Yoga

In recent years, this fishing town -- and next-wave surf spot -- has turned into a popular rest stop for Inca Trail hikers. Bus ride: $37 The quickest way to reach Máncora, about 700 miles north of Lima, is to hop on one of Lan Peru's twice daily flights from Lima to Piura ($225 round trip); from there, it's about a two-hour cab ride to Máncora ($70). If you have 18 hours to spare, take the Cruz del Sur bus (cruzdelsur.com.pe, $37). Tear your eyes from the dubbed American movies shown along the way and you may spot a dolphin or two frolicking in the Pacific Ocean.

Most of us have experienced those maddening midnight moments when, no matter how tired we are, we either can't fall asleep, can't stay asleep or our sleep is of such poor quality it feels as if we were awake. For anyone who has tossed and turned at night, here's some expert advice for solving nine sleep problems. The night waker Her challenge: After a stressful breakup two years ago, Meredith Crowell, 40, a single real estate property manager and yoga instructor from Boulder, Colorado, would wake up in the middle of the night filled with sadness and anxiety.

Crunches are yesterday's news. Step workouts have hit the floor. And weightlifting has become a heavy load. What are today's celebrities doing to stay in shape? Trying a discipline that goes back hundreds of years: yoga. Madonna performed yoga to help improve her performance (not to mention her flexibility and stamina) for her current world tour. Supermodel Christy Turlington, a longtime aficionado, credits yoga with helping her quit smoking. Director and actor Ed Burns, Turlington's fiance, has tried his hand at postures with names like "downward dog," "warrior one," and "triangle pose.

John Sahakian takes a deep breath, and then his legs become contorted into a complex yoga posture. A few minutes later, his back moves into an arch in the shape of the letter "C. " Sahakian barely lifts a finger, or a leg for that matter. His instructor does the work for him, performing a Thai massage, an ancient technique characterized by lots of contorting and moving, with ironically little work on the client's part. Some people have even called Thai massage (or Thai yoga)

Yoga is catching on as the latest in healthy bonding sessions for mothers and their infant children. n FRINGE MAILnWould you like to receive a weekly summary of Fringe news in your inbox Sign up for Fringe Mail.; The Goodson Parker Wellness Center in New York claims to have given birth to the idea. ; But no matter where the idea originated, it appears to be a hit. ;

Judge Larry Standley is known for his creative sentences. In a recent case, Standley ordered a man convicted of slapping his wife to take a yoga class as part of his one-year probation. CNN's Fredericka Whitfield spoke with him about the unusual sentence. WHITFIELD: Some might say slapping your wife is a serious charge, maybe even borderline abuse. I know this case is very unusual. But it's domestic abuse, and here you hand him a sentence of yoga. STANDLEY: First of all let me explain that there was a plea agreement between the prosecution and the defense attorney.

Gigi reaches up into her sun salutation. She steps back into her high lunge and kicks her legs straight into plank pose, a push-up she holds without wobbling for 10 seconds before looking up impatiently at her yoga teacher. It's close to 6 p.m. She's had a long day. She collapses on her mat, rolls on her back and closes her eyes. And then sends one finger digging up her nose. What? C'mon, she's only 5. This is yoga for kids. Once an oddity reserved for only the crunchiest communities, downward dog for the grade-school set is now being taught in studios from Minnetonka, Minnesota, to Moscow, Russia.

Where can you grab a cold beer from the company keg when the clock strikes four? Where can you take in a yoga class during your lunch hour? And where can you do laundry for free? At work, that's where. Years ago, such generous benefits were better fit for a utopian dream than real workplaces. Nowadays, while competitive salaries and advancement opportunities still rank high on the list of job priorities, lavish perks like posh vacations, gourmet cafeterias and concierge services are inching their way up the importance scale.

Injuries suffered by Madonna during a horse-riding accident mean she will have to stop dancing for several months and take a break from her beloved yoga, medical experts say. She is recovering at home after falling from a horse as she celebrated her 47th birthday on Tuesday. She suffered three cracked ribs, a broken collar bone and a broken hand in the accident. The star was with her husband, film director Guy Ritchie, and her two children when she was thrown from the horse in the 1,200-acre grounds of Ashcombe House, her country residence in the village of Tollard Royal on the Wiltshire-Dorset border.

