From traditional Khmer healing and temple yoga to meditation retreats, luxury spas,Sak Yant, lotus tea and rainforest wellness, discover the many ways to experience wellbeing in Cambodia.
I keep trying to explain Cambodia to people… and I keep failing, because it’s so much more than the temples or food or even the landscape. It’s the people.
There is something about the way people relate to you in Cambodia. They invite you into their world. They want to share things with you. They talk to you, laugh with you and include you. And it’s not just about doing things for tourists. It’s just the way people are. There is an inherent calm and kindness to it that I just haven’t experienced anywhere else.
They seem somehow lighter. There is a warmth and ease to the way people move through their days, a willingness to stop and talk, laugh with a stranger or share something with you. And after a few days, I realised I was feeling it too. I was lighter. More relaxed, more open, less caught up in whatever noise I had arrived carrying.
It’s a strange thing to notice in a country with such a brutal recent history.
Cambodia has lived through things I can barely comprehend, and somehow what it has produced isn’t bitterness… it’s warmth. The Khmer Rouge fell in 1979. So this isn’t ancient history. It’s recent enough that the people who lived through it are still here, raising families, running businesses, driving tuk-tuks and guiding tourists. In Siem Reap, our guide is one of them. Kind, warm and genuinely curious about everyone around him. A few days in, he told us a little about his childhood, the civil war, the genocide and the family he lost. He spoke about it plainly, without asking for anything from us in return, then moved on to the next story just as easily.
He is the exact same age as me. He’s lived through the same decades I have, except his childhood and his memories belong to a reality I can barely fathom. And yet here he was looking after us, content and smiling, and taking a genuine interest in everyone around him. How do you live through something like that and still have so much room for other people? I don’t pretend to know the answer, and I don’t want to turn unimaginable trauma into some neat story about resilience. People’s lives are far more complicated than that.
But I kept thinking about that lightness. Maybe there is something here about wellbeing that I hadn’t understood before. Because wellness in Cambodia doesn’t seem to be confined to a spa menu or a yoga retreat. It is tangled up with traditional healing, Buddhism, food, nature, community and the simple act of slowing down.
That got me curious. Not about some grand Cambodian secret to happiness, because that would be ridiculous, and certainly not about turning other people’s experiences into a lesson for the rest of us. I just wanted to understand what I was noticing.
And yes, there are plenty of places where you can lie down while someone with excellent qualifications rubs expensive oil into you. I’m very much on board with those too. But there are plenty of other ways to tap into that feeling of lightness, from traditional healing and meditation to food, nature, movement and simply giving yourself permission to slow down.
Here are some of the best.
Experience Traditional Khmer Healing with a Kru Khmer
If you want to get properly into the Cambodian idea of wellness, start with a Kru Khmer. Kru Khmer are traditional Cambodian healers whose knowledge has been passed down through generations. Their work can encompass herbs and traditional remedies, massage and physical healing, as well as the spiritual and ritual side of wellbeing.
Admittedly, to Western sensibilities, Cambodian wellness can get a little woo, as traditional Khmer medicine doesn’t necessarily make the same distinction between the physical and spiritual worlds that Western medicine does. Herbs, massage, ritual, blessings, beliefs about spirits and ideas about balance can all sit within the same understanding of healing.
But I find it fascinating. This isn’t some modern wellness trend that’s been given a Khmer name and slapped on a spa menu. Traditional Khmer medicine is part of Cambodia’s cultural history and is still practised today.
And while Kru Khmer is uniquely Cambodian, the ideas behind it aren’t. The belief that wellbeing comes from looking after the whole person, using natural remedies, caring for the body and paying attention to what is happening beyond the physical is something you find in healing traditions all over the world. Maybe that’s part of why it still feels relevant.
Around Siem Reap, there are cultural experiences where you can learn about traditional medicine, magic and animist beliefs, and if you want to experience Kru Khmer healing for yourself, Mahalaya Spa at Angkor Grace offers it as part of its treatment menu. The spa describes it as a combination of herbal remedies, therapeutic touch and spiritual practices. Sokunthea Vuthy, who manages the spa, has more than 20 years’ experience in wellness and has trained in Kru Khmer massage. Now, Angkor Grace is a luxury wellness resort, so this isn’t exactly the village-healer experience. But I like that you can book a treatment with someone whose practice and training are documented.
