Pangkor Laut Resort, Lumut, Malaysia

A monitor lizard the size of a Komodo dragon saunters out of the jungle and slips into the sea. As I watch in astonishment, the two-metre long creature swims casually away, looking more like a seal than a forest saurian. Pangkor Laut Island off Malaysia's west coast embodies extremes like these, from the primordial — such as this spectacular amphibian — to luxury that verges on the postmodern.

My over-water villa at Pangkor Laut Resort is part of an elegant new Spa Village. Perched high on piers, beautifully formed in dark teakwood and connected to each other by rambling walkways, the 22 Spa Villas collectively look like the kampung of particularly well-off sea gypsies. My villa's beautiful bathroom boasts a tub almost the size of a rowboat, on three sides of which are huge, wide-opening windows, with no-one but the sea and stars peeking in. Definitely a tub built for two. No sea gypsy ever had it so good.

I'm on a mission to sample Pangkor Laut Resort's new spa, so I weave my way along those lovely walkways, above jade waters, beside a shoreline of sea-sculpted granites, past the verges of the island's two-million year-old, never-been-logged rainforest and into the marble calm of the spa. Here, on a Malaysian island in the Indian Ocean things go post-mod.

From a broad array of Asian and other treatments the spa manager, a Hawaiian, suggests for me, an Australian, a massage, Malay-Thai style, which will be done by a therapist, Balinese, who — and so on.

All main treatments begin with the free, signature Bath House Ritual. After bathing my feet my masseur, Ade, gently belts my soles with a light bamboo hammer. Known as Chinese Foot Pounding, I'm told that only the concubines of feudal China previously enjoyed this little treat. The Emperor didn't know what he was missing.

Next, to the segregated Bath House to enjoy a Malay bath — where water cascades over me from a series of raised urns that supposedly represent the mother, wife, sister and daughter in a traditional Malay household, each one honouring dear old Dad with a good drenching. A soap-and-scub, Japanese-style, with a "goshi-goshi" cloth is followed by a dip in a simulated hot spring. Finally, I surrender to an exfoliating Shanghai Scrub. After 40 minutes I am already light-headed with a cleanliness that must surely be next to godliness — and my real treatment hasn't even begun. Time out for cup of herbal tea then into the main event, the Campur-Campur ("mixed") Malay-Thai massage.

It's an old pun, and hardly even a good one, but the medium is the massage. To keep mental notes on a treatment is, for me, to limit it as a medium for release and well-being. Oscar Wilde said, "The best way to cure the soul is through the senses, and the senses through the soul." My soul doesn't feel any great need for a "cure" but, as Ade's massage does its work, I let it — or at least my mind — go for a wander. In this space one can be restored, the stress cracks in our psyches can be healed. Some 90 absent-minded minutes later it is time to return, refreshed, to my senses, with the treatment concluded.

The Indian Ocean laps a wake-up call below my teak floorboards. Morning means breakfast served on the villa's sunny deck, with views stretching from the Malayasian mainland five kilometres away to Pangkor Laut's densely twined jungle. The breadfruit trees, cycads and tall hardwoods of that forest hide hornbills, sea eagles and monkeys. A little way down the shore from our Spa Village the exuberant greenery cedes just enough space for the resort's other structures, which include four excellent restaurants, a gym, reception and 126 accommodation units that range from water villas to beach and garden villas.

"How beautiful God has made this paradise!" Luciano Pavarotti reportedly exclaimed when he visited privately-owned Pangkor Laut Island. Eighty percent of its 120 hectares are untouched and under the philosophy of "one island, one resort" will remain so. For guests this means tranquillity awaits you at almost any point ten paces beyond your villa door. (Tranquillity within it is ensured by no television set, just a CD player, not to mention the ocean and jungle outlooks.) "The only traffic jam I ever had there was a few monkeys on my porch," says former manager Laurent Myter.

Turning my back on the forest's high canopy and hidden orchids — and on the temptations of more angel hair pasta at the Fishermens Cove restaurant — I head again to the spa's beautiful complex of pavilions. The range of programmes that its staff of 16 therapists offers is huge. Chinese, Malay, Thai and Indian traditions are the mainstays although the most popular, according to spa manager Enola Kaneta, is still the Balinese massage.

An Indian Ayurvedic treatment known as Abhyanga is recommended for me. Other than commencing with the wonderful Bath House Ritual, this experience varies from my earlier Campur-Campur session in almost every way. My masseur, a young man from Kerala, directs me to an unusual massage table, a broad, slightly convex neem wood slab with gutters along the sides.

After a good scalp massage he anoints me from head to foot with warm sesame oil in such volume that it is soon obvious why the table needs gutters. With long sweeping strokes — to increase circulation to all parts of the body, I'm told — he bastes me with ever more oil. I'm soon glistening like something ready to be popped in the oven; meanwhile the massage is diligent, the relaxation a real pleasure. The treatment concludes on an even more acute culinary note with a "de-oiling" scrub that sees me coated all over with dahl paste. The paste then combines with the sesame oil to burn like chilli powder, turning my back fiery red. Call me sensitive — call me tandoori — but Ayurvedic obviously isn't for the recipe everybody.

On my last morning at Pangkor Laut I take the short jungle hike across the island's spine to its true gem, Emerald Bay, a pristine horseshoe cove cupped between long, rainforest-clad headlands. Its translucent waters are the colour of their name. Devote what time and attention we may to the finesse or flattery of treatments, to me there is nothing so restorative — healing, if needs be — than the massage of these waters, the forest sounds and silences, the untrammelled light. Welcome to Pangkor Laut's original spa.