Bathing in Baden Baden

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Baden Baden alias Baths

When my husband was nominated for an international award, both of us were overjoyed. Apart from the honor and the glory it brought, it also gave us a chance to visit our married daughter in Dusseldorf. We immediately phoned her.

“Hello Bunny, we are coming to Dusseldorf on Tuesday and will be with you for a whole week. Won’t it be wonderful?”

“Oh, mom, I will be working in Paris throughout the week and Ingo will be in Munich. What will you people do in Dusseldorf when we are not there? Who will pick you up? Can you not come on Friday when both I and Ingo will be returning to Dusseldorf? We will have a lovely weekend together”

So, that is how we happened to be in Baden Baden on the western edge of Black Forest of Germany. Baden Baden are two words, always said together because it means Baden in the district of Baden. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baden-Baden
We planned to spend 4 days touring Neuschwanstein, Baden Baden, Triberg, and then take a Rhine cruise and reach Dusseldorf on Friday. It would also utilize our one-week Eurail pass fully. The Rhine cruise was included in the Eurail pass.

There is an excellent website of German railways on the net, which is used extensively by travelers all over the world to plan European Rail holidays.
( http://bahn.hafas.de/bin/query.exe/en )
I too used it and planned our journey in the minutest detail, because to reach Baden Baden we had to change railway connections four times in a day, and each connection had only 10-12 minutes in which to make the change. However, we pinned our faith on the efficiency and punctuality of German Railway as well as on the muscle-power of my husband to lug our heavy bags all around.

We attended the conference at Oslo and flew back to Frankfurt from where we took a train to Munich. The next day we visited ‘mad’ king Ludwig II’s three castles : the ‘ fairytale castle’ Neuschwanstein, his hunting lodge Linderhof and castle Hohenzollern. I had wanted to see the original fairytale castle ever since we had seen it’s copy ‘Cinderella’s castle’ in Disneyland.

We did manage to reach Baden Baden the next day at 5:30 after visiting Triberg and breezing through all the connections.

The real reason to visit Baden Baden was to emulate Agatha Christie’s English Lords and Ladies of 19th century and take the ‘baths’. The ‘baths’ are actually spas into which the water from the natural mineral springs is channeled. There are a number of spas in Germany, but Baden Baden is most famous.

The spas are quite modern though the springs were known from Roman times. Emperor Hadrian is given credit for founding the town of Baden Baden. That was one “good” Emperor who really traveled extensively, built temples, forums, mausoleum etc extensively, wrote poetry and autobiography, and loved and lived intensely.

There are two spas “Caracalla’s Bath” and “Roman-Irish Baths” side by side in Baden Baden

The spa that we went to, “Caracalla’s Bath” is named after a Roman emperor who was anything but “good”. In fact, he was one of the worst.

I had visited the sulphur springs of Vajreshri near dear old Mumbai, at Manikaran in Himachal Pradesh, at Chiater springs near Bandung, Indonesia and now I wanted to bathe in a German sulphur spring. Some skin conditions as well as a lot of chronic diseases like arthritis, rheumatism, gout, are supposed to get cured by taking regular baths in these waters. Now, don’t ask me the difference between arthritis, rheumatism and gout. I am not even sure I have spelt them correctly.

The spa consists of several swimming pools covered by glass domes. Diving is not allowed in the pools. The temperatures are maintained in different pools at different constant levels. Water is continuously flowing in from the sides and being drained from the bottom of the pool. You should stay a maximum of 20 minutes in the pool and then take a break, because, otherwise you may feel dizzy due to the sulphur smell of the water.

The spa, as we entered, gave a very ethereal feeling to us. It was as though we were inside a giant blue aquamarine crystal. The pool was a rhapsody in blue, with blue tiles and blue sky being reflected in the glass dome above. By one side was a grotto in which a waterfall was singing it’s siren song.

It was a romantic place, a place meant for seduction by water-nymphs.
However, the ‘nymphs’ were all more than 70 years old. So were the men. In fact, it was totally populated by old men and women ‘taking the cure’.

We plunged in the pool and soaked in the warm, inviting water. The sore muscles of the back (caused by hefting the heavy bags, no doubt) slowly relaxed when subjected to strong gusts of water.

I started believing in the therapeutic powers of the spa.

There is a sauna on the first floor, but I purposely did not tell my husband about it. Some information is best kept a secret from husbands. The sauna requires you to go in there in your birthday suit, and while I don’t mind wearing a swimsuit, (one-piece, mind you, not a two-piece one) I had no intention of parading in the nude before anyone.

After soaking in the pool to our hearts’ content, we hopped on the city bus and made our way back to the hotel.

Being a holiday resort town Baden Baden also boasts of a large opera and is a shopper’s paradise. In fact, 2006 World Cup’s English team was housed in Baden Baden.

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