Waxing lyrical in spa heaven

My history with Majorca goes back a long way. I used to go there to visit Lynne Franks, The Empress of PR.

No, Absolutely Fabulous is not all about her - but there were elements of her behaviour when I went to see her there that would certainly have indicated that it was.

Each summer Lynne used to hold a pagan moon dance at her villa in the village of Deia - gatherings of old, heathen hippies with huge, frizzy hair and those wide, inane grins they all have.

I recall much drumming and Lynne naked in the Jacuzzi with her very young fakir boyfriend. He wore the nappy and had the turban on his head and he would lie down and make us cover him with heavy stones. Then a volunteer would hack at the rocks, breaking them but not him.

He ate fire, walked on broken glass and, I imagine, was great in bed. Lynne would dance naked, swim naked and I always thought: 'How brave.'

Near her villa stood the La Residencia hotel and I fell in love with the place the moment I saw it. It lies in a lush valley with jaggedly dramatic mountains on all sides, which you gaze at from a pearshaped, turquoise pool, surrounded by white umbrellas.

The rooms are on all levels of the hotel, with balconies that give you a view you can only gasp at. The rooms are modern and cool, with tiled floors, hand-carved, fourposter beds and bathrooms so big you can jog in them.

The hotel, rather than being intrusive, makes the landscape even more beautiful. Behind it are olive groves where you hear the constant tinkling of goat bells. On the other side, a cluster of earth-coloured haciendas lines Deia's tiny streets that wind up and up the hill to the church on top.

It really is the stuff of fantasy, as are the nearby beaches, lined with cliffs and dotted with open-air seafood restaurants.

The village inspired the English poet Robert Graves, who moved here to write and surround himself with his band of muses. Isadora Duncan was one, and a whole tribe of intellectual Bohemians followed her to this tiny paradise. Something of this atmosphere remains.

The cafes are filled with a highoctane level of eccentrics. Old frizzle-haired ex-muses, smoking pipes, wearing tie-dye kaftans, listening to whales mating on headphones. I overheard a conversation: 'You see this table. Think of it as your consciousness!' All hippy-speak and acid brainburned-dialogue - I find it high entertainment.

Everyone but everyone is a wannabe artist. Some of it is brilliant, some my hamster could do with a little paint on his claws.

Anyway, back to the hotel. In the early days, the owner, Virgin boss Richard Branson, would be master of ceremonies around the pool. If he felt you needed to swim, he would throw you in. But, to his credit, if he felt you needed to eat, he would take you to the restaurant and buy you lunch.

He also taught each of my children to swim with a unique method.

When my son Max was five, Richard told him to take off his floaties and get in the pool. He waved £10 at him and said if he could swim across the pool, it would be his. Max had never had a swimming lesson in his life. I was terrified.

But Max must have inherited some of my Jewish genes. He swam, God knows how, and got the cash.

Richard did the same thing with my daughter Madeleine. She wouldn't swim right away, so he launched her in the air, like a plane, to set her off. She got £20 to get over the trauma. Richard signed the banknotes and we had them framed as the children's swimming certificates.

So when I went back to the La Residencia after many years of absence, I thought surely it would have fallen from its unbelievably sexy standards. To my surprise, however, not only has it not changed, it has got better.

It has a spa now. When I went for my weekend I was ill with flu. I thought if they could cure me with their detox programme, then it had to be good.

I had been ill for four weeks, so I presented quite a challenge.

Up on the hill, still filled with the sound of those goat bells, there's now a state-of-the-art gym and indoor pool. I got a yoga teacher who knew how sick I was so didn't make me do the usual yogic kissing of your own behind from both directions.

She relaxed me and made me do breathing exercises to visualise my fever away.

She was a genius. I knew she was a great yoga teacher just by looking at her - nothing on her had been affected by gravity. When you can't tell if they're 25 or 65, it's always a good sign. She left me feeling as good as new.

They then buried me in mud, not something I like to do in real life but it, too, made me rise from the dead. Ironic, though, that you're covered in dirt to feel alive again.

It isn't actually dirt - it was marine seaweed by Thalgo, but it looks like dirt.

A facial followed, in which they smeared about 20 different creams into my face. I had always thought this sort of treatment was a con, but afterwards I looked at myself in the mirror and said, 'My God, Miss Wax, you're beautiful.'

I glowed, I was young. When I got back to London I was a dog again, but there . . . even I would have married me.

I also had to get into a thousandjetted Jacuzzi filled with algae. I cooked in it like I was part of a grotesque bouillabaisse, but again I felt better, so who am I to bite the hand that bathes me?

Ed, my husband, went for a massage - twice. This was unusual since he never bothers with them at home.

He went the first time and told me the masseuse was a genius: he had to go back.

I decided I'd better go and see what all the fuss was about. Surprise, surprise, she looked like Bo Derek when she was young. Men are so predictable.

Let us not forget El Olivo's, the hotel restaurant, still my favourite in the world. The walls are rough stone, in the centre is a rustic olive press and you sit in enclaves surrounded by gigantic, wroughtiron candelabras dripping with melting candles. From the highdomedceiling hangs an iron chandelier with hundreds of candles. Even if you're alone, it's romantic. And the food is an orgy of tastes. I wanted to elope with my lobster.

So on the plane back to London, I was healed. I was radiant. And now I'm back to work and I'm sick again and miserable. It's sad to think that only luxury can cure me.

An indictment of my shallowness. But true.

GETTING THERE

Magic of Spain (020 8241 5019) offers three nights' bed and breakfast at La Residencia from £586 per person including return flights from Heathrow, Manchester or Glasgow and private transfers. For further information on La Residencia or bookings, call Limited Edition by Virgin on 0800 716 919.

Where to get the star treatment