The spas (health tourism)

THE SPAS (HEALTH TOURISM)

The Spas are the forerunners of the health tourism as seen today. After some years of being forgotten because of the explosion of mass tourism, they have returned with a certain strength in the traditional centres as well as in the most modern and luxurious hotels on the Málaga coast.

Combining the couple health and tourism or tourism and health, doesn’t stop being an attractive formula with increasing interest in the world as rest and physical well being are powerful arguments for the present tourist movement, and the spas, for their environmental characteristics, are not only ideal places for improving physical health, but also for fighting stress, tiredness of daily activities, the problems which the urban busy life generates in man. Therefore, the spa has stopped being an establishment for the old and is visited by people of all ages, sharing health cures with leisure, relaxation with fun. In the case of hotels with similar installations, the difference is even greater as it is another offer or a specialized service for the growing demand of the conventional tourist.

The province of Málaga has two important spas in Andalusia, the one of Carratraca and the one of Tolox. The first is situated in the locality with the same name, in the Guadalhorce valley, near Ardales, in a rough area in the Alcaparaín and Blanquilla sierras, at 58 kilometres from Málaga. It is a centre whose pools date from the 19th century, although the fame of the spring’s calcic sulphurous, arsenical and alkaline waters extended through Europe in the 18th century. The history of the spa, with a capacity for 200 clients per day, recalls illustrious visitors, such as Eugenia de Montijo, Lord Byron, and Campoamor.

The palace of Doña Trinidad Grund and the hostel Principe which king Fernando VII ordered to be built, are still conserved in Carratraca. These waters are for treating skin complaints and mucus, the nervous system, bones and articulations and many others.

The Tolox spa is situated between the Sierra de las Nieves to the west and the municipal districts of Istán and Monda, to the south. The foothills of the Ronda highland in these parts take the name of Sierra Parda and the locality is at 48 kilometres from Marbella, 54 from Ronda, and 55 from Málaga. This spa is at the foot of the Caballos river and was inaugurated in 1869, three years after José Garcia Rey, the town’s pharmacist, discovered the springs of bicarbonated, magnesic, oligometalic, radioactive and sulphated waters, which are recommended for complaints of the respiratory system, rinitis, pharyngitis, allergic catarrhs, bronchial asthma and complaints of the urinary tracts. Illustrious personalities also visited this spa such as the general Primo de Rivera, the singer Luis Mariano, and the bullfighters Lagartijo and Ignacio Sánchez-Mejías, among others.

As well as the two spas, the other centres which are appropriate for health tourism and which are situated in the Costa del Sol are the Buchinger clinic, in Marbella, with two dozen sanitary services as well as other cosmetic service; the Byblos Andaluz hotel (Mijas Costa) and Meliá Costa del Sol (Bajondillo promenade in Torremolinos), who both have centres for talasotherapy and hydrotherapy; the Incosol hotel (Marbella), with an offer of a dozen treatments and a series of services for improving the physical state; the Marbella Health clinic, situated near Benahavís, offers similar services. Two once conventional hotels have been transformed to attend to this type of demand of the health tourism. They are the old Stakis Paraiso, today El Paraiso, in Estepona and the Club Puerta del Sol, in Mijas. The first is dedicated to the traditional Chinese medicine and the second to natural medicine. As well as these and the previously mentioned, there are many hotels which although not specialized do have their own services for improving the physique with sauna, Jacuzzi, heated pools, gymnasium, massage, etc.