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Where to Take a Proper Bath in Budapest

You already know that hitting the bath is a must-do activity in Budapest. But which to choose?

On our recent trip, we decided to go with the Gellert baths, since a Hungarian friend had told us they were the most beautiful. Had it been summer, though, we might have chosen the Szechenyi baths; they’re bigger, and a large portion of them is outdoors. And another time, we’d also go for the newly refurbished Rudas baths, which we were told on our last day we should hit up.

Anyway, back to the Gellert. The baths are indeed beautiful—a gorgeous main art deco pool, and lavish thermal sections off either side of it. The main pool is just a swimming pool, and is co-ed; people mainly swim seriously or do aqua aerobics and stuff in here. At the foot of it is a small, separate thermal section. This is also co-ed.

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Checking Out the Womb Room at Fellini's Favorite Tuscan Spa

Pizza. Fine wine. Fellini. Some of the finest things to have come out of Italy. But while you can eat and drink till you pop in homage to the glorious foodstuffs, things are a little thin on the ground if you want to do a Fellini pilgrimage. There’s the Trevi fountain, of course, to recreate La Dolce Vita, but that’s touristy; and his hometown of Rimini doesn’t really have a huge amount to offer other than beaches.

But if you travel to the south of Tuscany – to the glorious Val d’Orcia, with its rolling clay hills and snaking cypress trees – you’ll find Chianciano Terme, the spa town where Fellini used to come to take the waters, and where he set 8½.

First things first: Italian spas are not generally like UK or American spas. Go to a spa town and you’ll be confronted with foul-tasting water to swill for the good of your liver, vapor to inhale and doctors to consult. Even for the most “spa”-like treatments – mud wraps – you’re stripped naked, slapped in mud, wrapped in a blanket and then ordered into a bath of thermal water. Therapeutic it may be; classically relaxing it aint.

Chianciano used to be like this back in Fellini’s day – in fact, it was like that the first time we visited; but then about six years ago, they decided to modernize the spa, knocking out a vast block of toilets (a side effect of the water) and installing a mega-spa. There are treatment rooms on top, but what you really go for is the spa: the Terme Sensoriali, with 20 different stages of spa-dom, based around the elements.

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Ear Candling for Frequent Flyers: A Hotel Spa Test

Ever been ear-candled? Is that even a verb? The quick and dirty way to explain the practice of ear candling is to say that you lay on your side, a plate/tray thing is placed over your ear, and a hole in it allows a special waxed muslin candle to rest in your ear. The candle is lit and it smolders, creating a mild suction designed to clean your ear canal of residual earwax other gross-ew-ew stuff. Whether or not it actually works and is safe is constantly being debated, but we decided to give it a go on our recent trip to Costa Rica.

You see, the Four Seasons Resort Costa Rica has quite the impressive spa, with a large spa service menu to match. It was there, under "Alternative Treatments," that we saw it: ear candling for frequent flyers. Bingo.

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And Now, Your Moment of Zen (from the Wilds of Costa Rica)

Deep breaths. It's Friday. The day after today is Saturday. Are you traveling this weekend? That's awesome. Are you doing something more local? Equally awesome, because you're out there doing, discovering, deciding to be anything but stagnant.

Let's have a moment, hmm? Recently we found ourselves sitting in knee-high, naturally heated water at the Rio Negro hot springs in Costa Rica's Rincón de la Vieja Volcano National Park. Above us was a swinging rope bridge we had crossed to reach this spot. Below us, the rushing crystal clear waters of the Rio Negro, and all around a saturation of green. Ahh nature.

That is a happy place, the type you sometimes come across in the world and which you attempt to burn into your memory to mentally escape from future stressful situation far, far away.

A video:

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There's Something Fishy About This Pedicure

Happening upon a hungry Coati wasn't our only interesting animal sighting on our recent trip to Mexico's Riviera Maya. We also spotted a school of fish, only they weren't in the ocean—they were in aquariums inside the Spa at the Grand Velas Riviera Maya. These fishies aren't there for decoration, either; they're there to nibble the dead skin off your feet in what's become something of a spa trend borrowed from Asia.

Ahhh! That was our reaction, too, but you see the "fish pedicure" is quite common in other parts of the world.

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A Shanghai World Expo Alternative: The Barbie Spa

A Barbie-tini in the Barbie Cafe

Had a long day of walking around Shanghai, visiting the giant World Expo? Add another one-of-a-kind place to your visit then, perhaps with a treatment at the world's only Barbie Spa.

Last year, a Barbie Flagship store complete with Barbie Cafe, Barbie Boutique and Barbie Chocolate Bar opened in Huaihai Road in the Fashion District, but it's only recently that we've discovered that the two-storied, 35,000-square-foot place also contains a Barbie Spa. Order a Barbie-tini and a Barbie body scrub, and let's just hope that neither contains contains bits o' Barbie.

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Nice Moove: Virgin Atlantic To Add Cowshed Spa To Gatwick Airport

The cows have come home: Virgin Atlantic's clubhouse at London's Gatwick Airport will be closed until the end of November for renovation, including adding a brand new Cowshed Spa for its passengers.

