Bill Gates is famous for doing twice yearly 'think weeks' -- he'll retreat to a cottage in the woods and just think about the future.
Gates spends the week completely secluded from civilization– alone with his own thoughts and a pile of thought proposals. The seven days tend to include a lot of reading, a lot of thinking, and a lot of alone time, as Gates is completely disconnected from family members, friends, and employees (despite one exception: a caretaker who slips him two simple meals a day.) Ref: https://thriveglobal.com/stories/bill-gates-think-week/
I'm no Bill Gates, but I'm thinking this isn't exactly a bad idea. I'm trying to put one of these together for myself, but lacking a dedicated cottage in the woods, I'm looking for suggestions on where to go. I think the requirements would be:
- A high end 'retreat' type property -- that means outside the city, and something quiet and peaceful. Beach, mountains, forrest, tundra whatever all probably OK, but no honeymooners shrieking as they zipline through.
- Large, private grounds where you can walk, sit, think, etc.
- At least 2-3 good restaurants on property -- my version of the 'caretaker'.
- Good tech infrastructure (e.g. wifi) -- lacking an 80,000 person company to send me proposals, I'd probably focus on reading blogs from thought leaders, etc. Probably also a business center type thing for printing out documents.
- Adults only? Guess not an absolute requirement, but you don't want kids splashing you while you're on your laptop by the pool.
- Also because I'm not Bill Gates, something reasonably priced on points or cash. That probably means going internationally, but maybe not.
So where? Something like the Maldives I think is out -- not great infrastructure and super expensive. Cabo maybe? Seems super touristy. One of those Arizona retreats, like one of the Hyatt Miraval properties? Beach retreat in Thailand?
Curious if anybody's ever tried something like this, or if you have ideas of properties that might be good.