Spa Trek

Can't face one more hot-stone massage? No desire for another body wrap? For anyone suffering from spa fatigue (and that could be many of us, given that every corner of the planet seems to boast a Thai-style treatment pavilion or Ayurvedic retreat) Kyrgyzstan's Lake Issyk-Kul should come as an intriguing discovery. Or perhaps that should be "rediscovery," since travelers on the Silk Road knew of the lake's therapeutic value for centuries. Soviet apparatchiks were also fond of it, holidaying in one of the 40 workers' sanatoria built by the communist state around the lake's 600 km of shoreline. Today, many of...