Tag Archives: yoga retreat

Beyond the Bedlam – The Alternative Phuket

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How many massages is too many? I clock up seven in twelve days and, frankly, it feels like I’m just getting into my stride. I begin to wonder if I should push on — double figures feels like a personal growth milestone. Mind you, after the Indian head massage, which was sublime, I come away looking like I swam through the Exxon Valdez oil slick. I need to shampoo my hair no fewer than six times. 

I’m at CC’s Hideaway, a small, low-key hotel perched on a hill behind the chaos of Phuket’s western beaches. Down below: jet skis, beach bars, wall to wall umbrellas and the raucous throb of sunburned tourists. Up here: birdsong, sea views, and me scheduling another massage. 

The view from the rooftop yoga studio

This place provides opportunities to engage in everything from high action: eco adventures, island trips, kayaking, kick boxing, zip lining, to gentler pursuits such as massage and spa treatments, yoga, meditation, visiting offshore island beaches, and aligning your chakras – which you probably don’t even know are out of whack.

It’s possible to book the hotel and pay as you go for activities. I go for the all inclusive Yoga Holiday, which gives the illusion I’m focusing on my health. Each day I decide whether to go active or go slow.  Spoiler alert – go slow is a very attractive option, especially as every day is about 32 degrees.  There’s a yoga class in the morning, another at sunset. Some classes are on the beach, which sounds idyllic until you realise it’s hot, tricky to balance, and sunblock attracts sand like iron filing to a magnet.  I prefer my exfoliation in the comfort of a spa room. 

Day one is a slow one: swimming in the pool; a private yoga lesson, where after 28 years I learn a few things – after all, they call it yoga practice; the best massage I’ve ever had; and an evening restorative yoga session. 

Next day, action woman. It’s the 4 elements adventure: Earth, Air, Fire, and Water. The earth is advertised as “a trek to Ao Yon Waterfall through the lush jungle of Phuket to discover the hidden beauty of the Waterfall. This trek offers the perfect mix of nature, tranquility, and adventure as you walk through the forest, feeling the Earth beneath your feet, breathing in the fresh air, and reaching the serene waterfall”. I’d describe it more as a half hour stumble up a rocky dry riverbed through dusty forest to a trickle more like a leaky tap. It hasn’t rained in a while. 

Now, I love a zip line, flying through the air suspended by a carabiner attached to a washing line. First run? A bit short. Second run? Bit longer. Wind in my hair. Third run? Bring on the big guns. I’m basically Bear Grylls. Well, maybe not, because I wasn’t expecting a high cable walk. Across a single wire with a higher one to hold – or grip for dear life.  I shuffle across. Yes, there’s photographic proof. Luckily it’s of my back so you can’t see the whites of my eyes. 

How does Tarzan do it?

Then a wobbly net – is there any other kind when it’s suspended above the jungle?  This leads to a drunken zebra crossing, comprising sliding, zigzag planks designed by someone who hates ankles. Please, I beg, tell me the rest is all zip line? “No, madam. More climbing.” At this point my legs are trembling like I’ve just played two hours of squash and topped it off with 50 squats. I make the executive decision to retire from extreme sports forever, unclip myself with what little dignity remains, and retire to my natural habitat – the bar. 

After lunch – the fire aspect, and fortunately I’m a world champion at eating – we go to Ao Yon beach, ”a peaceful beach to unwind and experience the Water element. You can relax on the soft sand, listen to the sound of the waves, and enjoy the cool ocean breeze.”

Beware what lies beneath

As nice as this is initially, it becomes an unexpected second fire element when one of our group steps on a sea urchin, and another one on something even more toxic.  The sound of the waves gives way to shrieks and sobbing and next minute we’re in a mad dash to a hospital, 30 mins away. The poor woman is in agony: sweaty, heart racing, tingling up her leg and crying in pain.

