic wisdom of the plants, understanding that one cannot extract magic. The healing process involves using various parts of the plant and harvesting the plants at specific times of the day, respecting the ancient knowledge of those who discovered their healing properties.
At Paojilhuasca, the experience of taking Kambo, Ayahuasca, mambe’, and yopo is steeped in cultural context passed down through generations of curanderos. It radically differs from the impersonal, pill-centric approach, emphasizing the interconnected nature of mind, body, and spirit.
Paojilhuasca believes in the synergy of body and soul for enduring healing results. The holistic approach ensures that the transformative effects of our healing practices resonate deeply within each individual, fostering long-term well-being.
The Process
STEP
1
The therapeutic process involves a comprehensive program integrating traditional Amazonian practices with psychological and holistic approaches. Participants begin with a psychological test to learn about their problems as well as other things they want to work on, and the team then personalizes each person's experience, determining the right amount of each medicine to take and the specific plants to diet.
Guests will also receive preparation and integration pamphlets to guide them through the process and are highly encouraged to keep a journal where they can record their experiences and dreams, reflect upon everything, and start formulating a re-entry plan for when they eventually leave.
Moreover, those participating in the PTSD study will have one-on-one interview sessions and take additional tests to assess the severity of their condition.
STEP
2
This is followed by cleansing rituals, ayahuasca and yopo ceremonies. Guests do kambo a day or two before taking ayahuasca to do a deep cleaning so that ayahuasca does not have to and can go directly to working on the mind. They will also take floral baths in their first few days. Ayahuasca ceremonies happen twice a week, and yopo ceremonies occur once per week. Guests also have the option to take bufo if they so desire.
STEP
3
In addition to the ceremonies, guests participate in integrative activities like qikung, dancing meditation, meditation, cardio exercises, jungle treks, and boat rides. Moreover, mambé talking circles always happen the night after ayahuasca ceremonies so that guests may relay their experiences, hear about the experiences of others, express concerns, and, ultimately, bond with one another. The group also makes ayahuasca together for group bonding purposes, as well as placing their intentions within the brew and learning the process of making it. The program emphasizes personal growth, community building, and well-being, incorporating mindfulness, cultural understanding. Guests are also encouraged to spend time alone in nature and do some journaling, meditating, and drawing.
All participants in the PTSD study will have follow-up interviews after each ceremony to help with the integration process and address any concerns that may have arisen during the ceremonies.
STEP
4
By the end of their stay, guests should have a fairly concrete re-entry plan consisting of various integration practices that they have developed during their time here.
Session Types
Ayahuasca ceremonies
Ceremonies happen twice per week. Guests also participate in making the ayahuasca under the instruction of Don Gardel.
Kambo
Guests generally do kambo a day or two before their first ayahuasca ceremony. They can even join Don Gardel as he fetches the frogs early in the week hours of the morning.
Mambe talking circles
Mambe talking circles happen the night after ayahuasca ceremonies for guests to discuss their ayahuasca experiences, hear about the experiences of others, express any concerns, and bond with the community.
Bufo
You have the option of doing a bufo ceremony. As these are completely optional, we do not have regularly scheduled ceremonies, but they are available for an extra fee.
Ecstatic dance parties with San Pedro
There is usually at least one Huachuma dance party per month.
Yopo ceremonies
You can have a yopo ceremony upon request. They typically occur once every other week.
Price
Week retreat
$600
Plant diet week
$700
Staff
La Maestra Alicia · Ayahuasquera
La maestra Alicia comes from a long lineage of curanderos: both of her grandfathers were tabaqueros, meaning shamans that work with the plant of tobacco to cure. As is often the case, she became a shaman after a serious life crisis that made her abandon her family and live in the street. After being cured by ayahuasca, she felt called by the medicine to treat other people. She is self taught, but when asked, she says that the plants teach her. She lives between the Paojilhuasca center and a very remote area along Momon River near Iquitos. This special isolation in nature makes her power even stronger thanks to the deep connection with the environment.
Treating:
Depression
Anxiety
Addiction
PTSD
Chronic Illness
Suicidal Ideation
Relationship Difficulties
Eating Disorders
Mind Expansion
Utilizing:
Ayahuasca
Ra'peh Tobacco
Specialties:
An extremely powerful ayahuasquera
Fabrizio · Co-founder, manager, and researcher
Fabrizio Beverina's background is in biomedical research. He was an expert in brain-computer interaction and emotional computing. He secured a patent for the creation of a brain computer machine and a number of his articles have been cited more than 900 times as a result of this ventures.
