Thermae Bath Spa

...the morning in the new Thermae Spa.

Bath thermae spa was, I believe, originally Bath's millennium project, but came in massively over budget and behind schedule. However the city of Bath, originally named Aqua Sulis by the Celts as it has the only hot spring in England, has long been famed for the healing properties of its hot spring, but this has not been open to the public since Roman times.

Getting there

...old Roman Baths in the centre. If you are unfamiliar with Bath the easiest option to travel into the centre is using one of the 3 park and rides, as parking within reach is at a premium and if you are going to be spending a relaxing few hours you don't want to be worrying about your parking ticket.

The Spa

Now the busiest time to visit the spa is from mid morning over the weekend, so we thought we would try and get there ... more

Now having kids is absolutely the best thing in the world, but once you've had them you do tend to forget what life was like without. So when my Mum decided to have them for the weekend so we could have some time off, after 10 years with no weekends to ourselves we didn't really know what to do with it.

We tried to book a weekend away by the sea, but being the middle of the summer holiday that was impossible, so almost in desperation we decided to go to Bath for the day and spend the morning in the new Thermae Spa.

Bath thermae spa was, I believe, originally Bath's millennium project, but came in massively over budget and behind schedule. However the city of Bath, originally named Aqua Sulis by the Celts as it has the only hot spring in England, has long been famed for the healing properties of its hot spring, but this has not been open to the public since Roman times.

Getting there

The Spa itself is situated very close to the old Roman Baths in the centre. If you are unfamiliar with Bath the easiest option to travel into the centre is using one of the 3 park and rides, as parking within reach is at a premium and if you are going to be spending a relaxing few hours you don't want to be worrying about your parking ticket.

The Spa

Now the busiest time to visit the spa is from mid morning over the weekend, so we thought we would try and get there as it opened. As we live an hours drive away and it was the first morning in a long time where the child sized alarm clock wasn't going to wake us up, this was optimistic, so we eventually arrived at, yes, mid morning. There is no pre-booking option to enter the spa itself unless you are going in a group of 6 or more. You can only pre book treatments, which is advisable.

There are 2 sections to the spa, which I think from their point of view is unfortunate, they have the main building the New Royal Bath and a very small building over the road called the Cross Bath, which at £12 for a 1½ hour session is considerably cheaper, but I'm sure if they could have arranged for it all to be on one site they would, as I don't think many, if any people were using the Cross Bath.

We opted for a 4-hour session in the New Royal Bath. This cost £30 each, and we then hired robes for a further £4 each. They also offer 2-hour sessions for £20 and full day sessions for £50. The robes were not particularly nice; I would have preferred a towelling one, so I would recommend you take your own. Towels are also available for hire at £3 each. Swimming costumes are obligatory and not available for hire!

On entering we were issued with a smart band, these are brilliant, they have a magnetic strip on them that controls your stay, and you use them to get through the turnstile, to lock and unlock your locker and to pay for anything you might buy while you are there. Which from their point of view means they don't have to worry about cash etc in the café and neither do you, you then settle up when you leave. We had eaten in the café and charged it to my band so when he left it just let him out, but it called for assistance for me. I guess it also refuses to let you leave if you exceed your time. There was one small issue, I charged our lunch, and if you spend time in the café you get an extra half hour added to your time, which we didn't use but if we had it probably wouldn't have let my husband out either.

Our first experience was the roof top pool, I think this particular facility may be the reason for the delays in opening and probably the over budget issue, as the amount of support the pool needs is incredible, you can see the pillars going all the way through the building and they are huge. I loved this pool, I would have preferred fewer people there but it was fantastic. All of the pools in the facility are fed by mineral rich springs, heated underground and are between 35 - 36oC. It was a clear day when we went, but not particularly warm and you could see the steam coming off the water and the feeling when you go in is like sinking into a perfectly warm bath, watching other peoples reaction to the water was interesting as not one failed to react with a smile and an exclamation as they entered the water. The pool also has a number of pressure places where you can massage your back or shoulders and a bubble section. However by far the best thing about this pool is the view, you have the Cathedral and the original Roman Baths opposite and a great view of the skyline, it is unfortunate that there are a few 60's style buildings to get in the way of the Georgian architecture but I don't suppose they would be allowed to take them down!

We then worked our way downwards, on the second floor are a four steam rooms, each with a different scent we tried Frankincense and Eucalyptus and mint, they were big enough that despite the number of people there they were not overcrowded and I felt comfortable with the space, the only time I felt the need to leave was when a hen party came in and literally started clucking which was not conducive to the relaxing atmosphere. This area also had some foot massager spa thingys which I can't describe to you as they were out of order, but the shower in the centre was enormous, it gave a really powerful massaging shower and the only problem was it was so large that everyone else seemed to think they were allowed in it too, it could easily fit 5 people under the massaging section at the same time.

After all this relaxing, I was definitely ready for lunch, however the café was the biggest rip off out. It is attractive enough and clean etc, but they had a limited healthy menu the options were essentially soup or a sandwich with a number of pastries to follow. The sandwich cost £5.70 and I had a pomegranate juice to go with it, which was another £1.70, they then take the pre-packed sandwich and put it on a plate with a salad. It was a nice salad but I don't like salad dressing and had great trouble trying to explain to the non-English lady that I wanted an undressed salad, but she was struggling with the language and consequently didn't understand me - I didn't complain when it arrived complete with dressing, my husband ate it.

After lunch, we visited the final pool, which is on the ground floor and has a separate Jacuzzi section in the middle. The temperature is the same as the roof top pool and to be honest I was disappointed at this pool, there is a hot bath near by, but you are only allowed in there if you have treatments and in the main pool only certain areas of the bubbles are bubbling at any one time, the power is probably shared between this pool and the roof top one. It was crowded and quite noisy. So we stayed in a while then worked our way back up to the top, including a doze on the balcony outside.

So is it worth it? I think this is a great attraction for Bath to have, I think considering its history it needs a public spa, 2 hours would not have been quite enough to really unwind and relax, 4 hours is too much, I can not imagine spending the whole day, I would be a shrivelled prune and bored stiff. It is expensive but not unreasonable for an occasional treat. I certainly will not be visiting the café again, I will take a 2 hour session and eat in the town centre which has far greater choice, I think there are things they could do to encourage more relaxation, for example it was lovely sitting out on the balcony, but it would have been nice to have a quiet room to sit in, with maybe a few magazines around. I also feel that it would not be worth the admission fee if the weather was such that you couldn't use the roof top pool.

I will apologise at this point as we did not take any pictures while we were there, but the picture shown by ciao at the top of the review is of the original Roman Baths, they don't expect you to relax in the odd colour green water! All the information you could need about visiting it is on their website www.thermaebathspa.com.

Thank you for reading. 

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