6 Stress-Relieving Spas to Get You Through the Holiday Season

December 8, 2014

Let’s face it – the holidays can be stressful. There are parties to attend, gifts to buy, friends to see and way too many foods and drinks continually testing your will power.

It’s easy to get caught up in the swirl of the holidays and forget that this downtime can be the valuable break you need to recharge and recenter for the new year ahead. So, why not do things differently this year and escape to get a massage or a few hours in a spa? Now we’re talking. Here are six top golf resorts with excellent spas.

Encore Spa at Wynn Las Vegas (Las Vegas, Nev.)

A unique design by Steve Wynn and Tom Fazio, Wynn Golf Course is the only golf course attached to a resort on the Las Vegas Strip. After enjoying 18 holes, unwind at Wynn’s Encore Spa, named a Forbes Travel Guide five-star award winner. Escape everyday stresses with a world-famous massage featuring techniques to relax your mind and body. With its designer treatment rooms, garden villas and couples rooms’, Encore Spa offers truly luxurious relaxation for all guests.

 

Hyatt Regency Hill Country Resort & Spa (San Antonio, Texas)

Not far from The Alamo, The Hyatt Regency Hill Country Resort and Spa sits on 300 acres and treats guests to 27 holes of superb golf designed by Arthur Hills. At the Wildflower spa go for the Aunt Mary’s Ranch Remedy where you’ve got to love the aromatic body scrub, hydrating massage and a full-body wrap in warm linens  or the Hill Country Spa Essentials combining massage, facial, manicure and pedicure. Chill by the private garden spa pool.

 

The Woodstock Inn & Resort (Woodstock, Vt.)

Set in a picturesque valley, the Woodstock Inn’s golf course, with its narrow, tight lies, many bunkers and about a dozen carries over the Kedron Brook and ponds, is a Robert Trent Jones classic. If the weather doesn’t permit for 18 holes, the Inn’s 10,000 square foot spa entices you to indulge in a sports massage or Body Melt Back Therapy with Arnica Gel and hot steaming towels. Very relaxing.

 

Crystal Springs Resort (Hamburg, N.J.)

Take seven courses and pretty hills, along with a full service resort, and you have a recipe for a great vacation. Courses climb up and down the landscape, offering dramatic drops as found on Wild Turkey and Great Gorge. Off course, book a service in the Reflections Spa that stimulates your sense with its vibrant red theme, back-lit panels and a quartz crystal ceiling. The spa menu offers some highly innovative treatments like a Chardonnay Vinotherapy Massage, Spicy Chai Wrap and Active Life Massage.

 

Shawnee Inn Golf Resort (Shawnee-on-the-Delaware, Pa.)

One of the older resorts dating from the early 1900s, the Shawnee Inn and Golf Resort can claim it has the first course designed by A.W. Tillinghast, with many of the 27 holes of Shawnee Country Club set on a private island. Another great play is the Great Bear Golf Club designed by Jack Nicklaus. Want to feel like a VIP? Create your own spa therapy in Spa Shawnee’s  Mixology treatment or book the Farm-to-Spa Table Body Wrap.

 

Omni Mount Washington (Bretton Woods, N.H.)

A grand Spanish Renaissance-style hotel rising from the trees like a European castle, the Omni Mount Washington has been welcoming guests like Winston Churchill and Bobby Jones for more than a century. Today golfing guests continue to play the historic Donald Ross track (1915) and tee up at the 9-hole Mount Pleasant Course (1895), both restored by Brian Silva. Soak up the views and soothing services at the spa where treatment rooms look out to Mount Washington.

 

 

Featured image courtesy of The Spa at Omni Mount Washington.