Michael Vale
Founder
Years spent ranking businesses at the top of Google before founding the agency. He still reviews every client strategy himself and takes the first call personally.
About us
About Us
Pisac Ayahuasca Retreats is a twelve-guest retreat center in one walled house on the valley floor at Písac, Sacred Valley, Peru: 9,750 feet, an hour from Cusco airport and two thousand feet lower than the city. Ceremonies are held by named Shipibo maestros from the Paoyhan and Nueva Betania communities in Ucayali. A licensed physician reads every application before anyone takes your money, and roughly one in five does not proceed.
This page is who we are: the house, the people who will read your file, the numbers we run on, and the lines we hold. If you are still deciding, it is written for you.
12Guests per week, with two maestros in every ceremony
22Weeks a year, so the maestros, the team and the garden recover
1 in 5Applications declined or deferred, never charged, reason in writing
12Months of integration calls, included in the price
Why this center exists
The Sacred Valley did not need another retreat. It needed a smaller one.
Most retreat weeks in Peru are sold like tours: thirty or forty mats, facilitators introduced by first name on arrival, a checkout page where a medical form should be, and a goodbye email standing in for integration. The centers are not run by bad people. They are run at a volume where nobody can hold your file in their head.
We built the opposite and accepted what it costs. Twelve guests means the senior maestro knows every voice in the maloca by night two. Twenty two weeks a year means the same four maestros, the same physician and the same integration lead across the whole calendar, not a rotating cast. It also means we decline roughly one application in five, and that the price is $5,800 rather than $1,900.
Písac itself was the second decision. Cusco has the airport and the hotels; it also has 11,150 feet. Písac sits two thousand feet lower, and you descend to reach us, so the settling days actually settle. The trade is stated on our home page and repeated here: a hospital is an hour away instead of twenty minutes, which is why a physician sleeps on the property every ceremony night and supplemental oxygen sits in the maloca.
The third decision is the one this page exists to make plain. This is a Quechua valley, and the medicine here is not Quechua. The icaros, the dieta and the lineage are Shipibo, carried by maestros from Ucayali who travel to Písac for the weeks they work. We name them, credit them and pay them, and we do not imply a local lineage we do not have.
What we believe
A retreat is screened, not sold
Two ways to fill twelve mats. Here is both, plainly, so you can see which week you are buying anywhere you apply.
The volume week
Booked
- Thirty to forty guests, and the facilitators learn your name on arrival day
- Screening is a waiver you tick at checkout, read by nobody with a license
- The deposit is taken before any medical question is asked
- “Shamans” appear unnamed, and the lineage is implied rather than stated
- Integration is a farewell circle and an email a week later
The Písac week
Screened
- Twelve guests, two maestros in every ceremony, and one physician on site each night
- Thirty four questions read by a licensed physician within 48 hours
- Nothing charged until a place is confirmed; declined applicants get the reason in writing
- Maestros named like faculty: name, community, years in practice
- Twelve months of integration with the person who read your file, included
The house
Five minutes from the plaza, out of sight of it
A walled property on the valley floor, under the Intihuatana terraces. One maloca, a plant garden that supplies every bath and the dieta kitchen, and rooms nobody shares. After nine at night you hear the Vilcanota and the dogs.
The maloca
Twelve mats, two maestros, supplemental oxygen on the wall, and a physician within calling distance all night.
The garden
Every plant bath is cut the same morning. The dieta kitchen buys from the chacras around us, walked rather than ordered in.
The rooms
Single occupancy for every guest, seven nights. Sleep is half the reason Písac works; we do not ask you to share it.
The team
Small team. One focus.
Everyone working on your account is someone you can name, and you are never passed along to an account manager who has never opened your intake form.
At a glance
The numbers we run on
Every figure below is the same one we give on the phone, in the application, and in writing to declined applicants. If a number on this page ever disagrees with a number we quote you, hold us to the lower price and the stricter safety figure.
Medical note
We make no medical claims. Ayahuasca is not a treatment for any condition. Participants report lasting change, and we cite the peer reviewed research with its limitations rather than around them.
What we will not do
The lines we hold, in writing
No medical claims
Nothing we publish says ayahuasca treats depression, addiction, PTSD or anything else. Participants report; research is cited with its limitations.
No anonymous shamans
Every maestro appears with name, community and years in practice, photographed only with permission, or not at all.
No kené as decoration
Shipibo textile patterns are never reproduced as borders, watermarks or backgrounds. Real textiles are photographed with permission and the artist credited and paid.
No urgency theater
No countdown timers, no invented scarcity. When a week has four places we say four; when it is full we say full.
No charge before a yes
Nothing is charged to apply, and no deposit is taken until the physician confirms a place. Declined applicants get the reason in writing plus a referral list.
No upselling medicines
Kambo and Bufo carry no extra charge and are never suggested to a guest who did not ask. Clearance for one is never clearance for another.
“They told me on the first call that my medication might mean no. It took three more weeks and my own doctor’s sign-off before they took a cent. That was the moment I trusted them.”
Questions about us
Asked by people still deciding
Who runs Pisac Ayahuasca Retreats?
A small permanent team at one walled house in Písac: four Shipibo maestros from the Paoyhan and Nueva Betania communities who travel here for the weeks they work, a licensed physician who stays on site every ceremony night, an integration lead who stays with each guest for twelve months, and a dieta kitchen with a nutritionist.
Are the maestros local to the Sacred Valley?
No, and we say so plainly rather than implying a local lineage we do not have. Písac is a Quechua valley; the medicine and the icaros are Shipibo, carried by maestros from Ucayali who are named, credited and paid.
Why only twenty two weeks a year?
So the maestros, the team and the garden recover. Fifty weeks means either burned-out facilitators or a rotating cast of strangers. Twenty two keeps the same four maestros, the same physician and the same integration lead across the whole calendar.
Can I visit the house before I apply?
Not in person, since guests in dieta need the property quiet. After your file is reviewed, the forty five minute call with the integration lead can include a live walk through the house, the maloca and the garden.
How are you different from centers in Cusco or Iquitos?
Altitude and scale. Písac sits about 2,000 feet below Cusco and you descend to reach us, so the settling days actually settle. Against jungle centers near Iquitos, we trade rainforest immersion for a physician on site, a clinic 25 minutes away and a hospital arrangement an hour away. Twelve guests, never more.
More practical questions about altitude, medication, legality and price are answered on the home page and in the application itself.
Contact us · reviewed within 48 hours
Apply, and let a doctor decide
Nothing is charged to apply. A physician reads your file, your integration lead calls you, and we either offer a place on a named week in Písac or explain plainly why we cannot. This is an application, not a checkout.