German public baths are intended for joint trips with family, work colleagues or friends. Many of them are located on the coast of the Oder and Main rivers, as well as near thermal springs. Their steam rooms are very different from our baths, so Russian tourists should first familiarize themselves with their rules. Different mentality and culture can cause a strong shock caused by the traditions of German public baths.
A little dry theory
In Germany (and also in Austria, keep in mind if you are going to ski resorts) there are very unique bath traditions. Locals consider it unhygienic, wrong and even possibly disgusting to bathe in synthetic swimsuits. It seems like these newfangled materials are harmful and unsafe. But at the same time, all German baths are shared - and traditionally men, women, children and old people go to the “therms” completely naked. This doesn’t bother anyone except the numerous Russian tourists who end up there either by accident or out of curiosity. In the first case, the reaction of our people is mainly negative, and in the second, it is not entirely adequate.
⇒ Useful: 11 Berlin hotels under €100
Washing complexes
In Germany you can find a large number of large bathhouse complexes, which often resemble not only bathhouses, but rather water parks. Such establishments are usually divided into several sections depending on their purpose.
Packing the necessary things for traveling this summer: tips for tourists
June 29 – Tikhon: you need to collect herbs and weed the beds (signs and beliefs)
A woman donated a log cabin built in 1910 to a Florida museum.
These could be sections with huge swimming pools. In this case, pools can be shallow or deep, filled with cold or hot water. Often there are pools with slides with special descents. A sector with premises for thermal procedures, such as hammam, hydromassage and others, is required in a bath complex. Next to the sauna there is always an area with sun loungers for relaxing from the heat.
What does the sauna process look like?
You come to the bathhouse, pay for the amount of time you need according to the tariff and go to the locker room. Further, the situation differs from the rules in a particular bathhouse - in some you can leave the locker room in a swimsuit, robe or at least a towel, but you will be required to take them off in the steam room or pool. In others, all your embarrassment along with your clothes must be left in the locker room - immediately behind it is the “Freikörperkultur” space. However, no one can forbid you to wear a towel or a robe made of natural materials, but you will look like a black sheep. In the steam room, you can also wrap yourself in a towel, but then you must have two of them, because one must be placed on the shelf in the steam room (so as not to drip your sweat onto it).
This is where all the dubious features end and the pleasant things begin. Each bathhouse has many steam rooms for every taste - Finnish saunas, Turkish hammams, infrared saunas, salt saunas, etc. and so on. Moreover, there can be several of each type, including those with different temperatures (for example, 80,90,110). At the exit from the sauna, two plunge pools will be waiting for you - with ice and hot water, as well as a tub of ice water that you can tip over yourself. There are also areas where you can sit and soak your feet in hot water. Every bathhouse must have a swimming pool, and even more than one, including an outdoor pool that you can swim into from the main one. Both inside and outside there is a relaxation area with sun loungers. Steamed after the steam rooms, refreshed in the pool, you lie down on one of them, grabbing water, tea or a glass of wine from the bar. To say it's a thrill is to say nothing! You can also get a massage, but such a pleasure in Europe is not for budget travelers.
There is also such a thing in German baths as aufguss. This is not another type of perversion, but just succumbing to steam rooms with various herbs and aromatic oils. They happen, like everything else in German life, according to a strict schedule. At a certain time, a specially trained person enters the steam room, pours water with all sorts of additives onto the stones, and then waves a towel towards those steaming. To be honest, we missed the aufguss on our entry, but according to reviews the feeling was very cool.
⇒ Step-by-step instructions: How to look for cheap tours to Europe
Swimsuits are not allowed!
Many health and entertainment facilities in Germany were built in areas where thermal waters come to the surface. This means that you can not only take water treatments and steam there, but also enjoy healing underground water.
Article on the topic Bath wisdom.
How to choose the right broom “German bath and water establishments are usually divided into two zones,” says my friend from Germany Manfred .
– In the part of the complex where the swimming pools and water slides are located, you must wear swimming trunks and swimsuits. In the sauna and steam bath area, both men and women are completely naked. You are only allowed to wrap yourself in a cotton towel.” The fact is that German lovers of “real steam” are firmly convinced that the use of synthetic materials in rooms with high temperatures and high humidity is unacceptable.
Swimsuits and swimming trunks, in their opinion, can become sources of dangerous fumes that will negate the therapeutic effect of the sauna. Of course, there is no question of entering the steam room in rubber slippers.
