Design the Wellness Experience You Need
Here, you can shape your wellness vacation your way — whether it’s a solo retreat, a couple’s reset or cherished time with family, friends or coworkers that focuses on everyone’s wellbeing. Many of these suggestions are offered year-round and other seasonal opportunities will come along, too. Please find the time to take care of yourself and those you love. It will happen here.
Create your wellness vacation with these refreshers:
Forest Bathing & Stargazing
Southwest Michigan has many parks and nature preserves. Walk or bike along trails and soak up the peace created by hardwood and pine trees, still ponds, flowing streams and rivers, colorful wildflowers, fluttering butterflies and the playlists of songbirds. Research shows that spending only 10 to 20 minutes in the woods, or forest bathing, can lower blood pressure, heart rate and stress-elevated hormones. Here are some soothing choices:
Watch the Stars and Incredible Sunsets
One of the hottest vacation trends, stargazing, can also help improve your mental health. Seeing a dark sky blanketed in stars and planets will fill you with a sense of awe that can make you feel better. We are lucky in Southwest Michigan to have one of Michigan’s three officially designated International Dark Sky Parks — unmatched for nights under the stars. Bring a chair or spread a blanket and gaze with wonder.
Another awe-inspiring moment that happens every day of the year is the sun setting below Lake Michigan’s western horizon. Watching sunsets is a ritual along the lakeshore. No two are alike, but on clear evenings the swaths of scarlet, orange, lavender and yellow painting the sky will leave you speechless. Below are some favorite places to pause and relax so you can sleep well at night.
Find Freedom Outdoors
One of the best things you can do for your well-being is simply to get moving. Beyond hiking and biking through our scenic forests, try these outdoor wellness experiences that blend energizing activity with the healing power of nature: