etreat, rejuvenate, revitalise and relax are just a few of the "r's" of the Willow Stream Spa at the Fairmont Southampton.

The treatments are many and not one of them lasts for less than an hour, as the spa's motto is, "with everything worthwhile, there are no shortcuts to an outstanding spa experience".

Willow Stream Spa lead body technician Shelley Fortnum spoke to about some of the many experiences that the establishment had on offer and of her personal path.

The Willow Stream Spa features 15 treatment rooms, heated pool, Jacuzzi, a gym, salon, male and female lounges, the couple's lounge and a host of other tempting delights.

Talking about some of the Tara treatments Ms Fortnum said: "We have two other treatments, which are not seasonal and they stay in the menu all year. They are the Tropical Essentials, which is lovely, and Jet Lag Recovery, which is really nice too.

"We also do a Jet Lag Massage, and that is using essential oils to specifically try and revitalise you. Then we have another line called Kerstin Florian, who initially had a salon on her own and then she began making beauty products. Now she is just products.

"She is neat because she is into a lot of facial stuff, but then we have a lot of body treatments. One is the Spirulina Wrap and the other is the Mud Wrap.

"Spirulina is an algae and I take it orally as a supplement and it is big in the health food world - they say it has the closest amino acids per protein that the body needs."

Of the Spirulina Wrap treatment, she said: "When you have the algae all over you it really detoxifies and is revitalising as well because it feeds right into the system.

"You then have a bath and a massage treatment after. I love that treatment, you feel really good after that. They do it all over France, but they don't do it as nice as we do - they paint you with a paintbrush and leave you for a while. So those are really nice treatments."

They also feature massages with stones, stress relief, scrubs and the Vichy scrubs. "Some people will call those (Vichy Scrubs) a rain shower, but it is five shower heads that just rain down on you and you get a scrub," she explained.

"We then have the Energy and Balance products, which come from a different company, Warren Botanicals. Whenever they have a new product Anne McCall, who is the head of corporate Willow Stream, introduces you to the person that created them and you feel connected to the person who is actually making the products.

"She (Ms McCall) met Sharon Warren, who lives in a tree house in Hawaii, and apparently it is no kiddie tree house, it has waterfalls running through it and is absolutely amazing. She has her own line, but she blended two lines for Willow Stream, Energy and Balance.

"It is a scrub and a treatment and is similar to the Total Adjustment. The energy line is everything that we use in our locker rooms, like the shampoos and they are lemon grass and sandalwood and that is a revitaliser treatment."

Ms Fortnum was trained to administer the above treatments, but she said: "I was somewhat so-so about it, but then I got such a big response from it.

"I think it is because you scrub with a bowl, like a file method, and then you are gommaging the body constantly... people who have had it say they feel like they have been really pampered in a sort of decadent kind of way."

In the salon there is a whole facial line, she added.

"But I deal with the body treatments, but we do have some really nice facials.

"They have a whole array of scalp massage and treatments, neck wraps, hair treatments, full pedicures, neck massages, manicures and head massages."

But if the thought ever crossed your mind as to what makes a lead body technician, Ms Fortnum shared parts of her personal journey.

"After Hurricane Fabian we were offered casual labour, but we all went off in our separate directions, so that was a big crunch and I thought 'what do I do, do I just go down the road and get a job?'

"So I decided to go to California and I always wanted to go over there and study yoga ? so I did with a woman called Shiva Rea and Sherry Brourman.

"I just did yoga every day and I was studying tons. I was living in Santa Monica, and LA gets a bad rap, but with it's superficiality it is also has an incredible amount of amazing people. It has an amazing balance."

Shiva Rea, she said, "is quite a famous yoga teacher now".

"She was initially an ashtanga yoga teacher and now she is teaches vinyasa flow yoga. She is one of the more prominent ones in the States and I was sceptical at first and I am always sceptical of anyone. I thought, 'I am going to study with this person and she is supposed to be really great. But is she?'

"At first I really couldn't quite get her, she was in and out of LA, flying here and there, to England doing workshops and she'd walk right into the studio and be like, alive. And I thought, 'how is she doing that?'

"She was basically living Ayurvedic, her husband James Bailey is an Ayurvedic doctor and they live a totally Ayurvedic lifestyle, they eat all these fresh things, and they are very respecting of lifecycles and nature.

"In the Spa, we do spa ayurvedic, but we are treating only seasonally, not individually and we are not ayurvedic doctors. But for them they are living it in full down to the personality they are. Actually when Shiva travels, she chops up her veggies, she takes her little cooker and makes her ayurvedic foods, so that doesn't change and that makes a big difference."

While there she did some courses with them and they invited her into their home.

"So I ended up studying with her and her husband about basically doing a course in Ayurvedic and how to incorporate it into your life. That was really my first look at the inside of Ayurvedic, although in 1998 I had been to India, where I did my yoga training, and I visited some Ayurvedic hospitals, but I didn't have quite the same understanding of it until going and studying with her.

"So that just got my interest going and then when I heard that we were flying Tara (Grodjesk) (Tara Spa Therapy Inc.) in, who is an amazing lady and she and I just clicked because we were into the same thing.

"Tara had done a three year degree programme with Dr. Vasant Lad at the Ayurvedic Institute, and she was the one who created our Tara line."

Continuing on the path of enlightenment, Ms Fortnum went to Albuquerque, New Mexico to do a course herself with Dr. Lad.

"I went and did a course with him in April and he was such an amazing being and he is so dedicated to Ayurvedic," she said.

"Ayurvedic has an incredible respect for each one individually and that is why I love it because it respects everyone for who they are on every level, emotionally, physically, spiritually.

"If someone gets hot and flustered then they'd say that's because her pitta is up and I think that is so sweet because we are so quick to judge people.

"I did an Ayurvedic course on how to heal emotional and psychological trauma, which was pretty amazing."

She then got treatments herself, by Dr. Lad's right-hand-man.

"I had been craving carrots like crazy for days ? it is an odd thing to crave ? and I had never craved carrots in my whole entire life.

"I walked in and he read my pulse and he said, 'you have been craving carrots.' He gave me some treatments and gave me some herbs."

But what she didn't know was that the results of a recent MRI for problems with her back.

"I went to the Ayurvedic in May and he gave me a bunch of herbs, which weren't exactly nice tasting, but I got used to them. I also had oils that I rubbed into my feet at night and a tea I took twice a day," she said.

"I did that for probably about a month-and-a-half to two months. He told me that there were probably issues around my reproductive organs, but I hadn't received the results back from my MRI until much later on.

"But they told me that I had suspected cysts, suspected fibroids and an enlarged uterus. So I went for the ultrasound in July after that and they said there was absolutely nothing to report.

"I don't know if this was the reason why it happened, but it certainly got my curiosity going and if something serious happened to me I would seriously consider going to the Ayurvedic Institute."

One of the treatments that the Spa offers is the Tara Ayurvedic Treatment, which is called The Total Adjustment.

"It is neat because it was just connecting me even more into what was doing in my own life," she said.