Photo Chateau Whistler Resort PALM: plants ring ‘the - ‘pool area in the Chateau Whistler Resort's health. spa at the base of tango band play : and tourists ‘a dashing fellow” ¥ nd long silk scarf. “ home to artists and squatters, - while a stroll among the antique shops reveals the detri- tus of Argentine’s lost wealth: Louis XVI furniture (probably reproduction), family silver and enough elaborate chande- “fiers to restock Versailles. Back in Recoleta, the ’ Alvear Palace Hotel in marble and gilt is as stylish as ever, December 21, 1999 <= Escape to Whistler spa north shore news N Timothy Renshaw Managing Editor trenshaw@direct.ca TO quote the band of Monty Python misfits in The Holy Grail: “Run away!” Some challenges warrant that response. Not all are winnable on the bartle field. Stress, anxiety and other rat race-generated foes are not cas- ily put to the sword. Run away, then, corporate warriors. A sweet victory awaits. Destination No. 1 in this Travel/Alternatives series: Whisdler — where stress reiease is becoming a growth industry — and the Chateau Whiseer Resort, where it is becoming a service industry art. Last December, the four- diamond hotel unveiled a new 4,200-square-foot, $1.3 mil- ~ lion wellness and Ayurvedic * treatment health spa adjunct to its existing suite of ste: cai, sauna, weight and exercise rooms. . The brainchild of Sandra Rathwell and Colleen Wight, it although most of the guests seem to be Americans in incentive groups, about the only people you meet in good hotels these days, while at the bar someone is defining an Argentine as an Izalian who speaks Spanish but would like to be an Englishman. I stay for lunch, and as the coffee comes I detect music in specializes in’ holistic healing for battered body and soul, be they corporate business or other. Rathwell and White, both registered massage thera- pists, have. built up the spa con- cept from a single treatment table, nvo-person in-suite busi- ness that operated out of the Delta Mountain Inn 10 years ago to the current 14-treat- ment-room, 64-employee busi- ness it is today. They are riding the crest of the wellness wave that has been building as the new millennium approaches, For the increasing numbers of weary corporate citizens who have chosen to run away for their own good health, the Spa at Chateau Whistler offers an arsenal to be reckoned with.