November is a moment of quiet between festive highs and winter’s slowdown. It’s the month where the year begins to exhale. For many women, professionals, homemakers, mothers, creators, it’s a rare window to pause, reflect, and recharge. With fewer social obligations and more personal awareness, it’s the perfect time to step out of daily routines and into spaces that nourish the mind, body, and spirit. In recent years, women-only wellness retreats have become sanctuaries where self-care goes beyond skin-deep: they provide space for solitude, sisterhood, healing, and meaningful conversations away from the noise of everyday roles and responsibilities.
India, with its rich tradition of holistic healing and growing network of women-centered wellness experiences, offers several curated retreats that are not only safe and nourishing but also profoundly transformative. These are places where a woman can take off her titles, roles, and to-do lists, and simply be. These retreats don’t ask you to become someone new; they invite you to rediscover who you are beneath the layers of expectations, pressure, and productivity.
Here’s a deep dive into some of the most inspiring and restorative women-only wellness getaways to consider this November.
1. Shakti Retreats – Rishikesh and Kumaon, Uttarakhand
Shakti Retreats specializes in crafting bespoke wellness journeys for women in the Himalayan region. Their programs combine mountain walks, guided meditation, yoga, and cultural immersion, tailored to support feminine energy and emotional healing. The retreats are designed to blend spirituality with real-world grounding, offering a space that is both nurturing and empowering.
Why It’s Special:
With women facilitators, trained wellness guides, and stays in restored village homes, these retreats allow for physical detox, emotional processing, and creative expression. There’s a strong emphasis on storytelling, journaling, and spiritual grounding. The retreats encourage women to slow down, witness their thoughts, and understand their own patterns through self-inquiry.
November Experience:
The weather is ideal, crisp mornings and golden afternoons. The mountains are quiet post-monsoon, and local flora is in bloom. The landscape offers a soft invitation to go inward, to listen to your body’s rhythm and nature’s cues. This setting allows deep mental and emotional realignment.
Best For: Women craving stillness, community, and nature-based healing.
2. Project Shakti by Vana – Dehradun, Uttarakhand
Hosted at the globally acclaimed Vana Retreat, Project Shakti is an immersive wellness program designed exclusively for women. Blending Ayurveda, Sowa Rigpa, and yoga with emotional wellness sessions, the retreat creates a holistic container for women to reconnect with their mind, body, and soul. It’s a space that acknowledges the multifaceted stress women carry and gives them tools to gently release it.
Why It’s Special:
The program includes guided silence, women’s circles, nutritional coaching, bodywork, and hormonal health support. It’s not just about relaxation; it’s about reclaiming well-being in an empowered way. Sessions are curated to help women understand their cycles, balance their energy, and reframe the way they approach rest and nourishment.
November Experience:
The lush campus, clean air, and gentle climate of November support both physical detox and mental clarity. The atmosphere at Vana fosters deep inner connection and the chance to reset lifestyle habits with expert guidance.
Best For: Women recovering from burnout, life transitions, or seeking spiritual renewal.
3. Soul & Surf Women’s Week – Varkala, Kerala
This unique retreat is built around surfing, yoga, music, and honest conversations, designed to help women reconnect with their physical selves and break out of urban monotony. Set on a cliff overlooking the Arabian Sea, Soul & Surf creates a relaxed and playful environment for self-discovery.
Why It’s Special:
It’s a space that honors joy and freedom. Instructors offer surf lessons for all levels, restorative yoga, shared meals, and open circles for conversations around body image, confidence, and creativity. There’s a conscious effort to foster body positivity and a non-competitive atmosphere where women can support each other while enjoying movement and the ocean.
November Experience:
Kerala’s post-monsoon coastline is at its most scenic. Calm seas and golden sunsets amplify the retreat’s energy of lightness and openness. With fewer tourists, the beach becomes a serene playground for exploration and fun.
Best For: Women seeking fun, movement, and connection in a non-judgmental setting.
4. Anahata Women’s Retreat – Auroville, Tamil Nadu
Held in the spiritual and experimental township of Auroville, the Anahata Retreat centers around heart-based healing. It focuses on feminine embodiment, somatic work, trauma release, and guided meditation. Here, the body is seen as a vessel of memory and transformation, and healing begins through gentle, sustained attention to one’s inner world.
Why It’s Special:
This is a deep, introspective space led by trauma-informed facilitators. Retreats include womb healing, sacred dance, art therapy, and Ayurvedic self-care. It’s about reclaiming emotional safety and inner voice. Women come together not to fix themselves, but to be witnessed and supported as they unfold.
November Experience:
The warmth of Tamil Nadu’s November weather encourages comfort and openness. Auroville’s progressive community and natural landscape offer a nurturing backdrop for profound transformation. It’s a place where healing is not rushed, but allowed to happen organically.
Best For: Women healing from emotional fatigue or past trauma, and those exploring spiritual femininity.
5. Naari Retreats – Himachal Pradesh
Naari Retreats are seasonal women-only programs conducted in cozy homestays in the Himalayan villages of Himachal. Blending yoga, local cuisine, hiking, bonfire storytelling, and workshops on menstruation, body wisdom, and feminine archetypes, the experience is rustic yet rich. It’s not polished, but it’s real, and therein lies its magic.
Why It’s Special:
The emphasis is on informal bonding, natural rhythm, and unlearning societal pressures. With small groups (6–10 women), it feels like a sisterhood getaway. There is no pretense, just genuine connection, raw conversations, and shared silence under the stars.
November Experience:
Chilly evenings, warm fires, and crisp mountain mornings create a cocoon for honest, unfiltered living. The simplicity of village life helps women reconnect with what truly matters.
Best For: Women seeking grounded, offbeat, and community-based retreat experiences.
Why Women-Only Retreats Matter
In many cultures, women are socialized to care for others first, often leaving their emotional and physical needs on the back burner. Women-only retreats give permission to shift that lens, to rest without guilt, to explore identity without roles, and to build bonds that don’t require explanation. They create safe containers for vulnerability, joy, and healing.
These retreats also provide women with tools, practical and spiritual, that help them navigate their everyday lives with more awareness, balance, and authenticity. They are not just escapes but return journeys, to the parts of us we may have forgotten in the rush of life.
Taking a step away from routine is not selfish, it’s soul work. Whether you are dancing under the stars in Kerala, sitting silently in the hills of Uttarakhand, or journaling by a bonfire in Himachal, these women-only retreats allow you to breathe in your own rhythm again.
So this November, consider booking a few days for yourself. Not as an escape, but as a return to self. The journey toward healing begins with a single yes, to rest, to softness, and to you. Because in caring for yourself, you return stronger, wiser, and more fully alive, to everything and everyone you love.
