The trip to Greece has been postponed to late May-early June 2011. There were too many complications to properly present a group trip in 2010, so I thought it best to just put it off until people are feeling more secure in the economy. Please start your travel savings account now.

Join Mark Dodich and like-minded people for a trip to Greece in Spring 2011. Wounded healer Chiron and spiritualizing Neptune will both be in psychic Pisces then, so that will be something major to tune into.

Wounded-healer Chiron enters the psychic sign of Pisces. The last time this occurred was 1961-67, before this alternative healer was even discovered. We shall visit ancient sacred sites to tune into the energies through meditation, healing ceremonies, short classes and more. For now, begin a travel savings account. Although costs have not been put together yet, the Egypt trip was $3300 with most costs included from JFK airport. Greece is on the EuroDollar, so it is likely to be a bit more expensive- but I shall do my best to keep costs down. We had 17 people for the Egypt trip, which worked well, so I expect to limit the group to no more than 22 people (small enough to know everyone, and big enough to keep costs down and allow for a wide variety of sharing experiences.

In Egypt, we found that short classes worked better than longer classes. We did a class under the deck canopy as we sailed up the Nile. We had a class in the forward section of the Nile cruise ship towards the end of day. We did short meditations and healing's at sites that permitted us to quietly pull aside, and we chanted loudly in the King's Chamber of the Great Pyramid. In Greece, we hope to find similar beautiful sites to tune into the intuitive energies that Pisces opens us to at the Delphi and Dodona Oracle temples. So far, we are told that doing ceremony at sacred sites in Greece is not allowed in many places, so we shall have to be adaptable in how we work. Classes will include group sessions on your personal astrology chart to help you tune into these energies. I would also like to teach about Hermetic Philosophy since this is the home of Hermes (like Thoth in Egypt or Mercury in Rome). We want to do intuitive opening classes and perhaps work with our dreams since this is in alignment with the oracle temples.

Some of the places in Greece we are looking at: Athens area- the Acropolis, the National Museum, Poseidon's Temple (at sunset, we hope) and other sites along the path - also some shopping and Taverna time. Mt. Pelion region- this is the area that Chiron (maverick, wounded healer) did his teaching and healing- we shall open to our healing abilities and bring forth the coming energies of Chiron in Pisces. This will help us to be ready for the incoming energies, to bring those energies back in service to our community, and a little self-healing added in. The Delphi Oracle area- a UNESCO World Heritage site. Imagine ancient Pythia priestesses wrapped in serpents and going into trance to provide messages to the pilgrims. We shall open to our own inner vision to bring messages back home to help both ourselves and the world as we head towards the end of the Mayan Calendar. The Dodona Oracle region where priestesses would listen to messages from God as the wind passed through oak tress and copper vessels hanging from their branches. I would rather not rush the trip, as Egypt was a whirlwind, so I am thinking this would be about 10 days.

Here is a question for anyone who is seriously interested in coming to Greece: I am exploring the idea of having the above sites as being the primary part of the group trip. Would you be interested if I offered a side trip at the end? We could take a short boat trip down to beautiful Santorini for a few days (you would recognize the picture as it is in all the travel brochures). Or, I have long had a desire to go to Istanbul, where Turkey meets Europe. This part of the trip would be optional as the Egypt trip showed that several people wanted to go off on their own personal side trip without the group. I also doubt that I would offer any classes during this part of the trip, except perhaps to gather anyone who is interested for a mediation or group dinner. Istanbul would likely be more structured than Santorini due to the nature of the places.

Check back to this page this summer as plans begin to unfold

The March 5-15, 2008 Egypt trip was great. Here are some personal notes on the trip because so many people asked. We are also putting up pictures on Flicker.com under the Astromark Egypt group.

We are contemplating returning to Egypt in Fall 2012.

A few comments on the 2008 Egypt Trip by participants:  

 Hi Mark, Thanks for giving the opportunity to chime in.  I would say something about the fact that I had NO real energy about going to Egypt until I was asked by Hante to sit and think on it.  When I did, it quickly became clear that the energy around that trip was huge.  I didn't understand fully until things unfolded on the trip, but I am certainly glad that I trusted that guidance.

