The first months of the year are a great time to rest body and mind before beginning to get back into shape for those beach days ahead. Lucky for us, we have a wonderful selection of spas to choose from along both coasts to help us catch up on some well-deserved TLC.
Hotel Almenara – Sotogrande
The Almenara is one of my all-time favourite spas. Being an Elysium Spa, you are guaranteed quality and exclusivity with a great hydrotherapy circuit to help you unwind before sampling a truly fantastic massage or facial. Unlike other spas, the use of the circuit is free when booking a treatment, so make sure to take advantage of this great feature. I visited last year with my sister as a graduation treat, for some much-needed relaxation after a busy final year at University. Given that it was a bank holiday weekend, we expected it to be busy, but upon arrival we discovered that we had the whole place to ourselves, making the experience more special than just your average spa.
Based at one of Sotogrande’s top golf courses, you can enjoy the extensive pool overlooking the hotel’s outdoor swimming pool surrounded by beautiful greenery, the perfect place to unwind. Within the Jacuzzi pool are powerful jets to stand under to release the tension of day-to-day life, and leave your back and shoulders feeling relaxed again.
In addition to the standard treatments of massages, facials, manicures and pedicures, the spa also offers a range of endermologie treatments, to ensure that your skin is at its peak condition, improving tone and radiance, aiding circulation, and reducing the appearance of cellulite. With Valentine’s Day coming up, be sure to treat your loved one to a couples massage, available in their double treatment room.
Stay at the hotel for a romantic weekend to also take advantage of the impressive 27-hole golf course, split into three nine-hole circuits, aiming for a hole-in-one before heading to the club’s impressive ‘Veinteocho’ terrace upstairs. Here you can enjoy the outstanding views and beautiful weather while sampling some delightful international cuisine washed down with your favourite tipple.
La Bobadilla Royal Hideaway Hotel Spa – Granada
This fantastic spa not only offers services to help you relax and unwind, but it also focuses majorly on health, wellness and beauty. With many ways to work out in the spa’s onsite fitness studio, you can start your visit by breaking into a sweat using weights, an elliptical trainer, bicycle, or just sprint it out on the treadmill. Cool down with a shower and jumping into the spa circuit, which has many water features on offer, including the swim current generator, contrast shower circuit, dynamic pool and Turkish bath, where you will be able to wash away all the stresses of the world outside.
The spa offers a wide variety of treatments, including rarer alternative medicine options, such as Ayurveda. This health belief stems from India and has been practiced for over 5,000 years. It is a treatment which aims to prevent illness and helps emphasise good health using herbal remedies. Those looking to start the year on a high by detoxing and improving their diet should definitely book themselves in for this, where they can have a one-on-one consultation with the spa’s experienced therapists.
In addition to this, the spa also boasts aromatherapy, hot stone treatments, hydrotherapy and reflexology along with facials, scrubs and wraps, and massages. With so much to choose from, you won’t want to leave this relaxation haven.
The Spa at Finca Cortesin Hotel – Casares
According to GQ Magazine, “the word ‘exclusive’ doesn’t even do this hotel justice.” In this luxurious spa, you can enjoy an oriental and serene theme throughout, not only in the treatments offered, but also in the wellness activities available, including yoga and pilates.
The hotel offers a unique retreat experience, which can be tailored to your own needs. This healing journey aims to connect your mind, body and spirit while staying onsite for a 2-4 day retreat. During your time here, not only will you enjoy the many healing benefits that the spa offers, but also the peace and tranquility that the grounds bring. You will also have the opportunity to explore nearby, as the hotel arranges excursions such as nature reconnection walks, hikes, padel and tennis, as well as the chance to work out one-to-one with an experienced personal trainer.
In keeping with the hotel’s tranquil theme, you can sample the delights of a healing Ayurveda treatment delivered by an expert, and enjoy the benefits of their Asian therapies, with beauty professionals who have trained in Thailand providing the finest treatments, sharing their knowledge of the authentic Asian practices.
The spa takes pride in the brands used onsite for their body treatments and salon services, including Biologique Recherche, Leonor Greyl and Tata Harper. In using these brands, they promise a genuinely natural experience, while not compromising on the luxurious feel of each treatment. These products are non-artificial, an increasingly important factor to many consumers, with the dangers of parabens being such a hot topic.
This relaxation sanctuary also offers rare features within its spa circuit, including a unique snow cave, where you can cool off and enjoy the benefits of the cold temperature, including the boost of sleep quality, the induction of fat burning, and reduction of allergies and inflammation. Exposing your body to cooler temperatures on a regular basis has also been proven by the University of Michigan to expand your lifespan. So what are you waiting for?