He fled the scientific world and studied meditation in Asia, spending 12 years in China and then travelling to Tibet and India to study with Tibetan Buddhist monks.
He founded RiShi Labs Dali, an anarchist community for musicians and artists in Yunnan, China. There, he used the alias Kandido Burenson to pursue his creative side. He created comics, experimental theatre, ink paintings, and interactive video installations.
He later founded Artha LTD in Hong Kong, one of the eight more cutting-edge firms invited to participate in London Techcrunch in the field of AI-assisted education.
He is currently conducting research on shamanic cures while maintaining a scientific perspective, all with respect to the tradition and the spiritual side of life. He has lived with several shamans in Colombia, Peru, and Brazil, where he learned a great deal about therapeutic plants.
Along with Don Gardel, he co-founded Paojilhuasca, where he also teaches meditation and qikung and assists in making a variety of ancestral medicines.
Treating:
Depression
Anxiety
Addiction
PTSD
Suicidal Ideation
Relationship Difficulties
Eating Disorders
Mind Expansion
Utilizing:
Ayahuasca
DMT
Mescaline
San Pedro Cactus
Bufo
Ra'peh Tobacco
Kambo
Yopo
Specialties:
Experienced biomedical researcher with a strong interest in spirituality and traditional plant medicine
Don Gardel · Ayahuasquero, kambocero, and co-founder
Don Gardel comes from long lineage of shamans: his grandfather was one, and his two brothers are shamans as well. In his young age he had the chance to live with the Matses, an indigenous group, on the Brazilian border. There, he learned to work with kambo and rapé. Later on, he fell ill, and La Maestra Alicia cured him by finding an old spell that his grandfather had put on him when he was just a kid, a spell to become a shaman. Don Gardel started to train, dieting plants with Alicia and has since become a shaman. Working and travelling around Peru, he has worked under the tutelage of other curanderos. Gardel has since founded the Paojilhuasca Amazonian Medicine Camp along with Fabrizio.
Treating:
Chronic Illness
Mind Expansion
Depression
Anxiety
Addiction
PTSD
Relationship Difficulties
Utilizing:
Ayahuasca
Kambo
Bufo
yopo
San Pedro Cactus
Ra'peh Tobacco
Mescaline
Specialties:
A well-known kambocero and ayahuasquero, Don Gardel specializes in kambo treatment and ayahuasca and yopo ceremonies.
Ventura · Hunter, fisherman, and general jungle man
The husband of La Maestra Alicia, Ventura keeps the grounds afloat and provides all of the meat. He is exactly the person you want around while you're living in the jungle.
Treating:
Mind Expansion
Utilizing:
Ayahuasca
Ra'peh Tobacco
Specialties:
Placeholder
Zach · Researcher and sitter
An MSc student in Transpersonal Psychology extremely interested in the scientific, traditional, and spiritual side of ayahuasca and plant medicine in general, Zach conducts interviews with participants in the PTSD study, crunches all of the data, serves as a sitter for those who would like one, does integration coaching, and also helps out around the center, be it translating, DJing during ecstatic dance parties, cooking, and tending to people's needs.
While once on a more traditional path, graduating from the University of Pennsylvania in 2012 where he used Mellon Fellowships to conduct research in West Africa, Zach left college really wanting to travel the world and moved to Shanghai for 5 years, during which time he traveled extensively around China and Asia and also did a few trips to Europe and Africa. After that, he spent a few years digital nomading around Canada, Eastern Europe, Egypt, and Latin America.
He found himself wanting to pursue research on ayahuasca after witnessing a few people overcome serious issues of trauma and addiction and after a few of his own personal experiences obliterated his materialist conception of consciousness and led him to start considering that consciousness might be non-local. He also writes novels and short stories that he hopes to have finished soon.
Treating:
PTSD
Mind Expansion
Relationship Difficulties
Utilizing:
Ayahuasca
DMT
Mescaline
San Pedro Cactus
Bufo
Ra'peh Tobacco
Kambo
Yopo
Specialties:
Psychedelic therapy, integration coaching, and researching
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Locations
Versalles 16004, Iquitos 16004, Peru
Remote sessions are available via:
Price
Week retreat
$600
Plant diet week
$700