Year after year, people pledge to renew their fitness routines every January, before finding that their motivation drops off as the month wears on. Instead, it might be worth while to try out an active travel tour in order to give your psyche the boost it needs in order to stick to your fitness goals. Many of these trips are better viewed as retreats, offering holistic wellness as their goal, rather than as a bootcamp style getaway.
A company like ToneEscapes incorporates morning workouts in a fun location. This year’s offerings include Santorini, Greece, Saint Lucia, and Marabella, Spain. Founder Mantas Zvinas says that she designed the getaways as a method for encouraging a balanced approach to wellness, rather than an all or nothing style that’s tough to keep up with.
These active travel companies all have in common that they’re using the surrounding environment to their advantage as part of their fitness routines, whether it’s running on a local beach or biking through the mountains. AKT Retreats is another company begun by a personal trainer, who also personally leads the trips, though AKT is designed for women only. Both ToneEscapes and AKT Retreats accompany their workouts with healthy meals inspired by local ingredients and cuisines. With AKT, you can even take a cooking class on their trip to Nicaragua.
There retreats aren’t restricted to warm and sunny locales, however. If you’re the type who prefers the cool whisper of a mountain breeze in the summer, or has more of an affinity to winter sports, there’s an active retreat for you too.
WearActive designs weeklong trips that take place exclusively in the Austrian Alps. Travelers are offered private accommodations along with the services of a chef. Each day, guests have the ability to design their schedule around a number of offered activities, snow sports in the winter, or rock climbing, hiking, or mountain biking in the summer.