Yosemite’s Tenaya Lodge Unveils New Wellness Spa
A garden gate lures at Tenaya Lodge Like many Californians, I love Yosemite but don’t visit very often, scared away by the hordes of tourists who can turn the valley floor into a giant big parking lot, albeit one with spectacular views. But there’s an easy way to enjoy Yosemite while at the same time [...]
Rancho La Puerta: A Wellness Retreat Ahead of Its Time
Sunrise on Mount Kuchumaa This week I have a chance to visit a place I’ve been hearing about all my life. Legendary Esalen, the Big Sur retreat that everyone raved about while I was growing up in the crazy ’70s? Nope, not Esalen — Esalen was modeled on this place. It’s Rancho La Puerta, founded [...]
Re-Fresh for Fall at a San Francisco Wellness Spa
Shirodhara = stress relief September brings excitement, yes, but along with that brave-new-start feeling comes a wallop of stress. It’s easy to feel like there’s just way, way too much to do and not enough time, money, energy, and attention to get it all done. When you feel you’re about to lose it — or [...]
Borinquen: A Hot Springs That’s Truly Volcanic
I’m having a surreal moment. I’m standing, covered head to feet in slick, graphite-colored volcanic mud, when suddenly the deep guttural honk of a howler monkey reverberates almost directly overhead. I walk gingerly up the slatted wooden walkway that traverses the boiling hot river, craning my neck for a glimpse of the monkeys and at [...]
The Sound of Inner Silence in the Costa Rican Cloud Forest
Since arriving at El Silencio Lodge, an über-private nature retreat in Costa Rica’s high volcanic mountains, I’ve been contemplating the meaning of silence. Because silence, at least here in the jungle during the early days of the rainy season, is anything but quiet. Let’s start with the cicadas, which sound like buzz saws about ten [...]
Catching the Contemplative Side of Cabo
So pounding tequila shots at Cabo Wabo isn’t your style? Don’t make the mistake I made, thinking Cabo’s not for you just because you’re not the type to use “par-tay” as a verb. Take a page from celebs like George Clooney and Jennifer Anniston, who regularly sneak off to Hollywood hideaways Palmilla and Las Ventanas. [...]
Treating Yourself to the Treasures of Tribal Arizona
Imagine having a Native American healing based on traditions so secret and private that a panel of tribal elders had to approve the course of treatment ahead of time. That’s the lure of the Aji Spa at the Sheraton Wild Horse Pass, the only luxury resort in the U.S. located on an Indian reservation and [...]
Top 5 Spa Trends: Las Vegas Shows the Way to Relaxation
I just returned from Las Vegas, where the over-the-top new CityCenter development boasts not one, not two, but three elegant new spas, each in the character of the hotel that houses it. The quest for distinction goes deeper than style, though; each of these spas also offers innovative new treatment rooms that borrow from the wellness [...]
The Perfect Healthy Getaway: 5 Tips from Solage Calistoga
This week I took an active travel getaway to Solage Calistoga, a new kind of resort in Calistoga, California, and was truly impressed. And it takes a lot to impress me these days. Although Solage Calistoga was created by the same folks responsible for Auberge du Soleil and the other high-end Auberge properties, it wasn’t [...]
Discovering Thalasso therapy in Ixtapa, Mexico
On a recent trip to Ixtapa, Mexico, I experienced Thalasso hydrotherapy for the first time, and became an instant convert. If there were a spa here in California that offered this relatively new treatment, I’d be booking regular appointments. Taking its name from the Greek word for sea, Thalasso therapy uses warm seawater in specially [...]
