Serious Wellness in Asia: Seven Retreats and What Each Is For

A spa is something a hotel has. A retreat is somewhere you go because of what will happen to you there. Asia has both in abundance, and the vocabulary is used so loosely that the two are easy to confuse. The useful question when choosing is not which place is best, but what you want to come home with: a medical picture of your health, a body that has been properly rested, a practice you can continue, or simply a few days of quiet. The seven addresses below answer different versions of that question.

For a medical baseline: RAKxa, Bangkok

RAKxa sits on Bang Krachao, the green peninsula opposite central Bangkok, and was built with VitalLife, a subsidiary of Bumrungrad International Hospital. Doctors and diagnostics share the site with Thai, Chinese and Ayurvedic practitioners and a medical gym. Programmes run from three to fourteen days. Choose it if you want data and a plan, and if you would rather not add a domestic flight to a long-haul one.

For longevity medicine: Clinique La Prairie, Anji

The Swiss clinic’s first resort outside Montreux has only 29 rooms, in seven villas among the tea and bamboo hills of Zhejiang, west of Shanghai. Stays are organised as week-long programmes built on medical assessment, nutrition, movement and well-being. It is the most clinical option on this list, and the most private.

For Ayurveda and a real change of rhythm: Six Senses Vana, India

In a sal forest outside Dehradun, Vana treats the stay itself as the programme: consultations, a personal diet, daily treatments and even the clothes you wear are included. Ayurveda is the core, practised alongside yoga and Tibetan medicine. Programmes start at five nights, and the classical Panchakarma takes 21. This is the choice for people ready to give it time.

For a mountain reset near a great food city: Six Senses Qing Cheng Mountain

An hour and a half from Chengdu, Six Senses Qing Cheng Mountain lies in the foothills of one of the birthplaces of Taoism. It is a resort with a strong wellness programme rather than a strict retreat, which makes it easy to combine with a few days of Sichuan cooking in the city.

For wellness without leaving the city: Asaya, Hong Kong, and Janu Tokyo

Asaya, at Rosewood Hong Kong, spreads over two floors above Victoria Harbour, with practitioners in residence and lodges for overnight programmes. In Tokyo, Janu gives 4,000 square metres to pools, gyms and treatment rooms in Azabudai Hills. Both are for travellers who have two or three days rather than two weeks. Six Senses Kyoto, with its bath houses and Watsu pool, belongs to the same family.

For water and ritual: Kinosaki Onsen, Japan

Not a retreat in the medical sense, and perhaps better for that. In Kinosaki, guests walk in cotton robes between seven public bathhouses along a willow-lined river. Two nights are enough to remember what unhurried feels like.

For silence: a temple stay in Korea

Korea’s Templestay programme opens working monasteries to guests for a night or more of chanting before dawn, silent meals, meditation and tea with a monk, as described in OKYTO’s guide to spending the night in a Buddhist temple in Korea. It costs little, and it is the most demanding stay here.

How to choose

Be honest about time. Medical and Ayurvedic programmes need a week or more to make sense, and the retreats that offer them are right to insist on minimum stays. Look at who is on staff: doctors, traditional practitioners or therapists. And decide whether you want to be told what to do. The best retreats are firm about it, and that is what their guests come for.