Tim Samuels visits an ‘integrated wellness’ retreat near Bangkok that’s truly out of this world.
The Truman Show appears to be alive and well on the outskirts of Bangkok.
Well, if you replace the white picket-fenced houses of American suburbia with boutique bungalows nestled behind lush Thai foliage, move Jim Carrey out, and ditch the plot to record every aspect of one unwitting man’s life.
But there is something fictional – utopian even – about RAKxa that’s almost too good to be true. It feels like you’re on the set of a vast production, where the supporting cast are there to make you feel as nourished, healthy and relaxed as humanly possible. It’s unlike any other wellness retreat I’ve ever been to.
A stress prescription
Opened in 2020 – though delayed by Covid – RAKxa lies 45 minutes from the bustle of Bangkok city centre. Spread across a vast 80-acre site, it is, in modern parlance, an ‘integrated wellness destination’. One of the new class of retreats fusing high-end medical and wellness treatments – for full body and mind restoration. While integrative retreats have popped up in places like Austria and the US, this is the first in Thailand – so expect treatments with a Thai twist and out-of-this-world customer service.
At the end of last year, I’d reached burnout. So I dragged myself through the Baltic British weather to Heathrow and flopped on an 11-hour flight to Bangkok. Within an hour or so of landing, I was facing a lagoon while being serenaded with a welcome gong bath and freshly made kombucha – a light breeze cutting through the sweet 30°C heat.
And then it was on to the diagnostics. I’d signed up to the spa’s signature ‘Rebalance’ programme – which promises to return one to ‘equilibrium and complete holistic health, by balancing physical and mental stability, brain and body coordination, the gut-brain axis, chakra alignment and the inner flow of vital life-force energy’. My mind and body were crying out for all of the above.
A doctor steeped in conventional and Thai medicine evaluated which ten or so treatments would set me straight over the next five intensive days. Traditional Thai medicine ensures that the basic elements in your body – earth, water, wind and fire – are in perfect balance and harmony. Herbs, bodily manipulation and mindfulness practice are used to restore elemental imbalances.
After a comprehensive once-over of my pulse, skin, eyes and tongue – and looking at my date of birth