If you’re genuinely unwell, obviously see a doctor. But if you’re interested in Cambodia’s traditional culture, experiencing Kru Khmer healing gives you a glimpse into a completely different understanding of wellbeing.
Try Traditional Cambodian Cupping
Cambodian wellness isn’t all herbal teas and meditation cushions. Traditional bodywork has its own history too, and cupping is part of that.
Cupping uses heated cups placed on the skin to create suction. The result is a collection of perfectly round red or purple marks that can leave your skin looking like it’s taking fashion advice from Minnie Mouse. They can hang around for several days, so perhaps don’t schedule this one immediately before your beach holiday.
It is traditionally used alongside herbal remedies and massage within Cambodian healing, rather than being treated as a standalone spa treatment. The idea is generally to release what is considered excess “air” and restore balance in the body.
I find this side of Cambodian wellness particularly interesting because it feels very different from the increasingly polished version of wellness we’re used to seeing in hotels and spas. These are practices that have existed as part of everyday Cambodian life, passed between generations and used alongside other forms of traditional healing.
If you’re into sporting big-arse polka dots for a few days, go for it. Just make sure you’re seeing a reputable practitioner who knows what they’re doing. In Phnom Penh, Sâmata Medical & Spa offers cupping alongside its other medical and wellness treatments.
Try a Traditional Khmer Herbal Compress
Herbal compress massage is one of those wonderfully old-school Cambodian treatments where someone steams a bundle of herbs and then presses it over your body while they massage you. Traditional herbal medicine has been part of Cambodian healing for generations, and I like that this feels like an actual piece of that tradition rather than something invented to make a spa menu sound exotic.
Depending on the practitioner, you might find those bundles packed with plants, herbs and spices, often including things like lemongrass, ginger and kaffir lime. They smell fantastic and the heat gets right into your muscles. The experience is part massage, part herbal treatment and part wondering why you haven’t done this before.
In Siem Reap, Sra Thnam is a good place to try it, with treatments rooted in traditional Khmer healing and herbal preparations.
Get a Jap Sosay Khmer Massage
If you’ve had Thai massage, traditional Khmer massage will feel familiar, but it has its own style. In Phnom Penh, Cholsa Spa offers traditional Khmer massage uses firm pressure, stretching, acupressure and kneading, and you stay fully clothed rather than being slathered in oil.
It’s a more physical treatment than the floaty resort-spa version of massage, with the therapist working through muscles and joints to ease tension and get everything moving again. After all the herbal compresses, cupping and coining elsewhere in this list, it felt like a pretty good idea to try the Cambodian massage that started the conversation.
Just don’t expect to lie there peacefully contemplating your life. Traditional Khmer massage is hands-on, stretchy and occasionally the sort of experience where you wonder whether your body was flat packed by IKEA and previously assembled without instruction or an Allen key.
Do Yoga at an Angkor Temple
Yoga isn’t exactly a Cambodian invention, but doing it in a Siem Reap jungle temple is a pretty good way to make it feel at home here. Sacred Sunrise: Private Temple Yoga in Siem Reap takes you to a secluded wooden platform beside one of the Angkor temples, with jungle-clad Preah Khan and Prasat Kravan among the possible locations. The private Hatha session runs from 6am to 8am, with transport, mats and props included and no mirrored walls, traffic or air-conditioning. Just ruins and the sounds of Cambodia waking up around you. Wellness doesn’t get much more rooted in place than that.
Aum Yoga Center takes the idea even further with its Cultural and Wellness Retreat, which includes an early-morning trip into the Angkor jungle to explore temples such as Ta Nei, a silent walking meditation through the forest and a standing yoga sequence in a temple clearing. And after all that downward dog, there’s breakfast.
There’s something about stretching and breathing surrounded by ancient stone, towering trees and birdsong that makes a yoga studio feel a little underwhelming.
