Spiritual Awakening - Rachel's Passage To India

The Kiwi beauty’s tour of me!

- Emma Clifton

It’s fair to say that for someone who never had a career plan, Rachel Hunter is doing pretty darn well. The Kiwi supermodel, who turned 50 last month, is currently juggling a serious line-up of jobs: yoga and meditation teacher, brand ambassador and now, author.

This month sees the launch of her first book, Rachel Hunter’s Tour of Beauty, based on the first season of the hit TV show which has been screened in 150 countries worldwide since its 2015 debut.

It’s an experience that changed her life and began a love story with India – a country she now spends large amounts of time in. The book acts as something of a bridge between the recent past and present of being Rachel Hunter – how she went from being a judge on New Zealand’s Got Talent to becoming a full-time yoga and meditation teacher.

“It’s the best birthday present,” Rachel says of seeing her book on store shelves. “What an amazing gift that is, and what a celebration it is, after six years of scribbling down notes.”

It makes perfect sense that even for her milestone birthday month, Rachel was on the move. In the week of her birthday, there were no official plans, just a bunch of “mundane, household stuff” as she had a couple of days at her home in Los Angeles before flying to Baltimore to teach a meditation course, then to Bali to lead a yoga retreat, before coming home to Aotearoa to launch the book and meet up with son Liam Stewart, 25, who is playing ice hockey in Queenstown.

Ever since Tour of Beauty, Rachel has lived a nomadic life. Following the death of her beloved mum Janeen Phillips in 2017 after a battle with cancer, without really knowing why, she turned to India. She headed to Rishikesh, which lies just under the Himalayas, to study yoga, even though initially she was questioning herself.