Weddingbee boards

I'm an avid fan of sacred spaces (and have a MA in Religious Studies), so one of my hobbies is visiting shrines/temples/famous churches/sacred rivers/mountains etc.  However, living in Korea where we have a small Orthodox community, we don't have a lot of Orthodox sacred spaces.  So I was really excited to spend the weekend at the Orthodox monastery outside of Seoul for the weekend.  Incredibly, I've never been to a monastery before (much less stay the weekend), and I found it to be a very spiritually deepening experience.  I tend to experience a spiritual connection most with God and the Church while singing - those from Liturgical traditions can probably understand this best.  However, there are very few opportunities in Korea to hear let alone sing services in English, so it was a great experience to sing 4 different services in English and actually have time to meditate on the meaning of the services instead of rushing home to work or meet other people. The experience has really inspired me to seek out other monasteries (Orthodox or Catholic) and try to visit our monastery here more often. 

So has anyone else had a great experience at a monastery?  Or can anyone recommend great monasteries?  I don't get to North America very often, but I'd love to try and incorporate a few visits in every time I go. 

Well, my next trip will be Hong Kong over Christmas.  After that, our next trip will be back to Canada (Southern Ontario) for the wedding.  There's not too much in our area, but we might be flying back to Korea through California.  Any places you know in the Napa Valley region?

I do want to get to Ireland at some point (my name's saint is Irish so I want to visit her shrine), but I'll probably also go to France on the same trip.  Any recommendations there?