Try Traditional Cambodian Coining
One of the more unusual traditional healing practices you’ll come across in Cambodia is coining, or kors kyal. It comes from the traditional belief in “wind illness”, where an imbalance or blockage of wind in the body is thought to cause things like headaches, colds, fevers and muscle aches. The treatment involves rubbing a coin firmly over oiled skin, usually along the back, shoulders or chest, until the skin becomes deeply red. The marks can look pretty dramatic, sometimes leaving bruising that makes it appear as though you’ve been in a fight with a very determined vampire. But coining isn’t some strange relic pulled out for tourists. It is part of traditional Cambodian healing and something many people have grown up with. The practice has its own logic within Khmer medicine, where the body isn’t necessarily understood in quite the same way as it is in Western medicine.
Of course, I tried it and, in fact, liked it enough that I bought one of the little coin device thingies they use and brought it home with me.
Enjoy Sunrise Meditation with a Buddhist Blessing
Get up (very) early and head out through the countryside to Phnom Krom, a 10th-century hilltop temple overlooking the countryside around Siem Reap.
The brilliant folk at InsideAsia arranged a sunrise meditation for my son and me, led by Nina, a meditation teacher who set us up with yoga mats and cushions overlooking the countryside. The meditation itself was very much in the Western mindfulness tradition, all about sitting quietly, focusing on your breathing and trying to persuade your brain to stop racing off in seventeen different directions.
My son succumbed to the incredible relaxation almost immediately. My brain had other plans. But sitting up there as the sun came up, with the countryside spread out below us and the day barely getting started, made it considerably easier to be still for a while.
We then wandered through the sacred temple ruins before heading to a small contemporary pagoda, where a Buddhist monk performed a private blessing ceremony for us, wishing us good health.
It was a world away from the yoga mat. There was chanting and ritual, and suddenly we had moved from Western mindfulness into something much more deeply rooted in Cambodia’s Buddhist tradition.
I loved the combination and walked away feeling genuinely calmer than when I’d arrived, with that slightly tingly feeling you get when you’ve experienced something you couldn’t really have recreated anywhere else.
Maybe that’s part of the secret. You can bring your own ideas about wellness to Cambodia, but there is always something here that makes you slow down and see it a little differently.
Go Forest Bathing at Phnom Kulen
There’s something particularly good about getting your wellness from a forest rather than a treatment room. At Phnom Kulen, we started at Preah Ang Thom, stopping for a blessing at the temple (because apparently you can never have too many blessings), then followed our amazing InsideAsia guide straight into the jungle. And I mean literal jungle. No neatly marked wellness trail or carefully landscaped garden, just narrow tracks through thick forest, getting wilder with every turn. For a while, I felt like the Cambodian Tarzan. I should have been carrying a machete.
The trail eventually led us to a waterfall, where we could cool off in the water and sit surrounded by jungle. After the heat, the swim felt bloody fantastic, but there was something else about the whole thing. The walking, the shade, the sounds of the forest and the complete absence of anything remotely resembling a schedule made it incredibly restorative.
It reminded me of forest bathing (shinrin-yoku), although there was nothing particularly polished or Japanese about it. This was Cambodia doing what Cambodia does best: temples, jungle, water, a local guide and a few hours delving through the bush and connecting with nature. Because sometimes a yomp through the forest followed by a swim is enough.
Get a Blind Massage in Cambodia
In both Phnom Penh and Siem Reap, social enterprises train and employ visually impaired massage therapists, offering skilled massage from people who really know what they’re doing.
This isn’t a token wellness experience where the feel-good part comes at the expense of the massage. The massage is good. Really good. You lie down, hand over your aching shoulders and let someone who knows exactly what they’re doing sort you out.
But the massage is only part of why I think this is such a worthwhile wellness experience. There is something genuinely satisfying about knowing your money is helping create opportunities and independence for someone else. You’re paying for a skill, for someone’s time and for work they are very good at doing. That feels good in itself.
In a country where opportunities for people with disabilities can be limited, businesses that create real employment can make a meaningful difference. And I think there is an emotional side to wellness that we sometimes forget. Feeling better because someone has worked the knots out of your shoulders is one thing. Feeling good about where your money has gone is another.
In Phnom Penh, try Tath Nika Shiatsu and Anma Massage Center, and in Siem Reap, the senses – blind massage or Angkor Seeing Hands Massage By Blind
Find Inner Peace at Cambodia’s Temples and Monasteries
You don’t necessarily need to sit down for a formal meditation session to get that feeling of calm in Cambodia. Sometimes you just need to find a temple and stay there for a while. We spent time at temples around Siem Reap that were nothing like the busy Angkor sites. There were monks moving quietly through the grounds, people coming to pray and enormous old trees throwing shade across the ruins. Nobody seemed to be in much of a hurry.
