January 11, 2017

On the outskirts of Cuenca, about a 30 minute bus ride from where we are staying, is a quaint little town called Banos. (There are actually two towns in Ecuador called Banos, the other Banos is near Quito). This little town is the home of Piedra de Agua Hot Springs and Spa, 

Mondays they offer two-for-one on the spa circuit, so it was a great day to treat ourselves. 

Arriving at 11 am we started out in the steam room (Turkish Bath). 15 minutes of hot steam.... it was a long 15 minutes!

From there we moved on to the mud baths.  Here is where the fun begins!!

The red mud pool is for exfoliating. We got all mudded up, including the face, then sat and let it dry.  A quick rinsing off in the red water, then a hot shower in one of the outdoor volcanic shower stalls, and into the blue mud pool. We did the same in this pool as we did in the red.



I have to say here, that so far it was pretty good. We had a few laughs and chatted it up with others enjoying the same treatments.  We met up with Dianna and Wayne in the blue pool, so we hung out with them for the rest of the day.  


After we were all showered off from the blue pool we were taken to an underground thermal pool. They call it the Underground Terrestrial Contrast. It was candle lit with nice soothing music. You can see two pools in the picture (borrowed from the website) - one was nice and HOT, the other was ICE COLD!  We were suppose to sit in the hot one for 15 minutes then dip into the cold one for one minute - and repeat - NOT!!  Pretty much stayed in the hot one - maybe dipped our toes in the cold.

The next stop was the Baths of Drawer - steam boxes. This was definitely a first for us! We were able to control the amount of steam that came in with a valve on the inside of the box. 







With all that being done, the last place we visited was the Japanese Swimming Pool. 

Here we just relaxed and finished out our day in the nice warm thermal waters.  

Piedra de Agua has three outdoor pools including the Japanese pool, set in a beautifully landscaped area with a fountain and gardens. They offer massages for an extra fee, and they have a nice restaurant (which we never ate at). 

It was about 2:30 when we decided it was time to shower once again and head for home. 

We had Almurezos (lunch) in the little town with Dianna and Wayne, then made our way to the street where we caught our bus.  A full day, it was 4:00 when we got home - and we both sure slept well that night.