"Cowshed Spa" sounds like an oxymoron, like that other British invention Shabby Chic, but the premium spa brand was named for the original purpose of the building that houses its first location, at the Babington Hotel in Somerset county. (There are no cows there now.) Its six locations in England include one in the London Heathrow clubhouse, where passengers can get treatments like hot stone facials and full-body salt scrubs. Cowshed is also the official spa of the SoHo House in , or so we hear because we can't get in.

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Why Just Visit An Irish Castle When You Can Stay In One?

All this week, Jaunted contributor CMB will be giving us notes on her Dublin Field Trip. Any questions or suggestions? Let us know.

If touring a castle in Ireland just isn't enough and leaves you wanting more, then why not sleep in a castle? it's the easiest way to live out your fantasy of being a royal, and you're in luck because there are plenty regal Irish castles that have been turned into luxury hotels.

One of the best castles-turned-hotels is the Dromoland Castle in Co Claire, just a few minutes from Shannon, making it easily accessible via the Shannon International Airport. It's also an excellent home base for visiting tourist traps in western Ireland, like the Cliffs of Moher and of course the Blarney Stone.

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Abercrombie & Kent Discounts For Rich Recessionaries

Do you have money to throw around yet? Because we've been in this recession for a fair bit, and hopefully people have been more frugal, luxury tour providers like Abercrombie & Kent are betting on people wanting to spend whatever savings they've scrounged. Because of this, you can now take advantage of slashed prices on trips like a 17-day excursion into India, which is now only $9,625. They're right that selling that same trip right now for its original price of $13,000 is a tough push, but $9.625 is too close to five figures for us yet.

Closer to home, the city of Myrtle Beach has already declared that the recession is over because a poll is up in showing "interest" in it as a vacation destination, even though bookings are down. And after a spa industry group reported that spa trips were up 18 percent last year, spas everywhere promoted themselves as a staycation with an edge. Keep in mind that some of these trips easily hit the four figures, and we're still not convinced that spa vacations or A+K tours are the best decision to make, even at the end of a recession.

Related Stories:
· Abercrombie & Kent offers ‘Christmas in July’ sale to spur holiday travel [LA Times]
· Myrtle Beach area travel desires rising [The Sun News]
· U.S. spas seem recession-proof, says industry group [Reuters]

[Image: Abercrombie & Kent]

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NYC Spa Week Will Cover Your Face in Bird Poop

It's just what we've always dreamed of: paying $50 to have a stranger give us a milk bath. Or how about paying $50 to have the same stranger cover your face in bird poop? If either of these scenarios sound appealing, then get psyched for New York City's Spa Week, April 13-19, when the creme of the city's spa crop discount select treatments to a single Ulysses S. Grant.

Of course reservations are recommended as early as possible, but you've still got a few days to ring up your choice of over 80 spas, like Completely Bare for a bikini wax or Saks Fifth Avenue for a mani/pedi. We however would like to believe that you're the intrepid sort, who might be intrigued by the Geisha Facial at Shizuka Day Spa. Nicknamed the "Bird Poop Facial," the $180 (but only $50 during Spa Week) treatment has reportedly been tried by the likes of Victoria Beckham, so you know it's going to be a winning conversation starter.

For those who would rather not cover themselves in guano, Spa Week is a notoriously prime time for freshening up for spring on the cheap. Register your basic details here first, before the list of available spas and services unveil themselves, and remember that saving money sometimes means loosing inhibitions.

Related Stories:
· Spa Week [Official Site]
· Geisha "Bird Poop" Facial [Shizuka Spa NY]
· Spa Week: April 13-19 [About.com]
· Cheap NYC Coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: insideSocal]

What Recession / Spa Travel / → All Tags

True Life: I'm At A Spa On Long Island

It takes a little chutzpah to open a spa in an economy like this. Naturally in any climate developers would look for the perfect place to develop that dream getaway, without anything that might make a potential customer blanch. But like a foaming hot tub pool, we're not quite ready to get into the Allegria Hotel and Spa just yet.

On paper, the Allegria looks like a perfect plan: A luxury hotel in a mostly condos-only strip, with big plans for LEED certification. But we can't get over that the hotel used to be a nursing home -- as in two years ago. (Then it had 170 rooms; now it only has 143.) Gut reno or no, paying $199/night or more for Grandma's old place, with the added bonus of being nowhere in particular, gives us the shakes. At least at the Spa Castle the old people get to play along.

Related Stories:
· November 2007: Long Beach's New Welcome Mat [NY Times]
· Allegria Hotel and Spa: LEED on the Ocean in Long Beach [Green Buildings NYC]
· Los Angeles Spas Celebrate Detoxification, Ogling [Jaunted]

[Photo: Small Luxury Hotels of the World]

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Over the Top Luxury Still in Fashion at Shanghai's 3 On the Bund

When planning a trip to cultural hotspot Shanghai, you will invariably encounter the the simple yet enigmatic name of the city's most luxurious shopping and dining destination, 3 On the Bund. Occupying the stately Union Building on Shanghai's Bund, a thoroughfare running alongside the Huangpu River, No. 3 began welcoming the moneyed locals and well-heeled tourists back in 2004.

At first, No. 3 was a revolutionary repurposing of one of the Bund buildings, the strip of which had fallen from grace over the years and were rapidly descending into disrepair and vacant space. After the introduction of upscale dining with M on the Bund and the Shanghai Gallery of Art, the Michael Graves-designed spaces filled up with 5-star tenant after 5-star tenant.

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