At Angkor, the scale is enough to stop you in your tracks. At the smaller temples and monasteries, it is the quiet that gets you. These are places where people have been coming to pray, make offerings and contemplate for generations, and you can feel that even when there isn’t another tourist in sight. I found myself slowing down without really deciding to. Looking up at the trees. Listening to the birds and the occasional bell. Sitting for a few minutes simply because there was nowhere else I needed to be.
Maybe these places are sacred for a reason. There is something about spending time somewhere that has been set aside for reflection and prayer for generations that makes it easier to put down whatever you arrived carrying, even if only for a little while. It is surprisingly difficult to feel stressed when you’re sitting beneath an enormous ancient tree with a temple disappearing into it.
Embrace the Woo with Alternative Therapies in Cambodia
For my woo girls, woo boys and anyone else who is perfectly happy to lie down in a darkened room while someone makes beautiful noises with rocks, Cambodia has you covered.
You’ll find crystal singing bowls, sound baths, Reiki, chakra balancing, energy healing, breathwork, meditation and all manner of treatments involving herbs, crystals, oils, incense and things I probably can’t pronounce. You can take it as seriously as you like.
In Siem Reap, Aum Yoga Center runs Yoga Nidra with crystal singing bowls, including a Friday evening session you can drop into without signing up for a retreat.
And if you want to take things further, there’s the Amazing Grace Crystal Sound Temple, a dedicated sound-healing centre where crystal bowls are very much the main event. It is also the venue for the 2026 Global Crystal Bowl Symposium, happening in October 2026, so apparently this is serious business. I have absolutely no idea what a ging does to my energetic frequency. But I can get behind lying down in a darkened room while someone makes beautiful, slightly otherworldly noises for an hour.
Drink Lotus Tea at a Lotus Farm
I am quite literally obsessed with lotus. They are my favourite flowers, so much so that I grow them in pots on my balcony. They are beautiful, obviously, but I also love what they represent in Buddhism. They grow out of mud, rise above the water and produce something beautiful, yet the flowers are fleeting. That combination of strength and impermanence really gets me.
So when I found myself at Lotus Silk Farm in Siem Reap, surrounded by lotus ponds, snacking on lotus seeds and slurping lotus tea, I was pretty much in my happy place. The seeds are packed with protein, fibre, magnesium and potassium, so I was also able to tell myself I was being virtuous while stuffing my face.
The farm makes its tea by putting oolong tea inside a living lotus flower overnight, so it takes on the flower’s flavour. Lotus tea is also traditionally used in Cambodia for medicinal purposes, including digestion, metabolism and sleep. In fact, I’m sucking on it now while I write this.
Other parts of the lotus are used too, with the flowers, leaves, seeds and roots finding their way into food and traditional remedies. Which is part of what I love about the lotus. There seems to be almost nothing this bloody plant can’t do.
Go on a Meditation Retreat in Cambodia with a monk
Everything else in this list nudges your wellbeing in some way, whether that’s through a blessing, a treatment, a swim under a waterfall, good food, time in nature or simply doing bugger all for a while. A Buddhist retreat gives you the time and space to bring all of that together, without the usual noise and without anywhere else to be.
This is obviously a rather different proposition from having a massage between temple visits. You are there to actually stop. To sit. To listen. To observe your own brain doing its ridiculous wandering, with 100 voices all apparently wanting a turn (OK, that may just be mine). And to potentially discover, once you’ve quietened everything else enough to hear it, that it has considerably more enlightening things to say.
In Siem Reap, Hariharalaya runs six- to 16-day yoga and meditation retreats that combine daily practice with a digital detox, workshops, plant-based meals and time to properly switch off. There are also distinctly Cambodian elements, including an Angkor Wat sunrise meditation and a Buddhist monk water blessing. It’s a very different proposition from a formal monastic retreat, but that’s part of the appeal. You can spend a few days actually slowing down without having to disappear from the world completely.
