From the moment you arrive at Oasyhotel, it’s a full-blown, out-in-the-wild adventure. Reaching the secluded drop-off point in Tuscany’s rugged foothills, you leave your car (and your stresses) behind, before ascending over a thousand metres up the mountain to delve deep into wildlife-filled forests and mirror-like lakes.
The rural rooms are wrapped up within the 1,000-hectare Dynamo Oasis Nature Reserve, where guests come to totally unwind, switch off, and reconnect with nature. Days are spent wild swimming in the floating pool on the lake, canoeing, paddleboarding, playing tennis, hiking or pedalling through the reserve on your designated e-bike. The hotel has thoughtfully marked out four specific routes for keen hikers and cyclists. Every experience is designed to immerse you in your surroundings, including bushcraft activities, cheese-making, and nocturnal wildlife walks with local guides.
Works by renowned artists are displayed in the onsite art gallery, which is housed in the former stables. Anthropologists and environmental writers are invited to discuss the relationship between humans and the natural world with hotel guests during book presentations, art performances, and educational talks throughout the year, and during the hotel’s annual NatureFest weekend.
With just 16 lodges, and an entire nature reserve at your feet, you often feel like you have the place to yourself. We would bike through dense woodland, and not see a single soul for hours (apart from a few cheeky badgers and foxes), which really enhanced the feeling of ‘getting away from it all’.
Food also plays an important role at Oasyhotel. Homegrown and locally sourced produce is championed across two restaurants — one fine dining option near the lodges for delicious (and nutritious) evening fare, and the other tucked away in the mountains. Everything you eat is grown and gathered from within a kilometre of the reserve, from jams and juices to honey, olive oil, and pasta.
As a member of SLH’s Considerate Collection, Oasyhotel is so much more than a place to spend the night. It is part of Oasi Dynamo, a WWF-affiliated nature reserve, which recovered and transformed this former hunting lodge into the protected sanctum it is today. One of the main projects is Dynamo Camp, Italy’s first recreational therapy camp for children living with serious and chronic diseases.
Each summer, the children and their families are hosted completely free of charge. The accessible, nature-attuned activities allow these kids to simply be kids, away from their everyday life and treatments. The programme has been running for 18 years now, and some of the children have gone on to become counsellors at the camp themselves.
Checking into Oasyhotel is restorative and truly good for the soul. Even after my short stay, I left feeling completely recharged, energised, and ready to re-book a visit for the following season.
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