Here are the fitness offerings from a sampling of major hotel chains: Westin Hotels (Starwood Resorts) ? fitness facilities (free) ? in-room yoga and Pilates instruction via custom TV channel (free) ? in-room stationary cycle or treadmill ($20 extra per room) Hyatt Hotels and Resorts (Grand and Regency) ? fitness facilities open 24 hours (free) ? in-room yoga instruction via On-Command television ($6.99) ? 24-hour concierge will provide exercise clothing for purchase within an hour Marriott Hotels (Renaissance, Marriott and JW Marriott)

Famed Indian yoga guru Baba Ramdev broke his hunger strike Sunday, nine days after it started to protest government corruption. Baba Ramdev broke the fast with some orange juice, said spiritual leader Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, who was persuading the guru to end the strike. Television footage showed the yoga trainer sipping what Shankar said was fruit juice from a steel tumbler. The guru sat on a hospital bed at Dehradun in northern India surrounded by Hindu religious leaders.

Riot police broke up an anti-corruption hunger strike led by India's most famous guru in an overnight night raid in New Delhi, giving fresh impetus to the nation's Hindu nationalist opposition to target the federal government for its handling of graft. A police spokesman said at least 50,000 followers of Guru Baba Ramdev had gathered at the site, but the protest ended only hours after it started. Government ministers holding talks with Ramdev, who is believed to have a massive following, defended the police raid, alleging the yoga trainer had not obtained a permit to carry out a hunger strike.

The idea of leaving your Blackberry behind and switching off all your senses to the outside world is a hard concept for anyone, let alone someone like me who is constantly glued to a stream of twenty-four hour news. Now we've all heard of the raft of day spas that dot most major cities around the world, but how much can we really unwind and find our true inner spirit with a four hour spa treatment? If you truly want to take a stab at disconnecting from the outside world and have the chance to re-center your mind, body and spirit, more drastic measures are probably necessary.

A Colorado man and his son began flying to Nepal on Monday evening to help search for his 23-year-old daughter, who he says failed to contact her family after hiking there alone last month. Paul Sacco says his daughter, Aubrey Sacco, last e-mailed her family on April 20, when she started what was to be a roughly 10-day trek through the Langtang valley region north of Kathmandu. "I want people to see me and know more about my daughter, and feel the urgency that we need to have to search for her," Sacco said by phone Monday about his decision to fly to Nepal.

The cheering was raucous and the applause thunderous for a man who makes few public appearances. As he made his way gingerly across a gravel park, where he had just dedicated a nearly 40-foot statue representing the "Soul of the Earth," a voice shouted out: "I love you, Ilchi Lee." Lee, a South Korean businessman, is the founder of a national chain of yoga and wellness centers called Dahn Yoga. The company teaches that its physical exercises "can restore the vibrations of the body and brain to their original, healthy frequencies," according to a video introduction on its Web site.

Gigi reaches up into her sun salutation. She steps back into her high lunge and kicks her legs straight into plank pose, a push-up she holds without wobbling for 10 seconds before looking up impatiently at her yoga teacher. It's close to 6 p.m. She's had a long day. She collapses on her mat, rolls on her back and closes her eyes. And then sends one finger digging up her nose. What? C'mon, she's only 5. This is yoga for kids. Once an oddity reserved for only the crunchiest communities, downward dog for the grade-school set is now being taught in studios from Minnetonka, Minnesota, to Moscow, Russia.

I don't do dogs and I don't do yoga. Having inherited my mother's abject fear of animals, I try to stay clear of anything with four legs and fur. Yoga is too slow for me. All that breathing and stretching and chanting and centeredness. Boring. I'd rather jump and kick and pump and gasp for air. But my curiosity got the best of me when I discovered that Bideawee, an animal welfare organization in Manhattan, offers a yoga class for dogs -- doga. During the 45-minute session, pooches and their masters give new meaning to the phrase "downward facing dog."

There's the cobra, the cat and the downward-facing dog. Now, the world's largest aquarium is introducing a new animal to complement those centuries-old yoga stances -- the beluga whale. The Georgia Aquarium -- which with 80,000 animals and 8 million gallons of water is considered the biggest facility of its kind -- has begun offering yoga classes in front of the tank that holds its belugas, whose playful nature and graceful movements have made them a favorite of visitors since the aquarium opened in late 2005.

The biggest, baddest, most terrifying part of falling in love is opening up and letting yourself be vulnerable. When it works, love can seem like the stuff of fairytales: you meet someone, you get to know and like each other, you enter into a mutually trusting and respectful relationship, you fall deeply, madly, hopelessly in love, and you live happily ever after. At least, for a while. But all too often it works out less well. Trust is shattered. Hearts get broken. Tears are shed.

Everyone wants to be more physically fit, but the toughest thing is finding motivation -- the motivation to get started, the motivation to keep going, the motivation to push yourself to the next level. Wii Fit doesn't try to motivate you with before and after photos. It doesn't try to motivate you with testimonials from fitness gurus. It doesn't even offer you three easy payments. But it does entice you to get into shape by making working out look like fun. And that it does very well.