For those wanting to explore the Goenka tradition, Dhamma Kamboja in Kampong Cham runs residential 10-day Vipassana courses based on anapana and vipassana meditation, noble silence and donation-based costs rather than a price tag. And at Blue Indigo, on the banks of the Mekong in Kandal Province, you can opt for something shorter. Its three-day, two-night Buddhist meditation retreat is rooted in the Vipassana Theravada tradition, with daily meditation sessions exploring mindful breathing and sensation awareness. There’s also monk-led guidance, vegetarian meals and the option to take part in a traditional Buddhist blessing ceremony, with Anapana sati and Vipassana meditation forming the heart of the program.
Seaside Spa Days and Wellness Retreats in Kep
Can you have wellness without surrendering your entire holiday to it? Absolutely. The coastal town of Kep is particularly good for this. You can have the spa, the yoga, the meditation and the beautiful surroundings without committing to a week-long retreat where you’re expected to find yourself before breakfast.
Samanea Beach Resort & Spa is a great place to start. Reccomended by our fabulous friends at InsideAsia, it is set in a botanical park on the coast, its Mangrove Spa & Wellness, nestled nonchalantly in an actual mangrove, runs yoga and meditation sessions alongside its treatments, so you can join in when you feel like it and ignore the timetable when you don’t. There is something particularly nice about doing a yoga session surrounded by tropical greenery, then going for a swim or simply lying around doing absolutely nothing.
And Kep itself makes it easy to balance the wellness stuff with, well, an actual holiday. Spend the morning getting a massage or sitting quietly by the water, then wander around town, explore the Crab Market or make the trip up Phnom Bokor into the mountains.
This is probably my preferred level of commitment. A little yoga. A massage. A swim. Some time by the ocean. Then bugger off to the Crab Market for a very large plate of pepper crab.
Enjoy Luxury Spa and Wellness in Cambodia
If money is no object and your idea of wellness involves beautiful architecture, private pools, personalised treatments and someone appearing with a cold towel before you’ve even realised you’re hot, there are plenty of Cambodian retreats ready to add a little extra schmancy to the fancy.
At Metta Residence & Spa in Siem Reap, Visakha Spa has treatments inspired by Khmer traditions, including its 140-minute Visakha Heritage Ritual with a floral foot ritual, Khmer herbal body scrub and traditional Khmer massage. At the time of writing, the spa is closed for restoration, so check its website before planning a visit.
Then there’s Amansara, for people who would like their wellness served with a side of serious luxury and a whole lot of Angkor. Its wellness experiences include monk-led forest walking meditation and a ritual water blessing at a remote Buddhist pagoda.
And if a private villa on a private island sounds more like your idea of wellness, Song Saa Private Island in the Koh Rong Archipelago builds its wellbeing programme around nature, mindfulness and connection, including Saraan Sanctuaries based on the Buddhist concept of metta, or loving kindness.
This is wellness for people who don’t want to know what anything costs. I’m not judging. I’d quite like to be one of those people.
Experience Rainforest Wellness at Shinta Mani Wild
© Shintamani Wild 2017
Shinta Mani Wild is where Cambodia stops mucking about. The ultra-luxury camp sits inside a private reserve in the Cardamom rainforest, with just 15 tents designed by Bill Bensley and strung along a river below a set of waterfalls locals call the Raging Sisters. You arrive by zipline, 400 metres of it, straight over the canopy, which is either the least relaxing start to a wellness stay imaginable or exactly the kind of jolt that makes you actually arrive in your body instead of just checking in.
Wellbeing here isn’t a spa menu bolted onto a luxury stay. It is the rainforest. There are stone foot massages by the river, facials in your tent with nothing but the sound of the water outside, full-body scrubs at the base of a waterfall and yoga in the forest at sunrise. There’s no wifi worth mentioning and nowhere else to be, so the usual noise falls away almost by accident.
And there is another kind of wellbeing running underneath all of it. Bensley reportedly outbid a logging company for the 99-year lease on the land, and every stay at the camp helps fund rangers who patrol the reserve against poaching and illegal logging. So you’re not just disappearing into the rainforest for a few days. Your stay helps protect the place you’re there to enjoy. Honestly, it’s much easier to let go when you know your holiday is helping look after the place you’ve come to see.
