Oneika Raymond kick-starts this season in Sedona, Arizona, a desert oasis tucked in the Verde Valley and known for its stunning red rock formations and energy vortices. There, she embarks on a wellness journey to explore how Sedona encourages visitors to slow down to reconnect to themselves. She meets up with three locals who help her tap into Sedona’s must-visit stops to experience self-discovery and mindful travel.
Oneika starts her day with a morning hike to Yavapai Vista to meet with Melina Fuhrmann, the owner of SpiritFlow Sedona, a wellness center that helps others reconnect to themselves in this one-of-a-kind place. Melina shares the secrets of Sedona’s energy vortices before leading Oneika through a grounding meditation.
Then, Oneika and Melina head to the Courtyard by Marriott Sedona, for a sit-down conversation about the art of self care. We hear how vital it is to slow down in nature.
Next, Oneika heads to the Palatki Heritage Site, an archaeological site with cliff dwellings and rock art from some of Sedona’s earliest inhabitants. Oneika’s guide, Nick Massoni of the U.S. Forest Service, bridges the past and present by sharing ancient stories of Sedona’s past that help Oneika understand her own legacy.
As the sun sets over Sedona, Oneika travels to her final stop — a stargazing session with Dave Sander of Sedona Stargazing tours. Oneika takes in the starry night sky while learning the impact darkness plays in the desert’s habitat, and on our own busy lives.
Experience Sedona’s transformative power for yourself. For more about Oneika’s journey — and to get other itinerary ideas — visit Marriott Bonvoy Traveler. To learn more and book a room at the Courtyard Marriott Sedona, visit the hotel’s website. Book wellness-inspired activities for yourself at Marriott Bonvoy Tours & Activities. Marriott Bonvoy members earn points on every experience booked through the site.
To read full episode transcripts from About the Journey and see photos of each featured destination, head to About the Journey on Marriott Bonvoy Traveler. Starting this season, you can watch full videos of each episode on the Marriott Bonvoy YouTube channel.
PODCAST TRANSCRIPT
Melina Fuhrmann: In Sedona, people feel more. They come here really for that experience. To really, to connect with themselves, connect with nature as part of their wellness journey.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Welcome to About the Journey. I’m your host, Oneika Raymond, travel expert and member of Marriott Bonvoy. In this season, we’re exploring how travel changes us, for the better, allowing us to nurture ourselves, our relationships with family and loved ones, and even with the world around us.
This week, we are in Sedona. This desert oasis tucked in Arizona’s Verde Valley is known for its striking red rocks and energy vortices. But while the beauty might bring you here, a trip to Sedona is equally about connecting back to you.
So on today’s itinerary in Sedona, I’ll be traveling to places that invite me to slow down and reconnect to myself and my surroundings. And by the end of this episode, I hope that you’ll not only feel grounded, but ready to mindfully visit Sedona for yourself.
Melina Fuhrmann: As part of a wellness journey, I think that nature like this helps you to even understand, well, what about yourself? Taking care of yourself is also, I would say, vital.
Nick Massoni: I always try to connect people with the people of the past and realizing that they are not so different from us.
Dave Sanders: We need the night sky to teach us tranquility. And it can do that if you pay attention to it.
[Theme Music fades out]
[Ambi — footsteps crunching]
Oneika Raymond (Field): I am at Yavapai Vista and I’m on my way to meet with an energy and sound healer, and we’re going to do a session. And I have to admit, this is not something I typically do on my travels. But, you know what, we’re in Sedona and that’s kind of what you have to do here. So, I am very open to the experience and looking forward to it.
[Music Cue – comes in]
Oneika Raymond (VO): I’m meeting up with Melina Fuhrmann, the owner of SpiritFlow, a wellness center that she opened in Sedona.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Melina!
Melina Fuhrmann: How are you?
Oneika Raymond (Field): How are you? It’s great to meet you.
Melina Fuhrmann: So great to meet you, too.
Oneika Raymond (VO): Melina is set up on a red rock plateau, yoga mat by her side. From our elevated spot, we can see towering red buttes in the distance. Scattered green brush pops out against the red rock landscape.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Melina, thank you so much for having me here. I am super excited, but I’m not exactly sure where we are or what we’re going to do. So where are we exactly?
[Music Cue stings out]
Melina Fuhrmann: Okay, so we are on Yavapai Vista. So that is one of the trailheads here where you have the most amazing view of Courthouse and you have Bell Rock. So these are like two of the iconic Sedona mountains, red rocks, that we have here, and a very special place. High vibrations. It’s really going to be a special, special session.
Oneika Raymond (Field): I love that. High vibrations all the way. Now, you know, Sedona is obviously known for its amazing beauty, but also, people talk a lot about the energy vortices. What is an energy vortex?
