What is brine?
Brine is water with dissolved common salt — recognised as healing water from about 14 grams of salt per litre, that is around 1.4 per cent. Many brine baths work with considerably higher concentrations of three to twelve per cent; by comparison: sea water lies at about 3.5 per cent, the Dead Sea at nearly 30. Brine is won from underground salt deposits or saline deep springs — in Bavaria the tradition reaches back to the oldest inland saltworks still working in the world, in Bad Reichenhall.
Why salt water does the body good
Three effects carry the brine bath. Buoyancy: the higher the salt concentration, the more strongly the water carries — joints and spine are noticeably relieved, which is why brine is classically used in movement therapy. The skin: the salt works mildly keratolytically and is traditionally used as an accompaniment for psoriasis and neurodermatitis. The airways: above the warm brine water stands salty air that moistens the mucous membranes when inhaled — the same mechanism that graduation towers and salt grottoes reinforce.
Brine bath, salt grotto, salt sauna — the formats
The brine bath is the pool itself, often run pleasantly warm and in many thermal baths kept as a separate pool beside the fresh water. The salt grotto does without water: a room lined with salt whose air carries finely nebulised brine — a session typically lasts 45 minutes in a lounger. The salt sauna combines mild sauna warmth with salt to rub into the skin. Good spa landscapes deliberately place the formats side by side.
Brine in a spa hotel
Brine pools and salt treatments now belong to the basic equipment of ambitious hotel spas — from the brine pool in the adults-only spa to the salt-stone rest lounge. Whoever wants to bathe deliberately for skin or airways watches for the stated concentration and plans several treatments spread over the stay; whoever simply loves the carried, weightless bathing needs no justification.