Our guide stays with her at the ED and we next see her four hours later, limping and bandaged, clutching pain killers and antibiotics, but with an excellent vacation story with which to regale friends and family. She spent the first three hours lying in a corridor with staff ignoring her, so it’s just like ED at home. From this day forth I wear reef shoes every time I venture near the ocean.

And so the days drift by in a haze of smoothies and good intentions. I’m enthusiastic about a trip to a “desert island.” Desert implies deserted, but in this case  it’s only a 10-minute longtail boat ride so, not so deserted. Undeterred, we march heroically across to the other side and discover an uninhabited stretch of sand, complete with trees thoughtfully providing shade for the impressive mountain range of plastic waste artfully scattered along the shore. Ahhh Paradise. Lost. 

The clear water is in contrast to the trash ashore – Bon Island

In the interest of regaining my sense of adventure, I decided to try aerial yoga. How hard could it be? It’s just yoga, but in a hammock. Suspended. In the air. By fabric. 

We start with some stretches, hoisting a leg into the hammock and engaging in a series of contortions, which I’m sure you have to pay for at a BDSM house. Getting into the hammock requires engaging your core, the precursor for which is having a core. After a small but committed wrestling match with the silk, I resemble laundry aggressively flung over a fence during a storm.

Then came the inversions. I know my limits and draw the line when the instructor tells us we’re going for the “chicken roll”, which is nothing to do with food and requires complicated wrapping of various limbs, all of which I prefer to keep. I resist her insistence I challenge myself, preferring to keep my appendages where they were set at birth. 

While I demur at the prospect of the splits (Good God I’m nearly 70 and couldn’t do it at 17), I manage to impersonate a butterfly – I believe I might be ready to audition for Cirque de Soleil. Right up til I attempt to dismount. Then I am a newborn giraffe. Would I do it again? Probably, if only to prove the hammock doesn’t win.

Your fearless correspondent
Ever picture tells a story

If staying another week I’d likely do a cooking class, maybe an eco printing workshop, try another island trip that includes biking and kayaking, possibly even join a fermentation workshop. I suspect the Muay Thai kickboxing is beyond me, but I’d definitely have another few massages. 

Trading The White Lotus for The Sacred Lotus

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If anyone had told me I would be in absolute bliss, lying naked except for a bikini version of a sumo wrestler’s undies, on a hard wooden table having buttermilk dripped onto my third eye for 45 minutes, well, I’d have thought you’d lost your mind. But that’s exactly where I am on day four of my Ayurvedic Yoga retreat in Kochi, South India.

Now, I may not have done my research very thoroughly as I was thinking of a retreat more yoga and less woo woo, but it turns out to be a happy balance. There are literally hundreds of Ayurvedic retreat centres in the state of Kerala alone. This ancient Indian style of medicine dates back over 3,000 years, and is based on the concept of dosha balance, that is maintaining harmony among the three fundamental energies: Vata (air and space), Pitta (fire and water), and Kapha (earth and water). So when in balance we experiences good health, while imbalances, not surprisingly, can lead to physical and/or mental ailments, requiring dietary, lifestyle, and herbal interventions to restore equilibrium. This isn’t to the exclusion of modern medicine and techniques when required. So not so woo woo, just the rest of the world takes a while to catch on. So what happens?

Each day starts at 7:00am, unless of course you are not me, and go for a 6:00am walk. A therapist arrives at my room with a laden tray and carries out a cleansing ritual. She says a prayer, takes my temperature and BP, then I lie down and she gently washes my eyes, places dabs of oil on my nostrils and gives them a good massage while instructing me to breathe, then a brief face massage before she hands me a glass of indeterminate liquid and sends me to the ensuite to gargle. I then drink a foul smelling ‘medicine’ and head off to yoga. 