The Marbella Club Hotel – Marbella
Based in one of the most sought-out areas of the coast, the Marbella Club’s Wellness offering helps you focus your mind and goals for weight loss and exercise regimes, tailoring them especially to your individual needs. Whether it is more energy you desire, to lose weight, or eliminate toxins, the onsite team of experts will be able to create a programme to help you achieve your goals for the year 2019. The list doesn’t end there; mothers-to-be can also enjoy a relaxing and enriching programme, designed to enhance their health and comfort with some special treatments.
This Thalasso spa’s ethos is ‘be your best self,’ and is focused on four essential elements in order to get you to where you need to be: wellbeing, fitness, nutrition and spa. The beautiful landscape and surrounding area of the hotel helps nurture your wellbeing, including yoga and pilates to give you a totally spiritual experience. On-hand fitness trainers can stimulate your physical appetite not just by providing one-on-one training sessions, but also with delightful walks onsite within the hotel’s luscious gardens, or within Marbella’s protected parkland to get you on the way to your fitness journey.
Good nutrition is the key philosophy here, overseen by the hotel’s Hollistic Studio, with delicious Mediterranean food being served in the Juice and Herb Kitchen, where you can also sample a range of juices from their onsite organic garden, and relax with herbal infusions concocted by the Hollistic Studio’s nutritionists. In this type of environment, you will be relaxed and ready for what the spa has to offer, where expert therapists will be able to advise which treatments suit your needs.
The Tibetan treatments that the spa specialises in will have you feeling more zen in no time. The Tibetan Sound Healing treatment, which is designed to bring relief to stress-induced conditions, uses ancient healing rituals and Tibetan Singing Bowls. The Tibetan Singing Bowl massage incorporates these ideals and also helps relieve physical pain and induce deep relaxation. This will be unlike anything you have ever tried before! All treatments over 60 minutes will grant you free access into the spa circuit, where you will find separate male and female steam rooms and saunas as well as the dynamic seawater pool. A selection of nutritious snacks and drinks are also available to enjoy.
Thermas de Carratraca, Villa Padierna Hotel – Málaga
Appreciate the ancient Roman Baths at the Villa Padierna Thermas de Carratraca Spa, where its extensive Mineral-Medicinal Thermal circuit will be enough to soak away the trials and tribulations of day-to-day life. Let the powers of hydrotherapy and the visual experience of the surrounding works of art take you to a different time zone, where you can enjoy three different steam baths, each with varying temperatures and aromas. Also included in the circuit are two saunas, and a flotarium, which has very therapeutic effects in soothing both body and mind by experiencing the feeling of weightlessness and isolation, which can be hard to achieve in our hectic schedules.
In keeping with its Roman theme, the healing power of the Mineral-Medicinal waters, known as ‘Carratraca’, rich in sulphur, calcium and magnesium, were used back in Roman times, largely by soldiers who had been injured in battle to heal their wounds. The word ‘carratraca’, however, stems from the Arabic phrase, ‘Karr-al-krak’, meaning scourge cleaning. These waters can now be enjoyed at the spa today where they flow out of a spring, with the properties preserved at a temperature of 18 degrees. The benefits of the waters here include: anti-aging, reduction in blood pressure, anti-inflammatory properties, and assisting the body with the detoxification process.
In addition to the circuit, there are specialised treatments that are quite different to anything you may have experienced before, for an additional fee and as part of a treatment for specific conditions. These include thermal water sprays and an inhalation treatment recommended to improve breathing and lung capacity for those with conditions such as asthma and allergies. Pressotherapy is recommended to improve blood circulation, lymphatic drainage and to eliminate fat and toxins – a perfect treatment to kick start the body for the year ahead. If you have an event that you are aiming to shred some weight for in a short space of time, then the X Cell Ultrasound treatment is for you, where low frequency ultrasonic waves are used to destroy fat cells.
The Hotel itself also promotes quality nutritional food, specialising in organic haute cuisine. Here you can expect to find beautiful dishes served in a nouvelle cuisine fashion. With several different restaurants to choose from, you can taste delicious food in each one, accompanied by impeccable service. In keeping with its ethos, the restaurants and lounges are of a relaxed nature, where you can continue to unwind after the spa.
With so many luxurious and enticing spas available in different areas around the coast, you will have no reason not to get yourself in tiptop condition for the year ahead. Take advantage of the quieter months and spoil yourself and a loved one by taking a well-deserved spa tour, visiting them all to see which one is your favourite.
WORDS ALEXANDRA CARUANA