It has been astonishing, in the 10 years that I have been involved exclusively in travel journalism, to see the way that wellness travel has exploded and diversified. Some trends, like forest bathing and adaptogenic smoothies, have carried with them a whiff of faddishness, but so much of what we have come to think of as wellness travel has felt so useful for helping us navigate this chaotic, confusing world: programs to better our sleep and nutrition, to practice mindfulness, even to improve sexual health. I myself desperately need some help with sleep, which I am eager to focus on when I visit the just-opened Mexico outpost of the acclaimed Spanish wellness clinic Sha later this year. You'll find a little more on the retreat in our What Wellness Is package, which explores some of the latest offerings in the category, from surviving the slings and arrows of menopause to building confidence to become a better leader back home. These stories are part of our greater push around wellness this year; look for continuing coverage on our new dedicated Travel Well vertical on our site.
Visiting Paris: I saved money by staying in Chantilly and catching the train
29.01.2024 - 11:17 / theguardian.com / Mark Rothko
We wanted to pack a lot into our few days in Paris: the Mark Rothko exhibition at La Fondation Louis Vuitton (until April), and, for my techie husband, the new Maison Poincaré maths museum near the Sorbonne (monoglot polymaths can relax: it’s bilingual). We’d been too late to book for Serge Gainsbourg’s house on the Left Bank (already sold out for 2024!) but the new Quai de la Photo floating contemporary photography museum was showing work by the late Jane Birkin’s daughter, Kate Barry. We also wanted to wander round galleries in newly arty Rue Béranger in the Marais and maybe catch Franco-Gabonese artist Myriam Mihindou at Musée du Quai Branly.
We had a shock, however, when we looked for somewhere to stay. Paris hotels are now so expensive: €300 a night is not uncommon. Then we hit on a cool solution: stay outside the capital, but on a fast train line. The small town of Chantilly is known for whipped cream, horse racing and fine handmade lace, and is less than half an hour (about €5 each way) from Gare du Nord.
We based ourselves at Hotel Le Chantilly (doubles from €130 B&B), an 18th-century coaching inn 10 minutes’ walk from Chantilly station, with original beams, wooden floors and exposed stone. Breakfasts were top-notch, and our room looked out on the creamy stone of Place Omer Vallon. There are cheaper places in the town, but this offered style and luxury we could never afford in the capital.
The added joy of this plan was that as well as getting our culture fix, we could explore a different, less-frenetic area. Just how gobsmacking the Château de Chantilly is shows in the fact that Valentino chose it as the backdrop for its 2023 show. (It was also the home of Bond villain Max Zorin in A View to a Kill.) The grounds were designed by André Le Nôtre, who also laid out the gardens at Versailles. The chateau was destroyed in the French Revolution, and its owner, the Duc d’Aumale, was later exiled to England, but when he returned he still had enough wealth and clout to rebuild and fill the rooms with art he’d collected while away. It’s now second only to the Louvre in France for old master paintings. We particularly enjoyed three luminous Raphaels and a lush Poussin landscape.
I have never seen horses more magnificently housed than in the chateau’s Great Stables, with cathedral-high ceilings and an indoor theatre space for daily equestrian demonstrations. Le Nôtre’s formal parterre is impressive, but the wider grounds, with woods, shady paths and lake are more enjoyable, nowhere more than the waterside Restaurant du Hameau, in the “Anglo-Chinese garden”, where we ate a simple but delicious lunch of charcuteries with crudités grown in the grounds.
After days spent in Paris, we tried out Chantilly’s
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