Massage Amsterdam, a sauna or a long bath: three ways to end a day on foot
Written for visitorsAfter a long day on foot, visitors weigh up a few ways to spend the evening: a sauna, a long bath in the hotel, or a massage in Amsterdam in their own room. Each has its place, and the choice depends mostly on how much effort is left in you.
The question comes up in booking threads, phrased one way or another: is it worth booking a massage, or would a sauna do? The honest answer is that they are different evenings. A public sauna is a place you go to. A bath is something you do alone. A massage in your room is someone coming to you. Which one suits depends on the day you have had and the evening you want.
The sauna evening
The city has several public saunas, and the larger hotels often have their own. Going means getting dressed again, travelling across town and following the house rules; in many city saunas men and women share the space and swimwear is not worn, which surprises some visitors. The heat and the cold plunge are pleasant after a cold day. But it is an outing, with a journey there and back, and after twenty kilometres of walking the journey can be the part you cannot face.
The bath evening
A long bath costs nothing and needs no arranging, if your room has a tub; plenty of city hotel rooms have only a shower. It is quiet and private and over in half an hour. Its limit is that it is something you do for yourself, and after a day of doing everything for yourself, from reading maps to standing in queues, some people want the evening to be the opposite.
Why some choose a massage in Amsterdam instead
A massage brings the evening to you. You shower, warm the room and wait; she arrives forty to sixty minutes after confirmation with towels and oil, and for the length you chose someone else sets the pace. Nothing on this site claims a massage does more for tired legs than a sauna or a bath. The difference is the attention of another person and the fact that you never have to put your shoes back on. The figure for each length is on every profile on the therapists page, so the cost is clear before you write.
Doing more than one
They do not exclude each other. A visitor with a hotel spa can spend an hour there in the afternoon and still book the room for the evening. A bath before she arrives serves as well as a shower, provided the room is warm and the bathroom free afterwards. The guide to a full body massage after a walking holiday looks at what a walking day does to legs, back and shoulders.