Lifestyle

3 Places to Spa Away Your Winter Blues

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Tony Maples Photography

 

Post holiday winter “blahs” got you? Chase them away by visiting a Texas Hill Country spa. Texas Hill Country spas range from luxurious destination spas to working ranches to golf havens.

1. Lake Austin Spa Resort

water-skiing

Photo: Flickr/md-2

With a waterfront location, a thirty minutes northwest of Austin, Lake Austin Spa Resort offers services ranging from outdoor fun to quiet, indoor activities. Visitors can try kayaking or stand-up paddleboarding. Love being out on the water? Take a pontoon boat tour or waterskiing lessons.

Open to the public as a day spa; Lake Austin Spa also boasts an exclusive, closed campus for its overnight guests. Small, with only forty rooms, the overnight facilities attracts an elite crowd of ladies. An expensive resort, the draw of wellness programming, classes, activities and great food make it worth the price.

To contact Lake Austin Spa Resort call them at (800) 847-5637 or visit their website.

2. Hyatt Regency Lost Pines

Archery Lesson

Photo: Flickr/Dan Markeye

Looking for the most kid-friendly spa in America? Look no further. A ranch-style resort Spa near Bastrop State Park boasts tons of outdoor activities and a kids club. The kids adore Boots, the mascot dog, who visits most of the kids’ activities.

With 492 huge rooms, you can meet all varieties of people riding horses or kayaking on the Lower Colorado River. The spa claims 405 acres right next door to the 1,100 acre McKinney Roughs Nature Park. All that space gives you room to do many things. Run on the trail, ride horses, or go rafting. Want to learn something new? Try archery lessons, stargazing, or birdwatching. Golfers can take on the Wolfdancer – a challenging but playable par-72 course.

The Firewheel Café provides healthy meals including fresh-squeezed carrot juice and organic chickens. To contact the resort, give them a call at (512) 308-1234.

3. Travaasa Austin

spa-ingredients

Photo: Flickr/Amila Tennakoon

Want something completely different? Visit Travaasa Austin. Seventy guest rooms, scattered throughout seven Texas farmhouse type buildings, across 210 acres is bound to scratch your itch.

Embrace nature as you unwind next to the Balcones Canyonlands Preserve.  In addition to massages and beauty treatments using organic, bioenergetics products in one of the eleven spa rooms, the spa also offers untraditional services.

Learn to ride a mechanical bull. Or join the Equine Encounter and let a couple of cowboys teach you to “horse whisper.” Visit the working farm to see the chickens and the honeybees. Test yourself on the Prickly Pear Challenge course. And when the day is through, two-step under the stars or join in on a fireside chat.  For more information, call (855) 868-7282 0r visit their website