Get a Traditional Cambodian Sak Yant Tattoo (but only if you mean it)
This one is not for everyone but while the sunrise yoga and the blessing were about calming the body and quieting the mind, getting a Sak Yant was about spiritual wellbeing, and I think that’s a part of wellness we sometimes leave out. We talk about looking after our bodies and our mental health, but feeling connected to something bigger than ourselves, having a sense of purpose and doing things that have meaning matter too. For me, this was all of those things wrapped into one very small, slightly owie tattoo.
I’ve been toying with the idea of a Sak Yant tattoo for around 20 years, since my first visit to Cambodia. I’ve returned multiple times, spent days loitering around temples, listened to monks, looked at designs, researched their symbolism and thought about it more times than I can remember. But I’m not really the tattoo type. Until I was.
A Sak Yant is a traditional sacred tattoo associated with spiritual protection, blessings and particular qualities or intentions. The designs have meaning, and the ritual is part of the experience.
So no, this wasn’t a case of seeing a pretty tattoo on Instagram and thinking, yep, I’ll have one of those. I’m Buddhist leaning, and Buddhist ideas around compassion, mindfulness, impermanence and karma are an intentional part of my everyday life. And yes, I’ve read the Dhammapada several times. Thanks for asking.
For me, it was about the meaning, the ritual and the connection to something that already sits comfortably within my own belief system. And it had to be Cambodia, a country I’ve thought of as my spiritual home for more than 20 years and to which I have strong and deeply personal ties.
I also thought carefully about cultural appropriation. I didn’t turn up with a Pinterest board and ask for a pretty design because I liked the way it looked. I was invited into the practice by a proper achar (master), who took the time to understand why I wanted it and what mattered to me, and let him determine the design. Me. Someone who is spectacularly indecisive and a bit of a control freak letting someone else choose what was going permanently on my body. Honestly, who even was I?
But that was kind of the point. Sak Yant is a living Cambodian tradition, not a decorative style, and I wasn’t treating a sacred practice as a collection of pretty symbols to borrow. I was taking the time to understand what I was participating in, why the designs have meaning and what the ritual represents. Whatever you believe about the protective power of a Sak Yant, there is something powerful about approaching a tradition with respect, rather than stripping away the meaning and keeping only the aesthetic.
The whole thing might sound slightly woo if you’re not inclined that way. The prayers, sacred geometry and belief in spiritual protection certainly aren’t everyone’s cup of tea. But it resonated with me. After 20 years of thinking about it, I wasn’t there for a souvenir or a fashion statement. My Sak Yant is small and private. It’s something I did for me.
Yes, it hurt. But I’m very glad I did it.
Donate Blood at Angkor Hospital for Children
If there’s one thing on this list that matters more than the rest, it’s this one.
I’ve spent a lot of time talking about your wellbeing (and mine). Your body, your mind, your stillness, your spiritual life and your pleasure. But other people’s wellbeing matters too.
Angkor Hospital for Children in Siem Reap asks visitors to donate blood to support children receiving treatment there. There’s no spa treatment at the end of it, no photograph for Insta and no great travel story to tell. You simply roll up your sleeve and give something that another person genuinely needs.
And I think that’s an important part of wellbeing too. Remembering that you’re not the only person in the room whose health, happiness and ability to get through the day matters.
Cambodia is healing
The more time I spend in Cambodia, the less convinced I am that wellness is something you can neatly package. It might be traditional healing, a monk’s blessing, a few hours sitting quietly in a temple, lotus tea or doing absolutely bugger all beside a pool in Kep. It might be a Sak Yant you’ve yearned for for 20 years or lying on the floor while a crystal bowl rings above your head as you wonder what the hell is happening and absolutely loving it.
But sometimes it is none of those things. Because, at least for me, it is simply Cambodia. The temples, the food, the rivers, the sea and, of course, the people. Perhaps that’s what wellbeing is really about. Coming to a place, connecting with its people and culture, and leaving a little lighter mentally, physically and spiritually than you arrived.
So go. Stay another night. Take the tuk-tuk. Hire the guide. Pay the massage therapist. Buy the lotus tea (and send some to me). But most of all, do what works for you. And give a little back while you’re there.
An award-winning travel writer and photographer, Aleney de Winter was fresh from school when she first set off to explore the far reaches of Australia with a two-man tent and a beaten-up Kingswood for company. Three decades, and two kids later, and she's still on the go, with her itchy-footed offspring in tow. 