Melina Fuhrmann: Well, exactly. In Sedona, we don’t say ‘vortices’, we say ‘vortexes’. But the vortexes that we have here, they are basically places of a higher vibration. The Native Americans came here for ceremony. And so, really, any place in the world where there has been ceremony, where it’s really been taking care of the land, you will actually find vortexes, or vortices, and it’ll be of a higher vibration and people, they come here really for that experience as a part of their wellness journey.
Oneika Raymond (VO): This is precisely why I’m here, too. I picked Sedona as my first stop on this season’s wellness journey because it is so alluring to people wanting to reconnect to themselves through travel. I also want to understand all of the ways that Sedona can facilitate this type of trip. Now, Melina is here to help me come back into my own body — and this precious land — starting with taking off my shoes.
Melina Fuhrmann: So when we are doing like a grounding meditation, so the idea is that we’re really connecting into earth energy, right? Because we want to really feel our feet there on the earth, right? And then the other part is to actually, to work with the breath. What I want to ask you to do is, starting with the meditation, is to actually breathe down into the diaphragm. You actually stick your stomach out.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Okay. I don’t have problem with that. [laughs]
Melina Fuhrmann: So for example, I will do one for you here. So if I would breathe in and then breathe out…
Oneika Raymond (VO): Melina takes a small instrument from her pocket and lifts it to her lips. With her exhale, she plays one long, drawn out note.
[SFX — sound of Melina playing instrument]
Oneika Raymond (Field): Wow.
Melina Fuhrmann: And I guess you could go longer.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Oh my goodness. Okay, so we’re really going to focus on making sure that that exhalation is very long and slow.
Melina Fuhrmann: Exactly.
[Music Cue]
Oneika Raymond (VO): Deep breaths help me take in Sedona more fully. I smell the earthy red dust that’s kicked up by the wind.
Melina Fuhrmann: And now I’m going to ask you just to visualize. Perhaps you want to bring in that red rock color, visualize the energy as an energy and light of red, orange, yellow, green. Feeling that connection with the earth. And you may slowly open your eyes. And just see how you feel.
Oneika Raymond (VO): From standing, Melina guides me to the yoga mat. I lay down, close my eyes and get comfortable. Melina leads me through a sound meditation using a metal bowl called a singing bowl. She runs a wooden mallet around its edge.
[SFX – singing bowl fades in]
Oneika Raymond (VO): Sedona’s vortex energy might be subtle, but these reverberations wash over me, and my whole body hums.
{SFX — singing bowl plays full volume for 4-5 seconds before fading out]
Oneika Raymond (VO): When I open my eyes, I take in the vista more fully. Maybe it’s Sedona’s vortex energy, but I do feel more embodied. But, I still want to unpack what I’ve just experienced. So, Melina and I make our way to my hotel, the Courtyard Marriott Sedona, to talk some more.
Oneika Raymond (Field): You know, you talk a lot about connecting to ourselves here, particularly, in Sedona, and that’s basically what we’ve come to Sedona to do, right? We’re really trying to focus on connecting to ourselves through travel. So why Sedona in particular? What makes Sedona such an amazing place to do a session? To reconnect back to ourselves?
Melina Fuhrmann: Well, Sedona, it is easier to sense and feel energy here. You connect not only to the nature, but to yourself through connecting to nature, through doing sessions like this. You know, you’re learning how to slow things down, to move the energy down into the heart and into the body. And, you know, so whether or not you’re doing hiking, right? I would still say eating really good food, as well. Or you’re doing sessions like this. It’s really, uh, it’s a place that people are drawn to and as part of a wellness journey, I think that nature like this and like understanding how important it is to take care of these unspoiled places helps you to even understand that, well, what about yourself? Taking care of yourself is also, I would say, vital. It’s not just the land, it’s the land and you. It’s, “and, and”.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Well, Melina, thank you so much for the session, for your words, for your wisdom, for your knowledge. And I’m looking forward to hopefully connecting again.
Melina Fuhrmann: Yeah, well, it was my pleasure. I’m so glad. Anytime that you come to Sedona, please be sure to come and see me. And we can always go deeper and deeper.
Oneika Raymond (VO): Melina’s invitation to go deeper sits with me as I head to my next stop in Sedona. Already, a morning soaking in the natural beauty here has done me so good. Where I’m headed next will ask me to dive into Sedona’s past, which feels like the right step on my journey.
[SFX of Oneika and Nick walking along a dirt road]
Nick Massoni: We’re walking up to the cliff dwelling. You can see it from here, through the bush there. It kind of looks like there’s a window. Can you see it?
Oneika Raymond (Field): Oh yeah.
