Expedia’s Unpack ’25 report revealed that two-thirds of Australians are planning a holiday to reduce stress and unwind. We explore how immersion in nature can help you escape into restorative bliss.
WORDS Catherine Best
Sinking your toes into the cool sand, the ocean’s song takes you to a calmer place. Your breathing matches the waves’ rhythm, your mind stills, and your body attunes to the sun’s warmth, the breeze’s caress, and the sea’s salty tang. This is therapy in nature. It’s a restorative force with the power to transform. Yet, because of our hyper-connected world, we are conditioned to want more from a holiday. To lust after that 14-night, 10-country European cruise, snap that picture in front of the Taj Mahal, and explore the city that never sleeps.
FOMO (fear of missing out) is real. It’s an unconscious urge that influences how you engage with the world. But it can cause you to return home feeling like you need a holiday to recover from your holiday. If that’s the case, then it’s time to embrace JOMO (the joy of missing out) and unlock the simple pleasures of disconnecting from our everyday noise and hustle and immersing ourselves in nature to reset and rejuvenate. This means choosing ‘soft’ travel – restful experiences that nourish your physical and emotional needs – over prescriptive, too-busy trips designed to light up your Instagram grid.
Brisbane (Meanjin) psychologist Christine Bagley-Jones says taking time out in nature is an elixir for mental health. “I think that it’s quite phenomenal how powerful nature is in terms of being that balm that we need for our nervous system, for our psychological and our physical wellbeing. It’s a recalibration, if you like,” she says. “Immersing yourself in nature might be one of the most effective ways to soften all of your senses and allow yourself to breathe more easily, to calm your thinking and really restore your body.” Bagley-Jones says being in nature creates space to reset away from the daily barrage of stimuli that crowd our consciousness. Simply standing barefoot on grass or feeling sand between your toes can have an immediate physical and psychological impact.
These simple acts kickstart the parasympathetic nervous system, which regulates the body’s resting activities. They can reduce your heart rate, lower your blood pressure and stress hormones, and increase the body’s ‘feel-good’ neurotransmitters, serotonin and dopamine, which are “magic for your mental health”.
Studies show that mindfulness – being present and tuning in to the environment around you – can reduce symptoms of depression and anxiety and improve cognition, focus, memory and resilience.
Bagley-Jones says ‘reset travel’ means different things to different people. Some gravitate towards mountains; for others, it’s the countryside or an escape by the water. However you choose to connect with nature, disconnecting from your everyday life “to allow our brains time to ventilate” is essential. This means avoiding devices, being in the moment, practising meditation and deep breathing, and enjoying unstructured time.
In her book Phosphorescence: On awe, wonder & things that sustain you when the world goes dark, award-winning author Dr Julia Baird writes about nature’s calming benefits. Baird took up ocean swimming during a harrowing time in her life, and later gave a TEDx talk about how experiencing awe and wonder in the natural environment gave her strength: “There’s a burgeoning body of research that shows a shrinking self, which is what happens when you’re exposed to awe and to wonder, can make us stronger, calmer, kinder, more connected,” she said.
She said these moments of awe are not found on screens but rather in sitting beneath a canopy of stars, on a clifftop watching a storm roll in or in a forest of towering trees.
4 UNIQUE WAYS TO RESET IN NATURE
When planning time out, know that little moments in nature can do wonders for your health and well-being. “Even as quickly as half an hour to an hour in nature can reduce our blood pressure, and that’s really good if we want to look after our heart and reduce the likelihood of a stroke. Prevention is better than a cure,” Bagley-Jones says. And when it comes to booking your next holiday? “Always choose JOMO over FOMO and be really proactive around taking that time out because that's where life satisfaction and fulfilment will be.”