 So it doesn't have to be an "I always wanted to go there" kind of thing at all.  And yet until we open to the possibility, it can't bear fruit. M. O. , Oregon

Great Mark!  Mark organized a complete and wonderful trip to Egypt.  The cost was reasonable and worth every penny!  We are here to experience life and to reach dreams.  Egypt was tops on my list.  What better time than now to follow your dreams.  I am planning on going to Greece too.  It's in my top 10!    N.G., Washington

Depending on who you are and what your needs, this caliber of experience holds the potential to present the daunting adversities that provide the blessed insights that are life changing.  It takes a great deal of courage to submit to such an experience (and then expend the required energy for it!) but I found that Mark and the tour group he worked with provided a unique "safety net" that supported my journey even beyond the guidance therein, and I'm eternally grateful for what inevitably has indeed been life changing. P.P. Oregon

Although not a direct quote, I paraphrase the words of a traveler from the USA east coast: This person was concerned about spending the money on the trip due to personal financial concerns. After coming out of private time in the great pyramid, and sitting on the giant blocks of stone watching the sunset over Giza, she said that the value of the trip was priceless. And this was just the first day.

Initiation into New Energies

Transforming Pluto Moves into Capricorn through 2024

The intent of our March 2008 journey to Egypt was to open to energies of higher initiation at sacred sites, including a private, guided mediation in the Great Pyramid. 17 people participated on the trip. The planet Pluto made its initial entrance into Capricorn for our trip, giving us a head start on opening to these energies that have not been around since the Revolutionary War and Industrial Revolution.

The trip turned out to be more of an adventure than anticipated. The weather was warm but not yet hot. Cairo is an intense city with heavy traffic and polluted air. Sanitation leaves a lot to be desired. As an example, we saw a dead horse on the side of the street. Still, Cairo is an exciting city and a feast for the eyes. You see a big Mercedes driving along side a donkey cart, and both drivers are on a cell phone. Riding in the bus on the way to our hotel in Giza on the first day, we had our first encounter with a camel cutting in front of us- and the camel was so high it looked us in the eye as we drove by.

The hotels we stayed in were top of the line. I had a view of the pyramids from my room. After a hot and dusty day, it was nice to return to a spotless hotel. Forget those youth hostels of days gone by!

The first sight of the pyramids from my hotel room brought tears to my eyes. Pictures do not do them justice. Climbing up and down the shafts was a big physical challenge. You are bent over, it's hot, you have someone's butt in your face and yours in someone else's, and breathing the humid air inside the pyramid is an effort. Yet to walk, hunched over, in energy that is so ancient, is quite a feeling.

We rented private time in the Great Pyramid, which is the only way to do it. We chanted, we were quiet, we took pictures in the King's Chamber filled with light orbs, we were excitedly loud- pretty much the gamut of emotions. By the second day, several people were feeling the stress in their knees.

We were happy to have our bus driver, Hamed, getting us around Cairo. Driving in Cairo is an adventure all in itself. It is a mix of modern buildings, ancient mosques, slum-like apartments, cemetery cities, lots of pollution, and a sense of magic-all wrapped into one.

Many of us discussed wanting some major sacred event, like an ascended master coming up to show us the way to enlightenment. It quickly seemed enough just to be in the intense energy of the place.

For myself, I did feel a sense of familiarity on the camel ride behind the pyramids. I had not even planned to take the ride, so was happy to have changed my mind. Later, when we went up the Nile, I dressed like a Bedouin desert person, and that felt really familiar- especially when we stopped for tea in Kom Obo in a tent that was of the Bedouin style.

Many in the group seemed to resonate with the region up river rather than at the Giza plateau (Karnac, Luxor, etc.). The temples are set up to have an impressive entrance, with an open area for all people just inside. The next layer in was for the low level priests, and the innermost area was for the high priests.

My experience was a sense of familiarity in the low priest area at Karnac Temple. My big experience was not one of those jaw-dropping 'this is it' experiences, but more of a quiet set of tears. We were at a temple called Edfu just up the Nile from Luxor. After taking the group tour with our professor guide, Dr. Wael Soliman (who did not believe in astrology but seemed to know a lot about the subject from an ancient Egyptian perspective), we would get time on our own to walk around.

I walked back to the non-crowded rooms of the high priests (not crowded because they did not have the tourist appeal of some of the other chambers). It was a room that felt very much at home to me. Another tour guide came into the room. He introduced himself and was making nice because he was bringing in a big group of people to disrupt my solitude. You quickly learn when someone is just being nice, and when someone is being nice to set you up for something in Egypt (like setting you up to sell you something by acting like a long lost friend). This guy way just being kind because he was disrupting my silence with a group in tow. Long story made short, he made comments that no one else did anywhere along the trip. He said things like ' you are home now' and 'this is the place.' So Edfu was my place of remembering. There wasn't anything in the physical structures that said it was this place, but the emotional feelings were definitely impossible to ignore.

We highly recommend Guardian Travel for your Egypt trip, be it a small or a large group. Phone 757-422-5568
www.guardiantravel.com