Hotel Hit Squad: An out-of-body experience and a fear conquered at the near-perfect Gainsborough Bath Spa

I couldn’t care less about the concept of “wellness” when I travel. For me, a spa day at a hotel consists of a steam room, a head rub and copious amounts of gin-based cocktails afterwards.

I went to a fancy fat farm in Bavaria once, where I sustained myself for a week on gallons of herbal tea, afternoon naps and marathon sessions of watching Frasier. I was getting married and it was an emergency measure – I lost a stone and put it all back on before the honeymoon was over.

I am aware, however, that many people are deeply into sunrise yoga when they travel, as much as I am turned on by expansive breakfast buffets flanked by ice buckets full of crémant.

Most people visiting Bath in Somerset go to “take the waters”, immersing themselves in the historic geothermal springs in the hope of discovering life-enriching benefits, just as generations have done before them, including Queen Anne, who came regularly to seek respite from gout and dropsy (which would also be rather snazzy names for a pair of Scottish Folds, that odd breed of domestic cat with a genetic mutation that makes its ears bend forwards and downwards toward the front of its head).

The Gainsborough Bath Spa hotel opened in 2015, directly opposite one of the city’s main attractions: the Thermae Bath Spa, where all that immersing takes place. The hotel – converted from two Grade II listed buildings – taps into the source of the latter for its Spa Village, a tranquil space of water and heat treatment rooms set around an atrium with elegant pillars.

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The hotel riffs on its wellness properties, hosting seasonal programmes of activities as well as yoga on Saturdays and tai chi on Sundays. While this sort of orchestrated well-being leaves me as cold as any plunge pool, I spent ages trying to find a single flaw with the place when I visited recently.

The only thing I could identify was the flowers in the restaurant, which were close to dead. But, just as I made a mental note of their decrepitude, a florist appeared and changed the arrangements.

This is a near-perfect hotel – right down to the selection of reading glasses offered at the spa reception, for people like me who pretend they don’t need them. The décor at the hotel, by New York-based studio Champalimaud Design – also responsible for the Beverly Hills Hotel Bungalows and The Dorchester in London – is grown-up contemporary and looks freshly minted, with linear graphic hallway and stairwell carpets in black and grey, and rooms in muted, pleasing blue.

It all feels reassuringly expensive as well as classic. There’s an appealing cocktail bar, and a restaurant that suffers visually from the usual problem of having to serve as both breakfast room and date-night dinner venue.

But it bears its burdens with good grace. The food itself is splendid: chef Dan Moon is doing fine dining, but there is nothing tortured about it. A six-course tasting menu (￡60) includes sautéed scallop with a Japanese citrus whisper of yuzu and spring rolls filled with confit duck, rounded off with Moon’s own take on After Eights, finished in green marbled chocolate. It’s all executed with a light touch and a sense of fun.

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You need to book a treatment or spa package to access the Spa Village Bath, but residents can visit gratis from 7am to 9am and 8pm to 10pm and pass through the circuit of steam and sauna rooms and hydrotherapy pools.

I booked the most unusual sounding treatment I could find: Freedom (45 minutes from ￡120 weekdays). I’d assumed it would be a version of watsu, which I’ve had before, being pulled around like a rag doll in a pool.

“I’ll be taking you underwater,” explained Kabir, the spa manager. “No, you won’t,” I replied, as white-knuckle childhood fears came to the fore.

After some coaxing, and the application of a water-tight nose peg, I agreed to at least the first part of the treatment, which was indeed similar to watsu. Kabir pulled me in circular, balletic motions around him. More and more of my face became submerged with each movement. Then he began to pull me under.

Despite an initial adrenalin rush of panic, I calmed down considerably on the second movement and it was… well, quite magical. A fear conquered.

And after 45 minutes, when Kabir led me gently to the side of the pool, I felt like I’d had an out-of-body experience.

“I’ve never experienced anything like that,” I told him with a hushed sense of genuine awe and bliss, before getting out of the water, drying off, and heading straight to the bar.

Rooms at The Gainsborough Bath Spa cost from ￡187; continental breakfast costs an additional ￡25. There are five fully accessible rooms for guests with disabilities.

? Read the full review: The Gainsborough Bath Spa