Badrutt's Palace, St Moritz

After a day spent skiing off-piste, dodging rock outcrops and crevasses, and convinced that I was going to die, upon entering Palace Wellness, the Spa at Badrutt’s Palace Hotel, I was pretty sure that I had, in fact, gone to heaven. Following a tripartite, 50 million  CHF redevelopment , executed between 2008 and 2010, the Wellness area has been seriously spruced up. During the first phase, the resort’s magnificent, 6 metre deep oval pool and Wet Zone, including ice and mist rooms, in addition to two saunas and a tropical rainforest shower was upgraded, and in the second and third, a new restaurant was built in the spa, along with new treatment and changing rooms, a fitness centre and a Kids’ Club.  As Martha Wiedemann, overseer of the redevelopment programme, explains: ‘ it is important to me that the beautiful surroundings of the Engadin valley flow into every part of the wellness area. Local purchases, plenty of natural light and local building materials characterize the look of the renovation.” In this vein, the hotel has returned to using white spruce, a local Grisons evergreen, for the wood paneling, the granite used originates from the quarry on the San Bernadino Pass located near St. Moritz, the treatment rooms are named after flowers from the Engadin region and the treatment menu  uses exclusively organic product lines such as Anika Organic Luxury, Intraceuticals, Shodeea and La Biosthetique.

The spa is a cross between clinical and cosy, with soothing music, water features and a particularly well-laid out relaxation zone. There is no tedious formality or dress code. The sign outside the mixed sauna area wasn’t so much a suggestion as an imperative to strip off (yikes! and even with blokes about). Thank heavens for the ladies-only area. I slid butt-naked into the aroma grotto, a scented Tardis-like chamber with a giant crystal in it, and tried to relax before my ‘Aroma Plastmark Mental Active’ treatment .

I was led into the Paradisea Massage room, a candle-lit boudoir in which I encountered a bed, quite unlike any massage bed that I had experienced before; a heated water bed, with integrated sound system. Apparently the ergonomic design helps to rebalance the mind and body. It did just that.

Karin, my therapist, was a dream. Soothing, assured manner? Check. Firm, dexterous hands? Check. Experience? She has a decade’s worth. The treatment included a foot massage with arnica milk, then a soak in a “Honey-Swiss stone pine bath”' (more stoic disrobing.) After pouring in aromatic honey and pine oils, Karin disappeared and I was left to loofah myself with the bits of orange shavings that bobbed about.

The stone pine is something of a miracle tree; prolonged whiffs of the bark are thought to slow down your heartbeat and boost circulation. Nicely woozy, I was primed for my back massage with the Oil of Life, aka marmot oil (from an Alpine rodent), a local cure for aching muscles, rheumatism and skin complaints. Seems that the Alps are overrun with the critters. Every autumn a number are culled and the oil is extracted and bottled. Whatever qualms I had (none, actually) melted away under Karin’s expert ministrations. This was a proper, medicinal pummelling and bliss to my knotty shoulders and stiff spine.

Other bonuses in the Wellness Area include free fitness classes for guests, a medical centre, with a team of doctors, and opportunities to participate in adventure sports, golf or hiking

Badrutt’s Palace Hotel www.badruttspalace.com +41 (0)81 837 1100 offers treatments from CHF 30 and standard double rooms are available from CHF 365 per room per night.