Wow, Karlovy Vary is stunning with a blanket of snow covering her. It snowed all night and I woke up to an incredible sight from my balcony. The sky was a pale grey as snow flurry's continued for a few more hours but you can still see from the pictures the natural beauty as well as the architectural beauty.
The Sanssouci Resort has turned out to be a great place with wonderful food and great spa treatments. The package for the 6 days includes 6 treatments, breakfast and dinner buffets which is incredible. Elke found the deal online and after many phone calls she managed to book it for us. So glad she did all that extra work because the whole package was only $300.00 US. Unfortunately the hotel doesn't have any availability for me to stay while I'm here the rest of the month they're booked up. But it's fine, I found a great hotel through hotels.com and it's right in the center of town with the spa also on the hotel premises which is great. It all works out the way it is suppose to and I'm very lucky I got to stay at this resort for the 6 days and am going to make the very best of it as you can imagine. The resort is up on a hill so the views are spectacular and like most of Karlovy Vary, the guests are over 95 percent Russian so that's fun.
Back to today exciting events. My first treatment was at 9:10am and was for a chocolate body wrap where I was first scrubbed from head to toe with a sea salt which I then showered off and then a thick layer of chocolate and oil was slathered all over me and then I was wrapped in cellophane a sheet and a blanket as well as some small towels wrapped around my feet to really keep me toasty warm. The chocolate concoction's main ingredient apparently is caffeine and this caffeine heats up apparently in contact with the body so the wrap got even warmer as the 30 minutes wore on. I happen to love that heat so for me this was incredibly relaxing and I think I even fell asleep at one point. After the half hour was up she had me wash off the concoction but not with soap and then she put a yogurt cream from head to toe and wrapped me in the warm cocoon again for another 15 minutes. Interestingly the chocolate mixture's heat reaction made my whole body look like it had been sunburned badly. By the time the yogurt cream was absorbed my skin started to look a little less red and more of a dark pink hue and very healthy and soft. And as an added bonus she gave me a phenomenal white chocolate candy bar from France with a pistachio cream filling. I ate the treat as I walked the maze that connects the three hotel buildings making my way back to the blue building which is where my hotel room is located.
We both then had the salt cave treatment at 12noon so we walked down and got to know the rest of the resort. The salt cave is basically what the title suggests. A man made cave with lots of huge blocks of sea salt as walls and then smaller stone sized pieces of salt on the floors. There is soft lighting and meditative music and about 10 of us relaxed on anti-gravity lounge chairs and breathed in the salt air. It's said that a few treatments of 45 minutes will be like spending weeks at the seaside. It's great for people with respiratory disorders but I felt a sense of well being overall.
It was then time to head out into the city center which is down the hill and a little 10 minute walk from there into town. We stopped off to admire the famous Grand Hotel Pupp which was featured in the movie "Last Holiday" with Queen Latifa. And then walked along the river past all the wonderful pastel colored buildings in the various architectural forms including Art Nouveau, Art Deco, Neoclassical, Neo-Renaissance and many more. The town dates back to the 1400's and I'll mention more of it's history in the coming weeks for today it was great, even with the snow flurry's and intermittent rain to explore a city automatically adored the first day I stepped on the historic cobble-stoned streets four years ago.
After a few hours and stopping off at the Austrian supermarket, Billa to pick up some snacks for lunch which is not included in the package we headed back to the town center to catch the bus to the hotel. By then, after three hours of strolling along we were both just too tired to climb back up the steep hill to the hotel.
We also had along the way several tastes of the different mineral waters which I'll also explain more about in the weeks to come but for now it's all medicinal and by Friday both of us should feel so much healthier from the water alone.
We did some swimming when we got back and a sauna and steam and I met a lovely Russian couple, Julia and Mike, who have been living in Brooklyn, New York for over 20 years. Julia recognized my accent and thought I might be from New York which of course she was right and she and her husband chatted with me in the pool for a bit. They have been here two weeks and leave tomorrow for Berlin where they'll catch a flight on Thursday back to NYC. They're very sweet and they were telling me how their daughter got laid off from work 2 years ago and only just got a new job less than two months ago. But good to hear that things are looking up job search wise but scary that it took two years. And Julia and Mike thought that I was around their daughters age when I was telling them I had gotten laid off as well. Their daughter is 30 and I'm sure they were just being very kind to think as Mike said, that I was actually 28, but it's always nice no matter how true, to be thought by total strangers that you're 15+ years younger than you are. |
| Me at the Park Colonnade mineral water fountain. I'm not sure what this particular water is suppose to cure but it takes like a combination of iron rich water and a fizzy tonic water. Strange but I'm sure very good for you. My hand is on the brass snack water spout that you are suppose to rub for good luck. |
Dinner was again fantastic with so many entree choices and an especially great salad bar. It's wonderful to just be in the town again but to be experience the Sanssouci resort makes it really special and also to be able to share all that is great about a town I adore with a good friend makes it even more special. Now if I could just get all my wonderful friends and family here that would truly be a perfect visit. Karlovy Vary is someplace you just can't help but want to share with everyone.
