It’s not impossible to improve your health and wellness at home – but with daily aggravations ranging from slow-moving traffic to slow-streaming Netflix, sometimes it’s hard to focus on feeling better. That’s why we have wellness resorts, places where your morning commute is replaced by morning consultations with a naturopath and the most stressful thing you’ll do all day is try and get into crow pose. Here are five of the best that opened in the past year.
Monticello, N.Y.
Abhay Jain
YO1 is a 1,300-acre resort in the Catskills Mountain.Abhay Jain
YO1 is pronounced Yauvan – if you’re confused when they answer the phone – which means “youth” in Sanskrit. So this resort set on 1,300 acres in the Catskill Mountains aims at restoring the vitality, energy and healthy skin of yesteryear through ancient Indian therapies. Here you can spend your days communing with nature in the trails around the resort, before returning to reflexology, acupuncture, yoga, hydrotherapy and mud therapy. The property also includes an outdoor amphitheatre and a 200-seat theatre where you can attend daily lectures from nutritionists and wellness practitioners, building on the education you may have already gotten at YO1’s museum dedicated to the history of naturopathy, Ayurveda and yoga.
Bali, Indonesia
Krishna Adithya Prajogo/Capella Ubud
Capella Ubud offers 22 tented one-bedroom suites modelled after campsite life in the 1800s.Krishna Adithya Prajogo/Capella Ubud
Nothing says “back to wellness” like emulating the life of early European settlers on a remote jungle island. Minus the mosquitoes, of course. This new offering from Capella opened in July and offers 22 tented one-bedroom suites modelled after campsite life in the 1800s – but with air conditioning. The resort is a true escape, 20 minutes north of Ubud with trips into working farms in the nearby village, spiritual healing rituals at the sacred Wos River and culinary medicinal healing at the resort’s Mads Lange and Api Dawa restaurants. For exercise, swim some laps in the 30-metre saltwater rainforest pool while the cool Balinese breeze blows over you. Or take a poolside yoga class, or a barre class in Capella’s state of the art gym.
The Waldhotel Health and Medical Excellence
Lake Lucerne, Switzerland
Waldhotel
Along with outdoor yoga and spa treatments, the Waldhotel also offers medical exams and hearing tests.Waldhotel
The Swiss are known for wellness and skin care, but they’re also known for precision and practicality. That’s why the wellness-focused hotel at the luxe Buergenstock Hotels & Resort Lake Lucerne not only offers an array of rejuvenating spa and skin treatments, it also offers medical examinations and hearing tests. For skin care, the hotel has Pellevé radio frequency and Icoone laser therapy alongside the traditional full body wraps and sea salt body peels. Skin cancer screening and full medical checkups are part of its $5,162 Basic Med package. If going to the doctor isn’t your idea of a Swiss mountain retreat, the spa offers more chilled experiences including, cryotherapy cabinets, from a salt grotto and aroma saunas to a traditional hammam.
Carillon Miami Wellness Resort
Miami Beach, Fla.
Carillon Miami Wellness Resort
A major renovation made the Carillon the largest spa in South Florida.handout no credit given
If you’re in Miami, getting a buff ballet booty is right up there with sipping a mojito on the beach on the list of things one must do. And lucky you, that is but one of the more than 300 group exercise classes offered at this newly redone art deco gem in Miami Beach. The Carillon completed a multimillion-dollar renovation in December, creating the largest spa in South Florida at 70,000 square feet. There you can hit the hydro circuit – a nine-station relaxation tour de force featuring an herbal laconium, crystal steam room, Finnish sauna, experiential rains and an igloo. The Carillon also opened a fresh, farm-to-table restaurant at the Strand Bar and Grill, where local chef Stephen Ullrich has crafted one of the most creative and healthy menus in the city.
Épernay, France
Royal Champagne Hotel & Spa
Every room at the Royal Champagne overlooks the vineyards of Épernay.Royal Champagne Hotel & Spa
Is it really a trip to wine country if you don’t have a room overlooking the vineyards? The designers of this resort don’t think so, as every one of its 49 rooms overlook the UNESCO World Heritage vineyards of Épernay and the surrounding villages of Champillon and Hauviller. Inside the resort – which includes a Modernist wing and a 19th-century post house – you’ll find a spa with nine treatment rooms, a wood-lined yoga room and a mosaic tile hammam. More importantly you’ll find a couple of restaurants from two-Michelin-starred chef Jean-Denis Rieubland; French fine-dining at Royal and all-day spa fare at Bellevue. Every room is decked out in Hermès amenities and you’re just a short ride away from some of the best wine-tasting in the world in the Champagne valley. C’est la vie.