In the USA an Ayahuasca retreat can cost around $850 USD while in Peru you could expect to Pay around $729 and in Europe as low as $275 Euro. These are often all inclusive of food, ceremonies accommodations and perhaps more. In this article I will talk about the different costs in popular parts of the world to drink Ayahuasca.
Table of Contents:
- Where are the best Ayahuasca Retreats near me?
- Cheapest Ayahuasca Retreats
- Ayahuasca Retreat prices in Peru
- Retreat cost too much? Ayahuasca without a retreat
Where are the best Ayahuasca Retreats near me?
We put together a list of the best Ayahuasca retreats around the world based on 4 criteria as given to us by experienced Ayahuasceros (Ayahuasca practitioners) from The Ayahuasca Reddit Group. They told us that a good Ayahuasca Retreat will,
- Medically screen you prior to taking a booking,
- have experienced shaman(a),
- have small group sizes (this one was hard satisfy),
- and take days off in between ceremonies.
The Ayahuasca Retreats on this map satisfy most of these but some struggle to meet the small group requirement. Santuario Huistin was able to meet all criteria.
An Ayahuasca Ceremony in the USA?
Yes there are several Ayahuasca Retreats in the USA including Origen Sagrada (from $850 USD) which operate ceremonies very close to our ideal criteria mentioned above. Ayahuasca in the US is somewhat complicated by legality but Origen Sagrada operates without issue in California and Colorado.
Cheap Ayahuasca Retreat
Ayahuasca retreat costs in the USA, based on our research, cost around $850 USD at Origen Sagrada based in Colorado and California. This is inclusive food, accommodation and the ceremonies which are run by Colombian (Taita) Shaman.
The cheapest Ayahuasca Retreats are often in South America. One of the cheaper we have seen is Santuario Huistin Ayahuasca Retreat (5 night all inclusive, 3 ceremonies $729 USD) in Pucallpa Peru.
If you are in Europe then Om-Mij is very affordable and based in Spain and The Netherlands who offer retreats for 275 Euro.
Ayahuasca Retreat prices in Peru
I surveyed at 14 Ayahuasca retreats in Peru and found that they vary from $112 – $286 USD per day in price with an average cost of $166 USD p/day inclusive of accommodation, food, ceremonies and sometimes more as they vary in what’s included for the price.
Retreat cost too much? Ayahuasca without a retreat
It is possible to drink Ayahuasca without a retreat setting but this is probably best done by those experienced with either ceremonial Ayahuasca or other psychedelics.
Some things to think about might be,
- do you know how to medically screen yourself for medications and conditions which can be dangerous in conjunction with Ayahuasca?
- Do you know how to set an intention for use in your ceremonies?
- Do you know how to prepare for Ayahuasca with a dieta?
If so, you may be able to find some Ayahuasca or brew your own in order to drink Ayahuasca without a retreat and still create a retreat like feel to your trip if you want. Soul Herbs will send you some Ayahuasca either in heroic or micro doses as you wish. Ayahuasca is usually drunk in heroic doses for a ceremony so you probably want one of the kits which can be stored for up to 5 years according to their website and contain a number of doses and in fact up to 12 heroic trip size doses.
The one thing I would be concerned about would be that Ayahuasca without a formal ceremony will miss a few aspects that a shamanic retreat would deem necessary. For example,
- A shaman(a) would open and close a ceremony with spiritually cleansing and protective actions. You should brush up on ‘spiritual hygiene’ as it were so that you do not engage with spirits or energies which may mean you harm while under the influence of Ayahuasca. This is a fairly common occurrence so be aware.
- Some basics of spiritual hygiene would be,
- burn some sage to cleanse the space you wish to drink Ayahuasca in.
- Make sure its clean and well ventilated.
- You could meditate prior to the beginning by focussing on love and not anxiety and fear. Negative spirits feed off of fear and anxiety so this would attract them. Love would keep them at bay.
- During the meditation you could also ask that no energies or spirits enter the space with which you plan to drink in that are not ‘positively aligned’ and only those that want to genuinely help you. Energies which have bad intentions should be deliberately asked to not attend or interfere.
- You could also bath before the ceremony with garlic infused water as spiritual protection for the coming ceremony.
- Start the ceremony off with a humble request (head down in a Buddha style meditation pose) that Mother Ayahuasca try to help you in your ceremony. I can’t stress the humility part enough. Be humble or Mother Ayahuasca may just humble you in your trip.
- I’m not sure how to end the ceremony. Perhaps some sort of humble offering or prayer/meditation on Mother Ayahuasca thanking her for her help. Humility is a big thing with Mother Ayahuasca.
- Usually a shaman(a) would spiritually close of a ceremony and actually remove any negative spirits who may have crept into the ceremony or indeed out of one participant and ‘into’ another. It may sound strange to those who have not yet been through a few Ayahuasca ceremonies but this can happen and so if you are doing a ceremony without an experienced shaman you need to be aware of this possibility and come up with some way to ‘close off’ the ceremony without spiritually harming yourself or those in the ceremony.
- I actually don’t know how to do this as I’m not a shaman so you would need to figure this out on your own.
- I suppose this is why shaman go through all their training prior to leading ceremonies which takes years of time.
- Some basics of spiritual hygiene would be,
- A shaman(a) would also know ‘Icaros’ which are spiritual songs which magnify and call in the spirit of Ayahuasca (known as ‘Madre de Ayahuasca’ or Mother Ayahuasca). These have their own particular meaning and use cases so it’s not as easy as simply searching the web for ‘Icaros music’ and playing that as it’s a bit like getting a tattoo in a language you don’t understand. You don’t know what you are writing or in this case ‘conjuring’ by playing a random Icaros. If I was going to do this I would probably not use Icaros at all and go without music.
Ayahuasca Tea costs per gram
If you are going to do your own ceremony you may want to buy Ayahuasca Kits from Soul Herbs. You can get Ayahuasca in 3 different forms and their customer service say that its easy to get these sent internationally except for the 10 minute kit to the USA as it won’t get through customs. If you aren’t in the USA then all of these are viable for you.
- Ayahuasca ’10 minute preparation’ kit (B. Caapi and Chacruna) will get you 120 grams for $297 USD making the cost per gram $2.475 USD p/gram. This yields around 160ml of Ayahuasca Tea and 4 heroic or transcendental trips with a cost per Ayahuasca trip of $74.25 USD.
- They have various sizes of kit. The above numbers are for the small size. The cost can drop to as low as $1.38 USD p/gram of Ayahuasca if you went with the large size.
- Soul Herbs have a guide for preparation of this 10 minute kit.
- Ayahuasca ‘brewing’ kit (Mimosa H and B. Caapi) comes in multiple sizes and gives you the raw ingredients to brew your own Ayahuasca Tea. The small kit comes with 200gr B. Caapi Powder + 60gr Mimosa Hostilis Root Bark Powder which you would then brew.
- This would then net you 4 transcendental or heroic doses. That would make the cost per gram in this option approximately $2.075 USD p/gram assuming this brew gives you around 120ml of brewed Ayahuasca.
- Soul Herbs show you how to brew Ayahuasca using this kit in their guide.
- Ayahuasca Micro Dose Drops costs around $5.80 p/gram and gives you 15ml or 14 days worth or micro doses. This is the cost of the small bottle.
- The larger (and most cost effective per dose) kit is $297 USD and gives you 60ml which would be a $4.95 USD cost p/gram. This is 60 days worth of micro dosing.
- Soul Herbs has a How to Micro Dose Ayahuasca Guide you can follow as well.
