Transformational Travel

By Jacqueline Miller

For those who love travel that features wellness and plenty of outdoor options,  our favorite travel guru, Lisa Silvestri (silvestritravel.com), shares two international resorts that provide a variety of activities and a perfect wellness world for renewed strength and harmony.

Let Your Soul Fly

 

“Although there are higher mountains, there are none more beautiful.”

— Reinhold Messner, world famous mountaineer, on the Dolomites.

Nestled in the heart of Val Gardena in the Dolomites mountain range in the Italian region of South Tyrol, is Adler Spa & Sport Resort Dolomiti. The area in north eastern Italy (part of the southern alps) is a UNESCO World Heritage site famed for its vertical cliff wall, and narrow, deep and long valleys.

With its breathtaking beauty, the Dolomites are a hiking paradise. Numerous paths take you straight from the Adler Spa & Sport Resort to the most idyllic places and most delightful alpine huts.Prefer a guide? You can join in on a flower, sunset or cultural hike to see things you will never forget.

In addition to hiking, the resort offers plenty of activities including yoga and pilates. In the warmer months there’s cycling, white-water rafting and guided full-moon walks. In the winter, there’s skiing, snowshoeing and tobogganing.

Set on over two acres of lush, green landscape, the 114-room resort is an extraordinary place of relaxation and power. The hotel interiors are stylish and soothing, combining clean elegant lines, warm wood tones and large panoramic windows to bring the stunning outdoors inside.

The spa is the hotel’s soul. The sprawling Water World area has hot and cold pools, baths, saunas, and indoor/outdoor relaxation spaces. There’s a salt grotto and rock salt sauna, a Rasul Bath with mud and herbal steam, a floral-scented steam room and the women-only rose-petal bath and lounge area. Treatments include Ayurvedic massage, Reiki, and Alpine baths with local pine needles and hay. There’s also a new offering, respiratory therapy, which is used either as a weight-loss or stress-management technique.

The cuisine combines Mediterranean and Ladin influences to create a mix of local traditional dishes and modern Mediterranean delicacies. Most ingredients are locally sourced. Ladin is a rural cuisine with Swiss, Austrian and Italian influences. The wine list features a selection of the produce of well-loved local grapes, as well as red and sparking whites from Tenuta Sanoner, a family-owned vineyard in Tuscany.

The resort’s best testimonial? A 98-year-old gentleman has just spent his 70th summer at the hotel.

Bohemian Rhapsody

 

“This is a dreamlike hotel, a product of an artist’s mind, a crazy, beautiful creative place. It’s luxury in its raw, local and personal state.” 

— Trip Advisor review

Looking to just relax, listen to nature, or maybe attend a creative workshop? Then Su Gologone Experience Hotel may just be your answer.

Located about 15 miles from the nearest beach, the hotel lies in the heart of Barbagia—an unspoiled part of the magical island of Sardinia so rich in traditions and history. Ancient olive trees and vineyards cling to the slopes of the mountainous Supramonte area, where the air is fragrant with myrtle and rosemary.

Su Gologone Hotel is a family-owned resort that started as a restaurant in the late 1960s.  It quickly became known for its excellent cuisine. The restaurant was such a success that the Palimodde family opened a small hotel to accommodate the stream of visitors arriving from abroad to taste their cuisine. Slowly, tourists realized there was a different Sardinia to discover beyond the island’s beautiful beaches.

Today, the property is a colorful, eclectic, world-renowned destination, with interiors that feature the works of major Sardinian artists and furnishings made in Su Gologone’s own Botteghe d’Arte. At the on-site Botteghe d’Arte, there are artist visits and arts and craft courses for your pleasure. Guests also enjoy numerous alfresco settings, and plenty of hidden corners to discover. Every detail of the hotel reflects the character of its location with deeply authentic furnishings and materials made of juniper wood, terracotta and inlaid plaster.

The hotel is surrounded by incredible Mediterranean flora—geraniums, hydrangeas, bougainvillea and prickly pears. You can inhale the fragrant air while enjoying the spring water pool and hitting some tennis balls. Looking for natural wonder experiences? The area is full of them—canyons, caves, archaeological sites, beaches with water bluer than the Caribbean, and star-gazing, plus there’s cooking experiences, yoga, reiki and meditation classes.

There are even more aromas to savor and great flavors to enjoy from the hotel’s farm-to-table cuisine. Meat cooked in the fireplace. Pasta made by hand by Sardinian women. Freshly-baked crispy bread. Local goat cheese and savory oils. It is one of the best restaurants on the island of Sardinia, famed for its local specialties.

Su Gologone Experience Hotel encapsulates the best of Sardinian culture—untainted nature, ancient customs and time-honored cuisine. If you’re looking for a relaxing, refreshing experience, this just might be it.