Oneika Raymond (VO): This is Nick Massoni, the manager of Palatki Heritage Site. He’s guiding me up to an ancient cliff dwelling created by some of the earliest inhabitants of the desert Southwest. Palatki is an archaeological site preserved by the National Forest Service.
Nick Massoni: We’re going to go probably about a quarter of a mile and we’re going to go see some dwellings that date back to about between 1100 and 1150. They were built by a people that archaeologists call ‘Sinagua’, and that’s really just an archaeological term. It’s a Spanish word, so it’s — sin agua — so it’s ‘without water’. The Hopi preferred to call them Hisat’sinom. And that means ancient ones. And that’s what they call their ancestors.
Oneika Raymond (VO): Nick and I walk down a dirt path headed towards the cliff dwellings. The vegetation thickens as we near the cliff’s base. Soon, we’re clambering over large boulders.
Nick Massoni: Usually when I bring groups through, I’ll stop in this little basin here, right below the dwelling. And I’ll have everybody look up because this is a really cool view. But I’ll point out these black streaks coming down the side of the cliff. These are outlines of waterfalls. And it carved out this little basin here, and it would have been really easy for a group to kind of dam this up and use this as a reservoir. So we think this is one of the tactics they used to get water.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Oh, this is so beautiful. I mean, the rock, the rocks are so large and I love this color.
Nick Massoni: Yeah. So the color is from iron oxide. So, you know, iron rusts red.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Mm-hmm.
Nick Massoni: That’s what gives the red rock.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Right.
Oneika Raymond (VO): We make our way up 60 stairs carved from the rock.
Nick Massoni: These stairs can be kind of uneven.
Oneika Raymond (VO): Soon, we’re standing on a flat landing. In front of us is a sight worth marveling at.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Now that is cool, because this looks like, it really looks like a fort. [laughs]
Nick Massoni: Yeah. [laughs]
Oneika Raymond (VO): Red sandstone walls tower two stories high. Some of the brick facade has fallen. But, considering that this site has never been reconstructed, it’s truly impressive how much of the original dwelling still stands.
Nick Massoni: It’s stood up for 700 years. We have photos of this site from 1895. And you can line up every brick, brick for brick in that photo. That walk that we just made probably resembles the walk that they would have made almost every day. And it kind of begs the question, why build a house here and not out there?
[Music Cue fades in]
Oneika Raymond (Field): Well, I mean, they want to hide, I’m guessing, or protect themselves from, I don’t know, somebody else coming.
Nick Massoni: Yeah, it’s possible. And that was, that was one of the thoughts when archaeologists first started digging. But as they kept digging, they really didn’t find much evidence of warfare going on.
Oneika Raymond (VO): Nick explains that the dwelling was placed here for protection from the elements. Here, in the shade of the cliff, daily life unfolded. Children slept, meals were cooked, and communities took part in ceremony.
[Music Cue stings out]
Nick Massoni: So right now we’re heading to the grotto area. It’s an area where we have a lot of rock art in this little, kind of shady overhang. So here we are.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Wow. So I see all of these, what looks like hieroglyphs. Or, well, paintings, I guess.
Oneika Raymond (VO): Every usable surface of the rock face is covered in art: amongst other things, there are etchings that resemble animals, humans and other objects in nature.
Nick Massoni: Some of these might date back 8,000 years. The oldest thing, we think, is this kind of scratching. It’s in this grid pattern. Our archaeologist, he speculates that these could be like 12,000 years old.
Oneika Raymond (Field): What really strikes me as I look at this, this rock with just all of these different forms and ways of people telling their stories. How does connecting with the past, how does coming here and trying to decipher these stories help us to connect with ourselves?
Nick Massoni: Yeah, I always try to connect people with the people of the past. And realizing that they are not so different from us. But there’s so many lessons to be drawn from these people: the ways that they lived, the adaptations that they had with their environment, sustainable living practices.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Definitely.
Nick Massoni: And then there’s just a lot of mystery to it as well, which gives you this unexplainable warm feeling inside. And that tingle…
Oneika Raymond (Field): That tingle.
Nick Massoni: …of the unknown, that sense of wonder.
Oneika Raymond (Field): I think it helps me to maybe understand more about myself. Being able to draw parallels with how people lived before me and what they cared about, and what they told stories about and how they overcame.
Nick Massoni: There’s a lot of people that visit that feel that exact same sentiment and you can kind of see it in their eyes, too, that like, wow.
Oneika Raymond (VO): I leave Palatki just as wide-eyed. What strikes me the most as we depart is that all of this still stands today. There’s something comforting about knowing that here, tucked into this small valley in Sedona, time is slow enough to feel the past echoing through today.
We’re near the end of our day in Sedona. The setting sun basks the Verde Valley in gold. The red rocks are further saturated by the fading light. Soon, only moonlight guides us to our final stop. So far, my day in Sedona has helped me turn inward. But, our final stop reminds me to look out — and up — on my journey.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Hi Dave. It is so lovely to meet you.
