After graduating from high school, Dr. Wolfgang Schachinger travelled with a friend overland on the so-called "Hippie Trail" to India in search of simple answers for a complicated life.

An illness on this journey brought him into contact with Ayurveda for the first time, and immediately after his return he learned Transcendental Meditation in Innsbruck. A short time later, in the summer of 1973, he had his first encounter with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in Seelisberg, Switzerland.

The young medical student Wolfgang Schachinger was enthusiastic about the healing effects of Transcendental Meditation, which he experienced first-hand and observed in many friends. During his medical studies, he trained as a teacher of Transcendental Meditation and regularly gives meditation courses in Tyrol, South Tyrol and Upper Austria.

To improve the health and resilience of meditators, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi began offering Ayurvedic treatments all over the world in the 1980s, with the help of top experts from India. Maharishi set great goals: to achieve a 'disease-free society' with the help of Ayurveda and meditation.

In 1984, the first training courses in Maharishi Ayurveda were held for Western doctors. Until then, such training was reserved for Indians only. Dr Wolfgang Schachinger, who at that time had established his practice as a general practitioner in Ried im Innkreis, seized the opportunity. He was among the first western doctors to receive thorough Ayurveda training.

Even then, he repeatedly had Indian Ayurvedic doctors as guest experts in his practice. Dr. Wolfgang Schachinger made Ayurveda known far beyond the Innviertel region through lectures for medical laymen, patients and for specialist audiences.

In 1993, Dr. Schachinger expanded his practice in Ried into an Ayurveda centre with a comprehensive range of outpatient Pancha Karma Ayurveda cures.

Pancha Karma is a gentle Ayurvedic cleansing cure that helps to restore harmony between body and mind. The healing effects of the individual therapies build logically on each other and complement each other. Through the individual treatment steps, toxins and harmful substances stored in the body (such as: heavy metals or acids) are systematically removed.

One thing was already clear at that time: these cures were very effective. But an in-patient treatment in an Ayurvedic spa house would significantly improve the recovery and regeneration effect of these Ayurvedic cures.

The search for an ideal place for in-patient Ayurveda cures began. Read in our next article how this exciting search went.