Therapy underground
The healing gallery is the underground variant of climate therapy: in former mines and natural caves a microclimate prevails that is almost constant across the year — cool, highly humid, practically free of dust, pollen and pollutants. Speleotherapy uses exactly that: patients and guests spend rest cures of one to two hours underground and let the pure air work on the airways.
How the gallery climate works
The saturated, moist, cold air (often around 4 to 12 °C) calms irritated airways, the freedom from allergens gives the immune system a break, and in salt and mineral galleries the aerosol component is added. Classic fields of use are asthma, chronic bronchitis and allergic airway diseases — more recently rehabilitation after respiratory infections too. The application is as simple as can be: lie wrapped up warm and breathe.
From mine to cure operation
Many healing galleries are second careers: the healing gallery at the Silberberg in Bodenmais, for instance, continues the legacy of historic mining as a therapy station — combined with the climatic health resort above it, a double climate offering. Similar addresses carry the cure landscape from the Alps into the low mountains; some salt mines combine the gallery with visitor operations and salt-grotto offshoots above ground.
The healing gallery in a wellness holiday
For wellness travellers the healing gallery is perhaps the most unusual half-day point of a region: one to two hours of rest cure in absolute silence and the purest air, then back to the warm hotel. Whoever stays in the Bavarian Forest — in Bodenmais, for instance — has the gallery and the spa in the same place; those plagued by airway trouble plan several appointments spread over the stay.
