This fall, Marcy invited me to speak to the Curious Traveler Club in Frederick, Maryland, as part of the club's Travel for Your Passions series. She found me on Google, which still makes me smile! I recorded the talk before I left for Sri Lanka and Morocco, and the club was going to watch it at their October meeting, but had an emergency, so they finally got to watch it last weekend. And now you do, too!
So, what kinds of wellness travel are there? I walk through five: thermal and mineral waters, medical wellness, Ayurveda, bathing traditions, and wellness and culture retreats. The whole talk runs about twenty minutes, and you can watch it right here.
What is wellness travel and what kinds are there?
What are the five primary ways to travel for your wellbeing?
Thermal and mineral waters
For thousands of years, people knew that one spring was good for skin, another for joints, another for breathing. The chemistry was doing the work all along: magnesium, sulfur, bicarbonate. In parts of Europe, some of these waters carry a legal designation. In Spain, aguas mineromedicinales are declared by Royal Decree to be of public benefit for their therapeutic properties. At Castilla Termal you can bathe in that water inside a twelfth-century Cistercian monastery, a convent founded in 1128, or a round royal cloth factory built in 1750. Then you go truffle hunting. Divine!
Medical wellness
This kind is preventive and led by clinicians: hormonal health, joints, back health, stress, digestion and sleep. At Rogaška Slatina in Slovenia, programs are built around Donat Mg, a magnesium-rich mineral water taken as a drinking cure, and the medical center connects to the hotel by a covered passage. Outside Cascais in Portugal, between pine slopes and the Atlantic, supervised programs run from two nights to fourteen. And on Morocco's Mediterranean coast, Royal Mansour Tamuda Bay opened the country's first medi-spa.
Ayurveda
Ayurveda is South Asia's traditional medicine, and Sri Lanka has its own long lineage of it. The first thing that surprises people is that you see a doctor. It's a real consultation, and everything after it is built for you: the food, the teas, the herbs, the treatments. Because the approach is preventive, it takes time, so plan on about a week. You can also pair it with elephants and leopards, Buddhist temples, and sea turtles coming ashore at night to nest. There is a wide variety of style and feelings for Sri Lanka’s Ayurveda resorts. I recently returned from there and am happy to share! Just reach out.
Bathing traditions
Before homes had running water, communal baths kept people well, and they were where you saw everybody. In Turkey you can build a whole trip around them: the historic hammams of Istanbul, cave hotels in Cappadocia with deep bath suites, and the Cleopatra Antique Pool at Pamukkale, where you swim over toppled marble columns from the Roman city of Hierapolis in water still coming warm out of the ground. In Morocco, the spa hammams are the polished version. Steam, marble, someone scrubbing you properly clean, and an argan oil massage afterward. If you’ve never experienced a Moroccan hammam, here’s your primer!
Wellness and culture retreats
These are mine! We are there to be curious, to learn something, make something, and feel wonderful doing it. A day in Marrakech starts with a movement class on the rooftop, where you can smell the bread baking in the ovens below. After breakfast we head into the medina for an art class: carved plaster, rug making, or tooling a leather bag. The afternoon is yours for the hammam, the pool or the souks. Dinner might be in a nineteenth-century riad. After days like that, sleep comes easily. We just got back from our October 2026 Hands of Marrakech retreat, and you can let me know under “Feel Great News” below if you are interested in my next one, planned for late spring of 2028.
What happened after I recorded it?
In the talk I promised to come home with more to tell you, and I did. I spent ten days in Sri Lanka, including five at Santani, a wellness sanctuary in the hills above Kandy.
Shirodhara is a treatment.I will choose again and again! It made measurable differences in my sleep and felt differences in my stress levels!
If you're curious what Ayurvedic treatments are like, I wrote about them here.
Then came Marrakech, with site visits at four of the city's top luxury properties, followed by my Hands of Marrakech retreat.
This was my sixth time in Marrakech and I learn more every time! I’ll write more soon about our experiences.
New to the hammam? Start with my guide to your first one. I'll share what each Marrakech spa does best in November.
Which one would you pick?
I closed the talk by asking the club to chat about this over coffee: which of the five would you pick, and why? The why is the interesting part, because it usually points to what you need right now. So which one is yours? Send me a note and tell me.
If you're weighing your options, my short guide gives you three questions to ask yourself before you book, and one for afterward. It takes five minutes to read. Scroll down HERE to get the guide.
Frequently asked questions
How long should a wellness trip be?
It depends on the kind. A thermal or spa stay works well over a few nights, but can be much longer if you choose. Medical wellness programs often run from three nights to fourteen, with seven nights being the most common to experience a full programme.. Ayurveda asks for more time because the treatments build on each other day by day. Santani, for example, asks for at least five nights and recommends seven to twenty-one. My retreats run from a week to ten days.
Can I combine wellness with sightseeing?
Yes! Euphoria Retreat in Greece sits beside the Byzantine city of Mystras, near ancient Sparta. Castilla Termal pairs thermal water with wineries and truffle hunting. In Sri Lanka, Ayurveda fits alongside wildlife, temples and tea country. Getting that balance right for you is a big part of what I do.
Do you give talks for travel clubs, groups, and podcasts?
I do. in person around Maryland and the DMV, or with arranged travel, or online anywhere,. Email me at samira@samirashuruk.com to ask about dates.
