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If you’ve been screaming into the digital void recently, it’ll come as a relief to find a bolthole where your phone isn’t welcome. New wellness retreats at Swinton Bivouac, an eco-glamping site in Yorkshire, provide an excuse to ditch technology for a couple of days and reconnect with your surroundings. Staying up in the Dales means unadulterated nature: noise-free woodlands, meadow valleys, sweeping lake vistas… you get the picture.
Retreat participants are put up in sustainable tree lodges (breakfast hampers and veggie dinners included), but you can book Swinton’s lodges or cosy meadow yurts for DIY nature-based frolics any time from Easter to October. There’s even a wood-fired hot tub.
The off-grid adventure is led by Forest Bathing UK founder Faith Douglas. For the uninitiated, forest bathing is just a soothing way to describe mindful walks in the woods. There’s lots of that here, but also sound bathing (think chilling out to the melody of gongs and Tibetan bells) and reiki drumming in a meadow tepee around a dusk campfire. Fear not: it’s actually a lot more down-to-earth than it sounds. Though if you do want a dose of magic, there’s an eighteenth-century woodland druid’s temple that’s atmospheric enough to validate any fantasies of fairies and forest sprites.
Masham, North Yorkshire. Two-night wellness retreat £375 per person. Next retreat Sep 22-24. Yurts from £109 a night. Find out more here.
Fancy a digital detox? Check out these really rural breaks from London.
Into forest bathing? Read more about it here.