Dave Sanders: Hello, it’s nice to meet you as well.
Oneika Raymond (VO): Dave Sanders is what one might call a professional stargazer. He works for Sedona Stargazing, a tour company that’s been in business for over 30 years that I booked through Marriott Bonvoy Tours & Activities.
Oneika Raymond (Field): What do you love about stargazing?
Dave Sanders: What I love about stargazing is looking up and seeing something in the sky that sparkles, that I can communicate with in a way that’s more personal. Like, I can look through a telescope, and I can see the light that came from something hundreds, thousands of light years away. And that light is actually hitting the retina of my eye directly. And that’s a communication.
[Music Cue fades in]
Oneika Raymond (Field): Yeah.
Dave Sanders: It’s a feeling that you’re a part of it.
Oneika Raymond (VO): Sedona was designated an International Dark Sky Community in 2014. This reflects the city’s commitment to maintain and protect its minimal light pollution, which makes for exceptional stargazing.
Oneika Raymond (Field): What do you want your customers to take away from this tour? What do you want them to feel when they go home?
Dave Sanders: I would like them to feel respect for the night sky and the darkness. And think about how it has affected our lives not to have this darkness as it once was. Like in the case of wildlife, wildlife really needs darkness to survive. And in the case of the human personality, our human feelings…we need the night sky to teach us respect — to teach us serenity and tranquility. And it can do that, if you pay attention to it.
[Music Cue comes in]
Oneika Raymond (VO): Dave guides me to a large telescope and asks me what I want to see.
Dave Sanders: Alright, how about the moon?
Oneika Raymond (Field): I would love to see the moon. It looks very full tonight, actually.
Dave Sanders: It is right now 98 percent full. Very bright.
Oneika Raymond (VO): Dave punches coordinates into the telescope.
Dave Sanders: …and push enter. And then it goes to the object.
Oneika Raymond (VO): With a whir, the telescope starts moving slowly. Once it’s locked in place, I look into the eyepiece.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Oh my goodness. It’s so bright.
Dave Sanders: It is very bright.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Wow, that is incredible. Just the texture.
Dave Sanders: Some of those bumps you see there are actually mountains and mountain ranges and then most of the others are craters.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Now that is cool. And how many light years away is the moon?
Dave Sanders: About one and a third light seconds.
Oneika Raymond (Field): What does that mean?
Dave Sanders: That means that the moon is very, very close.
Oneika Raymond (Field): Oh, it means, okay. And that’s why it’s so large.
Dave Sanders: Comparatively speaking, yes.
Oneika Raymond (Field): I think for me being here, it just makes me realize how small and…how small and insignificant we all are.
Dave Sanders: Yes. Right.
Oneika Raymond (Field): We’re surrounded by something so vast. So it just really brings everything into perspective.
Dave Sanders: Definitely. But when you’re looking at them and through the telescope, you’re connecting with them. It’s our moon.
Oneika Raymond (VO): You know, I came to Sedona to slow down and reconnect to myself, and that’s precisely what I got to do. At Yavapai Vista, for example, I spent time on the red rocks — and in turn, I got to tune into my body. At Palatki Heritage Site, I traveled back in time — and, well, it reminded me that the stories we tell still live on. And then, when I went stargazing, while I looked up at the same moon that I always see, this time I truly got to appreciate its beauty.
[Theme Music Fades in]
Oneika Raymond (VO): That’s all for this episode of About the Journey. But, you can watch my full day in Sedona on the Marriott Bonvoy YouTube channel.
Thank you so much to our guides Melina Fuhrmann, Nick Massoni and Dave Sanders. In our next episode, we’re talking solo travel with wanderlust expert Beth Santos.
Beth Santos: I love to travel by myself. [laughs]
Oneika Raymond (Field): I need to travel by myself. [laughs]
We share our top solo travel tips, tricks and tea from decades of solo traveling.
About the Journey is produced by Marriott Bonvoy Traveler, AT WILL MEDIA, mntra and me, Oneika Raymond. Our Marriott Producers are Robin Bennefield, Valerie Conners and Rachael Sulik.
Our AT WILL MEDIA producers are Kristy Westgard, Gale Straub, and Tina Turner. Mixing & Sound Design by Greg Deavens II with support from Andrew Holzberger. Original Theme Music by Zach Grappone.
Our MNTRA video producer is Arnaud Zimmerman, Director of Photography Gabriel Knoos-Newton, Post Producer Zach Gelman and Editor Bryce Perry.
For more travel inspiration, visit Marriott Bonvoy Traveler at traveler.marriott.com. I’m your host, Oneika Raymond. See you next time!
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