Suryavana Retreat Centre
All us need a break from our everyday lives from time to time.
Such a break can be both refreshing and revitalizing.
Suryavana opens the portal into the Buddhist world, offering a new perspective on life and living.
Suryavana is not just a country house, it is a Buddhist temple situated in the nature, expansive and stimulating. Not far from civilization, with bigger skies, a few days in Suryavana provides a shared experience of community, of living and practicing together. This nourishes, inspires and challenges us offering a renewed vision of living and connecting with ourselves and others.
Agradecimientos
Jesu Maraz – great companion
Yashomani – our Treasurer
Padmashalin – Main Chef 2025
Our donors who facilitated the renovation of the Shrine Room and the Stupa, and countless other details.
All the people who have helped us run events in 2025, especially in the kitchen.
All the individuals and groups who have organized and attended retreats at Suryavana in 2025.
Many thanks
Sudaka (Director)
The Dream of a Country Retreat
For decades the Valencia Triratna Sangha (founded in 1990) rented out places in the countryside around Valencia to run retreats. There was an elaborate and arduous journey to each retreat, loading up someones van with assorted meditation gear and sometimes our aging geodesic dome, doing the shopping and loading up another vehicle, organising cooks. We would head out to a rented property, usually an hour or two away. Then set up a shrine. This went on for decades and no doubt had its benefits and its own charm. Nowadays with just a couple of phone calls, maybe even just a WhatsApp, we turn up to a centrally heated country house, beds made, a shrine room set out with matching cushions and mats, the food store full and the kitchen team ready to go! Suryavana’s primary purpose is to provide a dedicated retreat place for our Triratna community, open to all, as well for Ordination training (for men and women), Order weekends and longer Order events.
In 2016, with much enthusiasm and hope the Council that ran the Valencia Buddhist Centre, we were ten at the time, bought the Masía Novales, a renovated late 19th century olive farm, an easy one hour drive from Valencia. Fortunately for us the house had already been refurbished as a “boutique hotel” some ten years previously and we could run our first retreat within a few days after acquisition.
The property was purchased with several substantial donations and two large loans. Suryavana, as a project, is in its “investment and pay back phase”.
The emphasis over the last five years (since the Pandemic) has been to build economic viability, as well as create a sustainable living space for the “team” (myself and my wife) running the project. Suryavana steadily proceeds forward with our Spanish bank loan (1129,89 euros every month), concluding in 2032! Only 6 years to go! The second loan from the Windhorse Trust to buy and start the project was £73,895.64. This is being paid back slowly (£6000 per annum). The completion date is March 2036.
Some data: In 2025 we ran 35 retreats. Some 500 people stayed at Suryavana.
Our Order and Triratna Buddhist community organised 12 retreats and friends of our Sangha; RespiraVida, Bodhiyoga and others ran 9 events.
We hosted 15 non-Triratna groups (Yoga, personal development and other trainings).
It is worth noting that about third of our income came from Triratna and friends, a third from non-Triratna groups, a quarter in donations and the rest from our little shop and solitary cabin facility.
We offer dates to other groups that want simple hostel style accommodation and nutritious vegetarian food. We can accommodate groups of 15-25 people in all weathers. Rooms vary from 2-5 beds with ensuite bathrooms. We have central heating in Winter and a cool Shrineroom and a swimming pool in Summer!
Most recently we have added a Stupa, just over 2m high, to beautify and sanctify our Buddhist temple, Suryavana.
It will serve to house some earth from our own teachers burial mound situated in Adhistana (England UK).
What does Suryavana offer to the world?
- A retreat centre for the Triratna community in Spain, open to all, an opportunity for anyone to encounter, explore and deepen their connection with Buddhist practice and meditation as presented by Triratna in retreat conditions. Some 500 people came through Suryavana in 2025
- A sacred space open to like-minded groups to rent and enjoy. To help generate income and resources for Suryavana.
We generated a donation of some 1700 euros for the Barcelona Buddhist Centre in September in 2025. - Suryavana is a team based business to partially support two or three members of our Sangha.
- A workshop, or “playground” for volunteers, to explore working and sharing practice in teams, in the kitchen and some “working retreats”.
Do you want collaborate with us?
- Come on retreat
The best support is to come here on retreat. Check out our programme!
We also have a solitary cabin facility, 200m from the main house - Support us financially
A small monthly donation is really helpful to budget our running costs - Make a donation towards the Windhorse Trust Loan
We owe £73,895.64 to be repaid by 2036.
How about giving us a large donation to clear this now?
This would have a number of benefits:
1. Free up resources to be invested back into the project, to upgrade our facilities and support a bigger team
2. Relieve ongoing stresses and strains of running a very tight streamlined budget.
3. Suryavana would be 5 years closer to financial independence
4. Your donation would have a double impact, as the Windhorse Trust reinvests its financial resources around the Triratna community worldwide. - Be a volunteer
If you live locally, we invite you to come help out on our retreats. Especially welcome is collaboration in our kitchen! From time to time we organise “working retreats” to take care of the property and gardens.
