During my stay at Olhuveli Beach and Spa Resort in the Maldives, I couldn’t resist indulging in a few treatments at the resort’s Sun Spa.

Located near to reception, the spa is an oasis of calm with quaint wooden bridges and walkways over ponds leading to private spa pavilions. The whole area is concealed behind thick vegetation and is bursting with flowers and birdsong – much nicer than my local beautician’s. Here it is quite different…

The spa rooms are stunning. Each pavilion has a toilet and separate changing area and the large covered room has two treatments beds and an open-sided back wall that leads into a private outdoor garden area with fountain, shower, bath tub and lovely plants.

Whilst perusing the spa menu – and there is an impressive choice of massages and treatments on offer – the staff kindly bring some herbal tea to enjoy and are happy to make recommendations. Eventually I opted for the Jet Lag Recovery massage as I was aching a little from the flight. At $70 US this hour-long full body massage was pure bliss - it involved a deep tissue massage using essential oils and a little bit of back and neck cracking which really woke me up and I felt fantastic afterwards! So much so, that I immediately booked in for an Ayurvedic Dosha massage at 6pm the next day.

This is definitely the best time to enjoy a treatment - the sun is setting and therefore you get to hear all the birds singing in the trees which is very therapeutic! I would also highly recommend Santha, my spa therapist, for Ayurvedic massages as she was very firm (without it being painful) and very professional. At $85 US this massage also lasted an hour and involved lots of deep tissue massage and more cracking of the back, neck, shoulders, fingers and toes. I felt as if I could walk on air afterwards!