Wellness & spa

Wat Pho is the home of Thai massage and still teaches it; a session there is cheap, firm and genuinely therapeutic. Resort spas cost ten times more and are more comfortable — both are legitimate.

For longer programmes we work with retreats in Chiang Mai and Hua Hin that combine massage, yoga and Thai herbal medicine. We will tell you which ones are medically supervised and which are simply expensive.

The distinction that matters is between Thai massage (nuad boran) and oil massage. Thai massage works along the sen lines with thumbs, elbows, knees and stretching, fully clothed, on a mat. Oil massage is what most visitors actually book when they say 'Thai massage', and it is a different treatment entirely. Ask for nuad boran if you want the real thing.

Prices vary by a factor of ten for the same hour. A shop on a Chiang Mai side street charges 250 baht; a five-star hotel spa charges 3,000. The training is often similar — many hotel therapists were trained at the same schools — and the difference is the room, the linen and the quiet.

A retreat is a different product again. Five to fourteen days with a programme of yoga, treatment, restricted diet and no alcohol. The good ones are in Chiang Mai and Koh Samui; the ones to avoid are hotels that have relabelled a spa menu as a 'detox programme'. Ask what the daily schedule is before you book.