For as long as I can remember, I’ve longed to be asleep. Sleep is the most sacred thing we do, and I protect it stubbornly from obligations that might pry me from it. Like my Italian ancestors, I nap nearly every day after lunch—a habit that feels like a rarity in bustling New York City, I’d argue. Yet I can’t say that I ever feel truly rested. In fact, I’m always chasing restfulness, searching for it in upscale pajamas, magnesium lotions and meditation apps that promise of dreamy peace.
As a travel writer and stand-out sleeper, I’ve watched the rise of sleep tourism with a sense of superiority: Couldn’t any tourism be “sleep” tourism if you prioritized sleep over sightseeing, tours, and tastings? (I don’t know what competition I thought I was winning.) Yet on a recent visit to the cliffside Waldorf Astoria Los Cabos Pedregal in Los Cabos, Mexico, for a three-night sleep and wellness retreat organized by the Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card, I realized that all my years of DIY sleep tourism—i.e. simply sleeping a lot while on vacation—had been amateurish. And that maybe I had been missing the point.
Over the course of the retreat, wellness expert and yoga instructor Phyllicia Victoria led sound baths, gentle yoga, and journaling exercises by the whale-flecked sea. The first night, in a candle-lit room alongside blankets and tea, she led my fellow sleep tourists and me in a calming sound bath. Afterwards, I floated back to my room to find an actual bath: atop the deep, filled-up soaking tub sat a tray of calming lavender and rosemary bath salts, a honey-infused face mask, and lavender body oil. To my surprise, the real magic happened in the morning: After a short beachside yoga flow, Bonanno led us in a gratitude journaling exercise, and then spoke about restfulness. Good rest isn’t just something to think about at nighttime, she explained, but also in the morning: How can we set up our days to find moments of rest and release?
“I believe in the duality of life,” Victoria told me. “If you want to sleep peacefully, you have to wake up peacefully as well—one cannot truly exist without the other.” I chewed on the notion that the mornings of a sleep retreat mattered just as much as the evenings. “Allow yourself time to wake up with the sun, gently take in the natural light, and, instead of popping right onto your cellphone, use the time to reflect, journal, slowly sip your tea or coffee, [do] breath work, or even some gentle stretches to start the blood flow to energize you,” she said. “The same way you start your day, you can end it."
The idea that good, restful sleep is not just about being unconscious for the right length of time had me reflecting on my rest-draining daily rituals: some unavoidably tiresome activities, like exercise and work, but also mindless pursuits like picking at my cuticles while spiraling about climate crisis, or watching dozens of Instagram stories at a time before I realize what I'm doing.
Victoria suggested that instead of starting our days checking emails in bed, which deprives us of those sacred extra moments of restfulness, to ease into the day with movement and meditation. This is stuff we do know: That the internet first thing in the morning is not psychologically ideal. But it had never occurred to me that I could better prepare myself for rest throughout the day—the actual “rest” part of rest and relaxation.
Rest and sleep are not exactly the same. In fact, some experts believe that there are seven distinct (though often overlapping) types of rest: physical, mental, spiritual, emotional, sensory, creative, and social. How do we make sure our sleep—and waking hours, for that matter—are restful and restorative? The studying of sleep quality, of which total time asleep is just one part, is a growing area of scientific study. According to the National Sleep Foundation, the biggest markers of sleep quality are sleep latency (how long it takes to fall asleep); amount of awakenings throughout the night and length of time awake; and sleep efficiency, the ratio of time asleep to time in bed: For example, I had work to do on my pre-bed and early morning phone time, not to mention the multiple times a night I awaken and scroll the Philadelphia Eagles Reddit.
Travel can sometimes exacerbate sleep problems. The sentence “I need a vacation after my vacation!” has become a cliche at this point, but for good reason. During supposed leisure time, we run ourselves ragged trying to squeeze every drop of enjoyment, adventure, and relaxation out of trips that we teeter painfully close into joyless territory. It’s why the recent sleep tourism trend has had such staying power, with more hotels offering sleep-related amenities like pillow menus, sleep tracking, and bed sheets coated with infrared-emitting minerals. Travelers are increasingly prioritizing bed time, too. According to Hilton’s 2025 Travel Trend Report, almost half (49%) of travelers say one of the reasons they plan to travel is to rest and recharge, with over 70% of luxury travelers choosing hotels that have sleep-related amenities and features. The survey had data points that actually surprised me: 63% of travelers say they sleep better alone, with 37% preferring to sleep in a separate bed from their partner when traveling. (I would never admit this to my chihuahua, but I was starting to wonder if I felt the same.)
Rather than little pastries or sweets, my turn-down amenities at Los Cabos Pedregal included lemon balm-infused pillow spray and QR codes for Alo Moves sleep meditations, which made throwing my phone in a drawer a little easier. At the spa, I chose between four moon-inspired treatments and landed on the Nourishing Moon, with a honey and jasmine sugar scrub and rose-fragranced massage that melted my muscles and nagging thoughts. After lunch, rather than take my customary post-meal nap, I walked along the ocean, letting the rumbling waves gently replace my brain’s typical soundtrack of nervous chatter.
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To wind down at night, Victoria led us in dreamy sound baths. “Most of us lay in bed with our cell phones still glued to our palms, so we have a lot of thoughts racing in our head about the day we just completed and the day ahead,” Victoria told me. Sound is a powerful tool to counter this mental frenzy. “Sound baths kind of trick your mind with a peaceful distraction of sound. Once you start to focus on the sound and your breath, eventually you let go little by little bit and surrender into a calmer state of being.”
Instead of rethinking sleep, as I’d planned, I discovered true rest. Good sleep begins in the morning, I began reminding myself as I woke up each morning, fighting the overwhelming urge to grab my phone. How can I prioritize rest today? I’d make my way to the balcony with coffee and my journal, taking in the way the sunlight hit the jagged seaside cliffs. But could I bring this energy back home with me, back to my responsibilities and street-level, street-facing bedroom and early-rising chihuahua? Better sleep and rest can all of a sudden feel possible in a brand new, beautiful location, without all the visual cues that spur our mindless habits at home. But I doubted it would last.
I’m still not entirely sure why it took going to Mexico, but in the month or so since I returned home, I have been able to successfully sustain a few habits that I never imagined I could pull off: My phone now goes in a drawer at least thirty minutes before bed. I wind down with an app-aided sound bath and sleep meditation. Most miraculously, I start each morning with journaling: specifically, writing down how I plan to find moments of rest during the day. I’m back to the post-lunch naps, sure: That’s my culture and I can’t change who I am as a person. But I follow them with short, easy floor yoga sequences, coaxing my muscles and racing mind into moments of true restfulness before it’s back to the grind.
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