New sweat lodge oven !

We have a new sweat lodge oven!

I’m sure many of you remember our old sweat lodge stove. There is a good story to go with it. We are in a forest fire-prone area with the dance, and the stove was built on the first dance in the country in 1994. I’ll never forget the image of us (and there were many of us) standing in front of our first sweat lodge in the evening with a towel around our hips, the fire still open (crazy…). Suddenly there were blue lights in the forest and three French fire engines were already on the square!

Waheo then negotiated with the firemen in perfect French (in a towel!) so that we could at least finish these sweat lodges. Afterwards, there was much palaver, and from this, under the supervision of two architects, the old sweat lodge oven was built, in shift operation with floodlights from the tractor, actually overnight.

Since then, it has been repaired from time to time, and at the 2019 dance we realized that it was now due for repair and we needed something new. Then Michael, our club president and craftsman, took up the cause.

Now in 2022, the time had finally come: a group of 6 people went down to Lavaldieu for a week during their vacation to work and rebuild the oven. Many thanks to Michael, Hans-Jörg, Sigi, Eva, Anette and Devadas, you are our heroes!

Of course, it wasn’t just the oven that had to be made, even if that was the biggest adventure. The huts were cleared out, materials checked, the new tarpaulins brought down and even the east sweat lodge rebuilt. A week later, we received many photos of tired and happy people from this wonderful team. Have fun with it!

And if this has aroused your curiosity and you fancy something meaningful – there are still a few places available in Michael’s Fire Keeper team this summer. Then get in touch with michael.m@lebenstanz.info