REVIVO, a “wellness resort” in Nusa Dua, is currently doing a day-time retreat program that they’re calling the “cleanse and detox weekend.” It’s going on throughout the month of August, and we gotta say: It’s a pretty sweet deal. You basically get a glimpse into a five-star wellness experience at a fraction of the usual cost.
The caveat: You don’t get to spend the night and fully melt into the luxury life, unless you want to fork over US$350 for a garden suite.
REVIVO is a fairly new enterprise — an enclave of luxury villas and suites which opened this past March. It’s divided into three departments, if you will: Remisso, the spa; Nutrio, the restaurant; and MOVEO, the fitness center.
In July, REVIVO kicked off a limited-time “cleanse & detox retreat” program that’s only offered on Saturday and Sunday (US$45 for one day or US$80 for both days). The program gives a taste of all three departments, granting access to their spa facilities, lunch from their restaurant, a fitness class, pick-up and drop-off service from Seminyak, and the add-on option (read: additional cost, of US$30) for a massage.
The breakdown of the day basically goes like this: They pick you up, shuttle you over to the resort to arrive by 10am, serve you a welcome green juice so you can start your detox (even though you’re only there for a span of eight hours), give you the option to join an 11am fitness class, feed you lunch, and then give the lymphatic drainage massage (if you’ve chosen the add-on, that is).
Then, you’re left the rest of the day until 6pm to do a circuit through the spa facilities and chill out in a sunbed by the very Instagrammable 25-meter lap pool.
Those spa facilities include an infrared sauna, steam room, jacuzzi, hot and cold plunge pools, and hydro Vichy showers, and a saltwater floating pool. Salivating yet?
The place has been touted by bloggers and lifestyle writers as “Asia’s best wellness retreat” — so, let’s just say we went in with high expectations when REVIVO invited us to pop over for a day.
FOOD
Before you get lunch, they make a point of serving you a bottle of kombucha from their own label, which they’re pretty darn proud of. The Red Java Chai flavor was pleasantly smooth, yet spicy in an earthy way. Also, it was the bubbliest kombucha we’ve ever sipped on — which, for some reason, made it feel a little bit more fancy.
Apparently the standard meal for day-trippers like ourselves is a bowl of detox, alkaline broth containing onion, leek, tomato, daikon, burdock, ginger, sweet potato, cabbage, zucchini, beetroot, celery and kombu seaweed. The broth was light, refreshing and a nice little palate cleanser. It made us feel like we were getting in some serious nutrients for a favorable trade off of not that many calories.
Normally they follow the broth with a plate of “wild ocean blue fish, pepes way” — using the Balinese cooking method of steaming the meat in banana leaves, but they let us pick what we wanted off of the menu. We tucked into the coco pesto pasta, which offers a chance to cut the carbs in exchange for zoodles and axe out the parmesan in favor of some creamy avocado pesto. So much yum. The only reason we’d say go with their recommendation of the fish is that the pesto zoodles did not keep us sated for long — our stomachs were rumbling in a few short hours after eating, but we didn’t want to cut the day short. So, we sucked it up for the rest of the visit. Sorry, stomachs.
FITNESS
MOVEO has three separate pristine studios for yoga, meditation, and Pilates — in this one, they even have a proper Pilates machine. Plus points for not just piling all of these into one studio and having dedicated spaces for each exercise type.
The gym looked amazing. It was spotless and had a great choice of equipment — we wish it were our everyday workout spot, but we figured… why go on some machines there when we get a one-hour fitness session included and there’s so much other spa stuff to enjoy?
We’ll talk about the class a little later.
SPA
If you’re used to IDR100k street-side Balinese massages like we are, then the setting of REMISSO will be a real treat. The crisp linens, the smooth wooden floors, the copper foot baths with lime, lemongrass, and salt, the high ceilings, soft robes, white, high-ceiling minimalist buildings, all really had us seeing how the other half lives.
The lymphatic drainage massage didn’t feel all that different from a typical full body massage we’d normally get at a local spa. The funny thing was that they had us fill out a questionnaire beforehand of which body parts we would like them to focus on, choices between head, shoulders, feet, and full body. One of us tried out the head and full body, while the other put shoulders — but it felt like we were given exactly the same massage, as our masseuses seemed perfectly in sync during the hour-long treatment and there didn’t seem to be any extra head rubbing time in my session.
This is our own fault, but we’re still face-palming over the fact that we missed out on the hydro Vichy showers. They showed us these puppies in the beginning, but by the time we got to our spa circuit, we totally forgot — partially because they’re in a separate building.
Worth it?
While we did love the overall experience, we did find some areas where the place fell short of its promise for true luxury.
-The infrared sauna: The sauna had a glass door, which maybe shouldn’t matter, but does in function — the construction on it made it so that it didn’t seal properly, which left it in a continuous state of trying to warm up but never achieving a stable, hot temperature, as the heat was always flowing out. Yes, we realize detoxing in infrared saunas is more optimal at lower temps, but we couldn’t help but be concerned about this thing leaking air!
-The floating salt pool: It was a pool that had salt, but there was no floating action going on. The floating motion is supposed to be effortless, according to REVIVO’s spa brochure, but it sure did take a lot of effort not to sink. We heard from a fellow spa-goer that the salt content the weekend before we went was a lot more dense, but that’s apparently something they need to work on getting consistent.
-The movement session: This is perhaps our biggest disappointment, because the wording of the promotional material made it sound like we’d be getting our choice of Pilates, yoga, OR meditation. But, when we arrived we learned that MOVEO has a fixed schedule, so we’d only get to choose from that day’s set offerings. We weren’t the only ones expecting to be able to choose from the three. One of our classmates expressed similar disappointment about taking the “HEAT” session — described vaguely as a class that features drills in agility, speed, power, and stamina — that we all ended up in by default. She had mentally prepped herself for a yoga class and hadn’t even brought trainers along, which would have been ideal for HEAT.
Basically…
Let us give it to you straight. Despite these critiques, the weekend retreats are an amazing deal. You’re getting incredible value for US$45, but we don’t think a day-pass, or even a half-day REMISSO Circuit Pass is worth its full price tag, so, as cheesy as it sounds, we’d say get in while you can.
They usually charge IDR3,150,000 (US$218) for not even a full day, but a half day pass that gives you three-and-a-half hours of access. It includes roughly the same activities as our day-long program: a 60-minute movement session, 30-minute steam or infrared sauna, 60-minute holistic treatment, 30-minute foot cleansing, and a healthy lunch.
For a full day (six hours), they charge IDR5,400,000 (US$374), and that gets you all the same things as the half-day pass, except instead of a 60-minute holistic treatment, they up things to a 90-minute body massage, 60-minute scrub and wrap, 30-minute salt floating pool session or foot cleansing, and 60-minute manicure and pedicure.
Let us remind you that the weekend retreat is only US$45 for eight hours. Let that sink in.
We will point out, however, that if you’re not able to make it in for the weekend promo since you’ve only got three more weekends to get in there before August ends, it might be worth checking out the MOVEO plans.
They offer special rates for Balinese residents and KITAS holders for longer term plans and considering that you get access to the sauna, steam shower, and plunge pools, it seems like a better way to go than getting a spa pass.
You can buy class passes for one, five, or 10 sessions, or choose a 30-day unlimited plan, or even a year unlimited option. These include 10 types of yoga, four types of meditation, Pilates, TRX, and some other specialized classes.
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