My experience in the thermal baths of Berlin
In general, I have never suffered from a craving for nudism (although who will believe me now), and it’s somehow not very interesting to look at others, but I really wanted to relax in a bathhouse after three days of running around Berlin. Well, since this is a local specialty, you can combine business with pleasure - take a steam bath and try something that is much talked about.
In our bathhouse you only had to undress in the steam rooms; throughout the rest of the area they wore bathrobes, and in the pool you had to wear a swimsuit. Like any normal person, undressing for the first time was awkward. It seemed to me that we would enter the steam room and everyone there was dressed, and only my friend and I were like two fools)) But no, in fact everyone was sitting or lying on the towel they had taken off.
There is semi-darkness in the steam room and without special efforts you won’t be able to see your neighbor. The Germans themselves go to the baths often and have already seen so many naked bodies that two more can hardly surprise them. If someone looks at another person, they do it as discreetly as possible - indecent) But only those who specifically came for this will be considered - for example, Russians)) Such people are usually given away by a wild look, and you can simply stay away from them. We went to a new and quite expensive establishment, the cost of which eliminates the undesirable contingent. In general, there were few people, and often we sat in the steam room or hammam together.
Overall, we had a great time - everything in the bathhouse was very high quality and beautifully done, we steamed, swam, and at the end drank a glass of wine on the sun loungers overlooking the garden. Have a rest! As for bare features - in Germany this should be taken for granted. You can not? Then just don't go. I can't say that I like it, but it has to be done. I saw these people for the first and last time in my life. I couldn’t go with friends and colleagues like the Germans))
About the culture of behavior
The women's bathhouse in Germany, a religious institution, is more likely for newcomers who are unaccustomed to the generally accepted practice than for the natives, and even a delight for the female part of the country's Muslim diaspora. The traditional public bathhouse in Germany, on the contrary, has its own rules of cultural behavior, because the Germans are a cultural nation, no matter what evil tongues may say. So, the main theses of the unwritten code of the real German bath wolf:
- No clothing except a natural towel and no rubber slippers.
- A real German bath towel should have the following dimensions. The length is the height of its owner, plus two more palms. Width - the distance from the fingertips of an outstretched arm to the middle of the chest. These parameters are not taken out of thin air. In the steam room you can sit only on your own towel, with your hands resting on it. If you occupy the second and third shelves, then your feet rest on the lowered edge of the towel. The dripping sweat ends up on the towel and stays there. No greasy shelves and no burns. Although the Germans were the first who began to massively use the African maple - abash for arranging paired rooms.
- There is no talking or loud expression of emotions in the steam room or thermal pool. If you can’t relax yourself, don’t bother others.
- There is no need to eat through the eyes of visitors, and especially female visitors. A wild look and lack of reaction to the environment is the first sign of an unusual and complex guest of the federal republic. If the reaction, on the contrary, is gushing and excessive, such a client will also be carefully taken out by the staff of the establishment and also, according to the good German tradition, shot. When visiting public baths in Germany, one can have a different attitude towards the manifestation of shame, considering it the boundary separating man and animal, or vice versa - an extreme degree of hypocrisy. In any case, the culture and customs of the host country must be respected.
A man's view of German baths
Our Vanya is just from that category of people who go to a German bathhouse out of curiosity. Of course, he examined everyone, but he assures that he did it as inconspicuously as possible, so as not to confuse anyone and not to look like a fool himself. He says there were some pretty girls, but not many)
In the bathhouse where he and his friend went, you had to be naked everywhere - even in the pool.
Another difference is that their thermal baths had many more steam rooms, and the pool had access (or swimming) to the street. Their cost of visiting was lower, and therefore the contingent was simpler. There were several Turks huddled in the pool, who probably didn’t just come to take a steam bath.
In general, Vanya’s impressions are even more pleasant - he wanted to go to the German baths, he went to the baths. I think he will repeat it at the first opportunity)
Saunas for every taste
Bergisch Gladbach.
Cafe in the sauna courtyard Photo: Photo by the author / Ilya Brushtein Many sauna complexes in Germany are truly unique. For example, there is an impressive sauna-planetarium, equipped with a dome of the starry sky. You can warm the bones and listen to a lecture on astronomy at the same time.
