A is also for Ayurveda

Never mind that Ayurveda has been around for 4,500 years; now that people want deep-down revitalisation, it's suddenly all the rage.

Like yoga, this holistic system from India has the ability to replenish the parts that stressful Western living depletes.

The most luxurious place to try Ayurveda is the Mandarin Oriental's Ananda Spa in the Himalayas, a contemporary conversion of a maharaja's palace. The treatment starts with a diagnosis. While you stare out across the Ganges river plain, an Ayurvedic doctor takes your pulse, scrutinises your eye shape, speech patterns and skin texture, and quizzes you about your dreams, spending habits, libido and bowels.

Ayurvedic language sounds alien. My constitution, for instance, was proclaimed 'earthy, damp, and cool'. Yet the doctor identified physical and emotional tendencies I hadn't even hinted at, giving me faith in his diagnosis.

First, my 'cool' system was heated by vigorous massage. Then came 'panchkarma' - hot oil was trickled on to my brow at the 'third eye', and miraculously, I experienced my first ever meditative calm. I was advised to avoid cool, wet foods, such as yoghurt or melons, because they make me retain water. Certain yoga postures were prescribed 'to stoke my metabolic fire' and I found that, over my three-day stay, I had slimmed down visibly.

Delicious though Ananda was, Ayurveda doesn't really belong in grand, marbled hotels. In beach areas like Goa and Kovalam there are dedicated Ayurvedic resorts, but it was in Kerala that I found a happy medium in Padma Nair, an expert in 'chavutti' massage.

For ten days, she massaged me, using her foot, with botanical oils, ironing away muscular tension. Only once she knew my body did she prescribe a herbal potion to dispel waste and boost my ovaries.

After seven days the massage suddenly released long-standing knots which I had thought were part of my posture. After that I had little doubt that the reason Ayurveda has survived for millennia is because it works.

Padma Nair's (00 91 471 363 038) ten-day, non-residential treatment at her home near Kovalam costs £300

A-Z travel guide for 2002