On a recent cool, cloudy morning, I pulled on my yoga clothes and slipped into my minivan, escaping my kids and the morning rush to try out Dock Yoga at Loews Coronado Bay Resort.
September is the month for “Vinyasa with a View” at the Loews Hotels in California. The four resorts throughout the state each offer a unique spin on a yoga class. Loews Hollywood Hotel is offering what might be the most exciting option: “Helipad Yoga takes place 20 stories up on the hotel rooftop overlooking the famed intersection of Hollywood Boulevard and Highland Avenue, with 360-degree views of greater Los Angeles and the iconic Hollywood Sign.” Also in LA, the Santa Monica Loews Hotel offers Muscle Beach Yoga, and the San Francisco location is participating with Sky Deck Yoga on the 40th floor with dazzling views of downtown, the Golden Gate Bridge, and Alcatraz Island.
As I left the quiet charm of Coronado village and sped down Silver Strand, I could already feel weight lift off my shoulders. By the time I hopped out of my car in the Loews Coronado parking lot, I could taste the salty sea air from the bay just a few feet away.
At the entrance to the hotel, the concierge directed me to the spa, where I found the yoga instructor, Rosie, waiting with her other clients for the morning session. Rosie is a calm, comforting person, the kind you immediately trust, with a soothing voice and quiet leadership. She handed out towels and yoga mats before leading us to the dock for the yoga session.
I have only ever participated in yoga classes in studios with very few windows in urban settings, so taking part in a yoga class outdoors was a new experience for me. The other participants and I laid our mats down on the concrete dock and glanced around at the small boats tied to the pylons and architecturally diverse houses of the Coronado Cays across the bay.
Rosie began to lead us in a 50-minute morning yoga class. I was relieved to find that her style was completely soothing and relaxing, as opposed to challenging or intense. While I have no doubt that she could make me sweat if that’s what I needed from the class, the style of yoga she chose for that morning was stretching, soothing, balancing, calming — in the end I felt like I got a massage as well as a thorough stretching and re-centering.
All was quiet and calm on the dock, with just the sound of the water lapping at the boats, the call of seabirds, and the quiet splash of a kayaker’s paddle as he slid smoothly past the dock.
The session wrapped up, and the class participants and I thanked Rosie as we rolled up our mats and walked up the dock. Rosie assured me that Dock Yoga is a regular occurrence at Loews Coronado, not merely a special event for the month of September.
Dock Yoga classes with Rosie are offered every Tuesday and Thursday morning at 8am, and they are $10 for visitors and complimentary for hotel guests. Other fitness classes — including other yoga sessions and other classes with Rosie — are all listed here on the Loews Coronado Sea Spa website.