The sauna-beer room is very popular, where in a “warm” atmosphere they not only hold a bath ceremony, but also treat them to beer. Non-alcoholic, of course.
Another attraction is the sauna-bakery, where after the ceremony the sauna master, who performs the duties of a baker, offers clients refreshment with fresh baked goods.
In the federal state of Baden-Württemberg there is a sauna-cinema where educational documentaries are shown on a large screen throughout the day.
A sauna-aquarium was also built here, in which you can watch the movement of fish through the glass.
“Many Germans visiting Russia speak with delight about the Russian bathhouse, about steaming with birch brooms. “We believe that a Russian bathhouse helps to understand the soul of Russia,” says Manfred and adds: “I think that Russian tourists in Germany should also visit our bathhouses and discover Germany in this way.”
Regarding photos and videos in German baths
I've been surfing the Internet, and the most popular request for German baths is related to photos and videos. So, my little lovers of XXX footage, entering the bathhouse with phones is strictly prohibited, and since everyone in the steam rooms is naked, I can hardly imagine where you can hide even a small camera. Therefore, basically all the photos on the Internet are staged. And this is good, hardly anyone wants to be filmed as a souvenir.
Most visited complexes
The Berlin Liquidrome complex is the leader in attendance among all establishments in the country. Its popularity is partly due to the presence of healing springs directly below it. Here you can also swim in a pool filled with sea water and undergo a full course of procedures completely free of charge.
Layer of dough, apricot jam and nut mixture: a simple recipe from Germany
Touching photos from the wild world of animals: daddy’s tenderness and care (photo)
Sugar cookies in the shape of a rainbow: we delight loved ones with a colorful delicacy
Rules
There are also certain unspoken rules in place on the territory of the bathhouse complexes. For example, photography and video recording are not carried out in these premises. It is also not customary to look at visitors and comment on their appearance.
In general, German bathing traditions differ quite significantly from similar traditions in other countries. Therefore, many foreigners are shocked when encountering them for the first time. However, for brave people, visiting such an establishment can be an interesting experience of getting to know another culture.
Found a violation? Report content
What is aufguss?
Public baths in Germany offer a special type of leisure activity called aufguss. “Aufguss” is translated as “watering”. The procedure involves the bath master dousing the stones with solutions of essential oils. These vapors warm up visitors.
The procedure itself is more like a show. The master jokes with the guests and tells jokes. Often all this happens to musical accompaniment.
The bath master waves a fan, towel and other objects. As a result, steam is dispersed throughout the room, and the sauna is filled with an amazing aroma.
The ceremony lasts no more than 10 minutes. At this time, it is not recommended to leave the sauna so as not to let off steam.
Special aufguss are also popular, when visitors are given ice cubes, massage salts, and creams. Such activities have additional therapeutic and cosmetic effects.
After the aufguss, guests are offered to drink aromatic tea, juice, lemonade, and enjoy ice cream. There is no additional charge for these pleasant surprises.
Aufguss are held strictly on time. For example, every hour. The plan of events can be viewed at the entrance to the bathhouse.
Thermal resorts and complexes
Many thermal complexes in Germany are so extensive in their territory and the services they provide that they are rightly called resorts. Such complexes base their treatment methods on the healing power of mineral water.
Oberstdorf is considered the most famous such resort. It is located high in the Alps. This is an excellent place to restore lost strength and health. The leading specialization of the complex is the treatment of diseases of the musculoskeletal system. In addition to thermal waters, massage techniques and acupuncture are used.
Resorts in the central regions of Germany are rich in mineral waters that help treat diseases of the cardiovascular system. Vacationers bathe in mineral water and drink it internally.
The resort of Bad Harzburg has seven thermal springs with a water temperature of 24 degrees Celsius. It is heated to 32 degrees.
Everyone knows the famous resort of Baden-Baden. It has a developed infrastructure with many hotels, parks and clinics. The development of the resort began in the Roman era. The Romans discovered the amazing properties of thermal water. They were the ones who built the first thermal baths. In the 19th century, the resort became known to aristocratic circles of Europeans. People from other countries began to come to it.
There are 12 thermal springs in Baden-Baden. They help treat rheumatism, asthma, heart disease. Mineral water is used for both internal and external use, as well as for inhalation.
The number of thermal resorts in Germany is more than two dozen. People come here not only to restore their health, but also to simply relax with the whole family, spend a vacation, relax and get a lot of pleasant emotions.
