$6,000-a-head yoga retreat helps yoga instructor find enlightenment, buy Mercedes

You can’t buy happiness, but you can buy a Mercedes-AMG GT Roadster with heated leather seats. Thankfully, if you’re the organiser of a $6,000-a-head yoga retreat in Costa Rica, you can have both.

Entrepreneurial yoga instructor Rita Clinkenspiel has been running her jungle retreat for less than a year, but she’s already saved up enough to buy a Merc and put a significant dent on the mortgage on her inner-London townhouse. Oh, and she’s like totally achieved enlightenment and all that.

“I feel such a sense of inner peace when I share my yoga knowledge with receptive souls,” Rita told The Tragic Traveller while watching on as a shirtless man named Julio polished her new roadster. “It’s an important reminder that true value lies in here,” she added, pointing to her heart, which was obscured by both her 24-carat gold necklace and her recently siliconised boobs.

Rita has come a long way since learning yoga via a YouTube tutorial in February last year. She’s subsequently read an illustrated book about chakras, completed a $69 online instructor’s course, and learnt the word “asana.” As far as her overly cashed-up clients are concerned, she’s a guru.

“A few people have pointed out that my yoga retreat is quite expensive,” Rita said, wiping her brow with a $100 note. “What they don’t realise is that that price includes a week’s accommodation in an almost entirely cockroach-free resort, plus all the plain rice they can eat. When you factor that in I only make, like, $5,800 per guest.”

At publication time, Rita was relaxing in the “balasana” pose and wondering whether she could get away with charging her guests an extra $50 a day for air-conditioning.