There are three yoga sessions a day. Not a morning person, but suitably cleansed, I haul myself to 7:30 class. Maya, our trans yoga instructor, has the loudest masculine voice, so instructions sound like orders.  I baulk when she says “breathe in the fresh air from the Arabian Sea”: I have walked down to the nearby Mahatma Ghandi beach, and I’m sure the piles of trash and pollution are not what he sat down for. After a short breathing exercise we move on to multiple Suryanamaskara (sun salutes) followed by serious strength poses held for long periods. Even this early it’s hot and humid, so it’s hard work. The second session later in the morning is all breathing work, and the afternoon session is meditation – which I suck at. It’s as if as soon as I try and quiet my mind, a flash mob invades and starts dancing around, vying for attention.

Maya, the yoga instructor, me, Asako from Japan, Gayatri from Seattle and Shalini who is Indian, speaks with a Scottish accent and lives in New York

Every day brings a new, and often unimaginable, delight. Six days and two treatments a day: one hour in the morning and a half hour in the afternoon, interspersed with three yoga sessions, meals, and plenty of relaxation. It’s 30+ degrees C every day, and humid, so not much activity outdoors. There’s a pool, with water almost too warm in this heat, and as untreated water here is not safe to imbibe, each time I swim I try to avoid galloping diarrhoea by not letting any water into my mouth.  My backstroke is improving. 

My first treatment is a full massage and steam.  We start with the ubiquitous karakia which is in Hindi, so I only get to join in at the end with the singsong om shanti, shanti, shanti, and the taking of blood pressure. This happens before every treatment. The table is wooden, so not the most comfortable, and I’m lying naked but for the sumo nappy.  Two therapists, one either side, drizzle me with warm herbal infused sesame oil and begin synchronised sweeping strokes from feet, up to and across my abdomen and boobs, and down my arms. Any modesty disappears with my dignity. Once I am at peace with that, it is very relaxing, but I can’t help but feel I’m being basted ready for a spit roast. By the time they finish the table is awash with oil and I am fully prepared to engage in Turkey’s national sport of oil wrestling. But with no Turk for thousands of miles I move to the next room, where I make the acquaintance of a piece of furniture which is either an antique writing desk or a medieval torture device. It is, in fact, a small steam room.  So I sit with my head poking out the top being gently steamed – a pork dumpling ready for yum cha. Fortunately that is the only steaming of the week, as in the heat my blood pressure already rivals a SpaceX rocket’s average altitude before exploding. 

One day I think I have wandered into an S & M parlour by mistake.  In the treatment room there’s a frying pan heating four large parcels. These turn out to be poultices containing “specific rice cooked in a suitable milk decoction (sic)” Today’s treatment, Choorna pinda swedam full body, starts as usual, but after the oil slick, the massage moves into high gear. I’m slapped with the warm poultices on the way up the body, and then there’s smooth strokes on the way down that exfoliate and massage at the same time. Again my synchronised therapists are in perfect harmony, switching to a new, warm, set of poultices for each swoop. 

This is possibly the only time being beaten up feels relaxing. After, my skin is amazingly soft. Marie Antoinette was ahead of her time with the milk bath, but if she’d traded it for Takradhara, perhaps she wouldn’t have been such a bitch to the peasants. 

Takradhara, the buttermilk on the forehead job, is my favourite treatment. Despite making you smell like you’ve just come in from the milking shed, I can’t begin to convey how fabulous this treatment is. After a time your brain just liquifies and it’s like you move to another level of consciousness.

The funnel ready to pour buttermilk on my fevered brow

It should be mandatory for dictators and despots. Picture Putin lying there, shirtless (because, of course) as a steady stream of cool buttermilk flows onto his forehead. At first, he resists “I wrestle bears for stress relief.”  But the treatment cools his brain, and at the end of the session he reconsiders his life choices. The world watches in shock as he trades invasion for meditation. 

If you’re wondering about the food, don’t. The Ayurvedic doctor sets you menu to balance your doshas. As a Vata with Pitta (not the bread) she is obviously trying to tone down my hotness, so generally my food is on the bland side. At the end of six days I feel pretty good, even though the treatments took my therapists dangerously close to areas usually only visited by my gynaecologist and gastroenterologist.