Heyyy Guys! We are so honored to have Felicia Tomasko, the editor-in-chief of the esteemed magazine LA Yoga, liveblogging about her experience at the much-talked-about Wanderlust Yoga & Music Festival this weekend! Take it away, Felicia!
Headliner Michael Franti had to cancel due to an emergency appendectomy….but it hasn’t dampened the enthusiasm. If anything, everyone here on the mountain at Squaw Valley USA, a down dog distance from Lake Tahoe, is fully engaged with sending plenty of good vibes to the inspirational yogic artist.
This intrepid reporter began her day at 5:30am, to get ready to help I LOVE YOGA set up their booth and follow Kasey from Yogamates around doing interviews. The first practice: 8am with Sianna Sherman, beginning with some “unrapping” (as he calls it) by popular yogic hip hop artist MC Yogi. (Check out his CD Elephant Power at the Drishti store). What a way to wake up…feeling our hearts sing like Hanuman, which was the theme of the class, complete with a joyful Hanumanasana halfway through.
Then more time in and out of the sun, and a few applications of sunscreen (we are at altitute and the sun is stronger here than the ocean’s all-too-frequent June gloom) and a beginner’s vinyasa class with Les Leventhal from San Francisco’s Yoga Tree. The energy of 200 yogis rising up in sun saluations while being accompanied by live music. There’s nothing like it, especially when graced by Ponderosa Pine-covered mountains. The best part…..Ananda playing didgeredoo over us during savasana. I don’t know if I got any special treatment, but it was certainly the reason to go to a yoga/music festival, when the two are intertwined.
Around the ski village, sunkissed people walking aroung with yoga mats are being seranaded by more than a few bands setting up under tents. Right now, we’re digesting after the morning buffet of yoga in spacious tents, on balconies and in ski lodges. And after posting this, it will be time to head up the mountain via the ski lodge to see Gillian Welch, Jenny Lewis, and artist, rapper and activist Common (who graciously was able to pinch hit at the last minute to keep the music flowing into the sunset).
My only regret so far…that I can’t be everywhere at once.
