Quito’s new Casa Gangotena hotel has announced that it is choosing to “stay close to its roots” by offering guests an exclusive insight into the Andean world which surrounds this World Heritage-listed city via an “Andean energy-equilibrium restoration treatment” that employs herbs, flowers and natural essences, administered by a local expert healer, or limpiadora.
According to Andean Cosmovision, a person’s energy can be blocked by espanto, literally “fright”. The ritual of the limpia, the treatment devised over generations to redress this imbalance performed by older women – limpiadoras – whose knowledge has been passed down from mother to daughter.
The ritual consists of being flicked with stinging nettles (optional) to improve circulation; rubbed with a mixture of 12 types of bitter herbs; massaged with a blend of flowers, roses and carnations; having an egg covered in aromatic essences follow the outline of the person’s body; and finally being swished with six kinds of sweet herbs bound together as a broom, which leave the patient equally relaxed and invigorated.
Quito hotel was recognised in both Travel + Leisure’s “It List” and Condé Nast Traveler’s “Hot List” for 2012.
Casa Gangotena introduces a unique Andean health treatment for its Quito Hotel guests