What do surfing, sex and the ancient Mexican practice of temazcal have in common?
The three top the list of this year’s wellness travel trends identified in Spafinder Wellness 365's annual Spa & Wellness Trends Report.
Leading the Top 10 forecast for 2106 is surfing. “There’s been a serious expansion in the demographic,” said Research Director Beth McGroarty, who steered the research team, along with Susie Ellis, president of Spafinder Wellness, Inc. “There are more women, more luxury surfers.”
Thirty-six percent of U.S. surfers today are women, McGroarty said. And the average surfer is in his or her 30s, well educated and earns $75,000 a year, meaning surfing, mindfulness and money are increasingly intertwined.
That has fed a rise in what McGroarty describes as a “a very cool genre” of destination properties around the world that offer surfing, along with spinoffs like stand-up paddle boarding and wellness programs that include a growing number of women-only retreats on some of the world’s most far-flung beaches.
“If you want to find next great beach, follow the surfers,” she said.
Leading the trend, according to the report, is Hotel Komune Bali, which marries "destination spa" levels of wellness with surfing and paddle boarding lessons at a famed wave break, and SurfSet Fitness, which has expanded to 250 studios in 20 countries.
The surfing industry is now a $130 billion industry, McGroarty said, that has moved far beyond beachside camps with simple cabins. "Think Four Seasons luxury, Six Senses luxury," she said.
And she says surfing and wellness is going to continue growing.
“They say surfers never grow up,” McGroarty said. “It’s an addiction.”
No. 2 in this year’s report is sexual wellbeing. The report says the shame sensationalism and taboo often associated with sex in our culture is fading, and many wellness retreats, hotel and spas are launching more sophisticated sexual wellbeing and literacy programs.
For years, some pioneering destination spas have offered some sexual wellness programming, typically focused things like better communication and intimacy for couples, according to the report.
“But the focus is shifting towards bolder personal exploration,” the report says.
For instance, Canyon Ranch in Tucson, Arizona, is offering a February retreat, “Women, Sensuality & Health,” that includes “helping women foster more personal pleasure.” And last year, it held a “Sensuality and the Art of the Tease” retreat teaching things like mastering the “Burlesque Strut” and FitStrip classes.
Some hotels have also begun offering sex amenities, like the SLS Las Vegas’s “intimacy kit” that includes condoms, lubricants and a vibrator. The Banyan Tree Mayakoba in the Riviera Maya, Mexico, now has a “romance consultant,” while Toronto’s the Drake has a “Pleasure Menu” that includes vibrators, sensual oils, erotic movies, blindfolds, velvet restraints, even a 24-carat dildo.
Temazcal at Sense, a Rosewood Spa.
Coming in at No. 3 on this year’s Top 10 forecast is the ancient Mexican practice of temazcal, which the report describes as “an elaborate ritual in which a trained shaman uses heat, steam, aromatic herbs, and ancient prayers and chants to connect guests with forces of the physical and spiritual world.”
As travelers increasingly seek native, authentic wellness offerings, temazcal is becoming commonplace on spa menus across Mexico, the report said.
Leading the trend, the report says, are the Riviera Maya resorts of El Dorado Royale, the Rosewood Mayakoba and The Viceroy.
Other tourism trends on this year’s Top 10 forecast include spa and wellness programs directed at children; adventure travel program adventure that offer adrenaline-rushing activities followed by spa and hot springs relaxation programs; and healthy cruising, like the Canyon Ranch SpaClub aboard Regent Seven Seas Cruises' Seven Seas Explorer.
McGroarty said the trends report revealed “innovation in and enthusiasm for wellness travel, and how wellness is an integral part of the most fundamental aspects of people’s daily lives: work, family and love.”
“Rather than focus on how ‘X is the new Y,’ we strive to make sense of the sea of forecasts and identify megatrends that are having, and will continue to have, the most meaningful impact on people’s lives, and on the industry, for years to come.”
This report was updated Jan. 14, 2016.