Thermal Bath

With the conclusion of the churches hosting of the German Synod, and later the congregations own annual general meeting my wife and I went to the Vita Classica.  The town of Bad Krozingen has the designation ‘Bad’ meaning bath and one of these baths is the thermal bath/spa of the Vita Classica.  A whole range of spa treatments are available, but we went for a swim in the several different pools.

The pools are warm, but not as hot as I was expecting from my experience of a Canadian outdoor natural hot spring.  However, what was nice was the ‘gong’ system.  The Gong works like this: each part of some of the pools has bubbles blasting away, and you get a nice massage as you go from one part of the pool to the next.  There is always a movement of people around the edge of the pool as a gong sounds signalling to those in the water that it is time to move to the next station.  If you have ever done a circuit training workout at a gym, going from different weightlifting machinery and cardio equipment, then you have some idea of what goes on in the pool.  Moving slowly from one blast of warm water to the next leaves you feeling like you have done a workout without really going anywhere.

Another interesting pool was the music room.  A large indoor pool with clusters of people floating about on their backs with the help of the Styrofoam ‘pool noodle’.  The water is almost at body temperature and nobody really talks beyond that of a whisper.  What is really great is once you relax and begin to float, and as your ears go under the water; you are serenaded by classical music which can only be heard underwater.

One more feature that I enjoyed about the pools were the changing lights.  My wife and I had hoped that the night sky would be full of bright stars to gaze at while we floated on our backs in the hot water, but the cloudy sky blocked out that hope.  The runner-up to the stars was the changing lights in the pools, or of the whole rooms if we were inside.  Deep blue lights signified the temperature of the pool was cool, or that the lights cycled around the pool like a visual gong, reminding swimmers to move on to the next active pool.

The basic pools were plenty to leave my wife and I more rested and relaxed.