Can a wellness retreat cure a midlife crisis? I gave it a try

“So my therapist says I’m having an existential crisis,” my oldest friend tells me, as we drive down a serpentine road on the way to Eden, Australia’s longest running wellness retreat, in Queensland’s Currumbin Valley.

Forty years young – Queensland’s Eden Health Retreat.

I knew my friend (let’s call her Z), a successful podcaster and media personality and mother of two young kids, had been feeling burnt out and needed time away. But when she tells me she feels indifferent about her life, and that she can’t remember what the point of anything is any more, I worry a health retreat won’t be robust enough to help her.

I shouldn’t have been surprised, I suppose. We’re both in prime existential crisis territory, since we’re both celebrating our 40th birthdays this year - as is, coincidentally, Eden itself. Like all good midlife crisis-havers, the retreat has celebrated its fourth decade by undergoing a bit of a facelift. There’s a new chef, an overhauled spa, and some slick new matte black timber-clad cabins that I’m here to check out.

Eden’s new timber-clad cabins.

The Cascade Lodge, my home for the next three nights, is one of these new additions and the most sumptuous of Eden’s 48 rooms. The breezy timber space has floor-to-ceiling windows flooding it with natural light, a sprawling balcony overlooking the valley (excellent for midday naps), lofty ceilings, a freestanding tub, its own fireplace and lounge, and a clean-lined contemporary design that immediately calms me.

The retreat’s sauna.

Z, however, is antsy. Her room, one of the old ones, is at the top of a steep hill. It’s 10 minutes’ walk from the dining room. It’s also smaller than she was expecting. The benefit of existential crises, happily, is the accompanying devil-may-care attitude: Z charmingly expresses her discontent, and within a few hours is happily ensconced in one of the lush new cabins set behind mine.

After an introductory stretch session with one of Eden’s in-house yoga teachers, we make our way to the dining room, perched on top of a hill overlooking the property’s manicured gardens. New chef Ash Martin, who was previously heading up the kitchen at Spicers Hidden Vale in Queensland’s Scenic Rim, creates seasonal menus in collaboration with nutritionists, so our meals are nourishing, balanced and somehow still delicious.

Ash Martin’s food – nourishing, balanced and somehow still delicious.

They’re all gluten-free and brim with fresh local vegetables, locally sourced seafood and organic meats, as well as lots of plant-based proteins, whole grains, nuts and seeds. Portions are small, but we quickly get used to that.

Eden’s spa overhaul includes seven new mint-walled treatment rooms, as well as new treatments including nervous system rejuvenation and signature facials. The following day I try an “ultimate rejuvenation facial” that includes acupuncture, gua sha, lymphatic drainage and LED light therapy, and emerge looking decidedly less almost-40 than I did.

These new additions all serve to elevate Eden’s offering far beyond the boot camp it started out as 40 years ago. There is still a lot of boot camp-style exercise woven into the daily schedule, including fitness sessions, bush walks through the 150-hectare property and a giant flying fox, but these days it’s alongside other more gentle offerings.

Getting the treatment.

We sign up to a gut health talk by a naturopath, a manifestation workshop and a pottery class, all of which are supremely rejuvenating.

What turns out to be most resuscitating for Z, though, are some giant belly laughs. A reminder that life isn’t all duty and hard work. We cackle like kids as we swing through the trees on Eden’s giant valley swing when we aren’t meant to during the sound healing and, most of all, when we slather our naked bodies in mud and lay in the sun to dry at Eden’s “club mud”.

By the time the final fire ceremony comes around, where we scribble things we want to release on scraps of paper then feed them to a roaring fire, Z has returned to herself. She feels restored, she says. Fresh and vital, as though she’s starting life over, and with a bag full of tools to help keep her balanced back home. I feel a bit like that, too.

As for the impending 40ths – mine, Z’s, Eden’s – I have a feeling our best days are ahead.

THE DETAILS

Eden is 30 minutes from the Gold Coast’s Coolangatta Airport. Packages at Eden Health Retreat start at $2750 for three nights, in a deluxe single room and including all meals, daily wellness classes and activities and use of the pool and sauna, with packages of up to 11 nights available. Spa treatments are extra. See edenhealthretreat.com.au.

The writer was a guest of Eden Health Retreat.