1. CHECK-IN TO A WILDERNESS TENT AT SAL SALIS
The quintessential antidote to harried modern life can be found in a canvas cocoon on the shores of Ningaloo Reef. In the dunes above a secluded beach, there are no stressors to draw the outside world in. Nature’s signals measure the days: a blushing sunrise, a bird’s chirp, lengthening shadows on the beach, and a molten sky extinguished by a blanket of stars. There’s limited internet at Sal Salis, so your connections are organic, shared only with a handful of like-minded travellers – and the Earth. And if you find yourself ruminating on work, home, and the daily grind? Nature serves up plenty of distractions, such as black-footed rock wallabies sparring at dawn in Mandu Mandu Gorge, sea turtles playing in the shallows, and humpbacks breaching offshore (from June to November). When (in March through August) you glimpse a whale shark, the biggest fish in the sea, gliding like an underwater constellation against the deep, there is no unease, just awe.
CONNECT with the land in a Sal Salis eco-luxury wilderness tent overlooking Ningaloo Reef.
2. SLEEP WITH THE FISH IN THE UNDERWATER SUITE
There’s an on-site wellness therapist at Reefworld pontoon in the Whitsundays (Ngaro Country). His name is George, and he’s a gentle giant who does his best work in the bedroom (!). George is the resident groper among a profusion of marine life that greets guests when they check in to Reefsuites, Australia’s first underwater hotel. Set four metres below the water and with floor-to-ceiling windows and glass panels on the floor, Reefsuites is the most immersive sleeping-with-the-fishes stay you can have on the Great Barrier Reef.
Turning on the floodlights outside your room and watching as a blizzard of fish swirls in the current by the end of your bed is soul-cleansing. See tiny baitfish sway like wind chime pendants, scattering as you move, and hear the water pop with the sounds of feeding fish. Overnight stays don’t get more mindful than this.
UNWIND to the rhythm of the ocean and a unique dose of vitamin sea on the Great Barrier Reef with a Reefsuite overnight experience.
3. SPEND A NIGHT ON THE SAVANNAH AT MONARTO SAFARI RESORT
Wilderness experiences don’t get more grand or raw than those out of Africa. But what if you could have an African experience on the city fringe? At Monarto Safari Resort, which opened in May 2025, guests sleep safely while surrounded by some of Africa’s wildest animals just 70km east of Adelaide’s (Tarntanya’s) CBD. Check into a Waterhole View King Room where you can listen to the calls of the African wilderness and watch zebra, eland, giraffe, and oryx come to drink. Enjoy your water therapy in the resort pool and, for the ultimate in self-care, book a treatment in the day spa. Surrendering to the calm of a massage as herds of animals roam in the plains beyond is JOMO done right.
REST like a rhino surrounded by the movements and sounds of Africa at Australia’s most iconic safari resort. Be one of the first to experience this rare opportunity.
4. FEEL THE PRIMAL POWER OF THE KIMBERLEY'S HORIZONTAL FALLS
Thundering waterfalls and crashing waves can improve mood and boost wellbeing. Research shows negative ions – nature’s mood-lifters, released when water molecules collide – can also ease anxiety and depression, improve sleep and energy levels and boost respiratory function.
Imagine the health benefits of combining a moving ocean of water with a horizontal cascade created by the force of one the largest tides on the planet surging through a narrow gorge. The Horizontal Falls (Garaanngaddim) are in the McLarty Range, part of Western Australia’s remote Kimberley region. Leave your worries behind as you board a seaplane in Derby and touch down on Talbot Bay’s iridescent waters for the first of four ion-enriched immersive wilderness experiences.
Transfer to a power boat and feel Mother Nature’s might as you navigate the flowing water through the McLarty’s gorges. Be wonderstruck, marvelling at the ancient rock formations on a gentle cruise through Tablot Creek, and become one with the water while swimming in the protected marine-viewing enclosure. Don’t mind the inquisitive tawny nurse sharks; endorphins are good for the soul.
SOAK in nature’s mood-lifter with a Horizontal Falls Luxury Overnight Stay.