4 YOU’LL GO ON A ‘HIBERCATION’

The move towards flexible working has kick-started a whole new travel trend: the ‘hibernation holiday’, or treating yourself to a long break to properly reset. Wellness holiday experts at Health and Fitness Travel have reported a rise in people enquiring after three or four-week trips to long-haul destinations that have largely maintained low Covid-19 rates, like St Lucia and Mauritius. In Europe, Airbnb has seen a spike in demand for month-long stays (with the Algarve, Sicily, Tenerife and Lisbon the most popular destinations), while Balance Holidays, which organises sustainable wellbeing retreats, has pivoted to allow remote workers to stay as long as they like – and have seen interest soar in Italy. On UK soil, Glass House Retreat, a spa and detox centre in Essex, is offering a ‘Work From Our Home’ long-stay package, and the Cornish island of Tresco in the Isles of Scilly is inviting you to open your laptop in front of an ocean view with access to super-fast wifi for weeks at a time. ‘If micro-cations were born from a lack of time, extended stays are the answer to a strained work-life balance brought on by incessant Zooming,’ says Misty Belles, managing director of global public relations at luxury travel network Virtuoso. The change of scene will do wonders for your health and productivity, adds performance psychologist Dr Josephine Perry (performanceinmind. co.uk), but that’s not all. ‘When you go somewhere new, the threat-detecting part of your brain [the amygdala] stays alert until you’ve sussed out your new environs and feel safe – and it’s unlikely you get to that place on a weekend break,’ she explains. ‘Being away for much longer will allow you to fully relax – and it’s in this mode that you’re more likely to be able to use the creative parts of your brain (that get stifled when under threat). This means you’ll work so much more effectively.’