Portland Studio Offers Snake Yoga, Blending Reptile Handling with Mindful Movement

Instructor Katy Vanek calls out the cue and her students comply: "Inhale, come up, mountain arms, wave your arms in the air, say, hey, Gemma." Gemma, for the record, is a python.

HISSS, a reptile-centered pet store in Portland, Oregon (that's HISSS with three S's), began clearing out its large, light-filled front room for yoga classes a few months ago. Owner Dru Morales opened the shop last year, and what started as a retail space has become one of the more unusual places in the city to roll out a mat.

The setup looks familiar enough at first: mats on the floor, soft music, students in comfortable clothes. Then Vanek starts class, and the snakes come out. Staff bring pythons up to seven feet long into the room one at a time, along with a baby Colombian common boa named Mango. Handlers drape the snakes over students' shoulders or bellies, though the animals frequently take their own initiative, winding across torsos and climbing up people's bodies as practitioners warm up. Cold-blooded and seeking heat, the reptiles snuggle in.

The snakes share floor time with a rotating cast of other animals. A tegu lizard described as the size of a small dog makes an appearance, along with a weirdly fast little gecko and a very slow tortoise named Pebbles. Vanek weaves all of them into her instruction. "Let's reach our hands up. And we're going to come all the way down, around your back like a turtle. Let's get eye level with Pebbles here," she told the class.

The students showing up are not a monolith. Kristen Bender and Julie Connelly were among the attendees at a recent class. One unidentified participant came in with full confidence: "I'm a reptile girl, so we're here for the snakes." Another arrived as a first-timer: "I've never hung out with a snake. And I'm super excited to hold one or touch one."

Vanek herself has clear favorites. "Gemma is one of my favorite snakes in snake yoga," she said, mid-flow, as the python in question made her way through the room.

HISSS operates as a full-service reptile shop beyond the yoga programming. Morales described the shop's offerings: "We offer beak trimming services for turtles and tortoises, nail clippings, spa packages, shedding assistance, a turtle and tortoise shell wax service." The yoga classes represent a newer dimension of the business, one that Vanek's instruction is shaping into something that feels genuinely intentional rather than gimmicky. Her cue to move "mindfully" through transitions takes on a different weight when she adds, "you never know who's going to be right by your side.