What’s it like?

Chun Hui Yuan (春晖园温泉度假村) bucks the trend in the world of Beijing hot springs, forgoing kitsch adornments and faux tropical scenes for something more stylish, with classic wooden trellises and sleek stone furnishings dominating the decor. The baths are divided into three areas – one indoors, two outdoors – and vary in size with plenty of options for both couples looking for a bit of privacy and large groups. The Garden Baths garner the most attention: ten steaming open-air pools offer different types of aromatic-infused waters to help relaxation; stay here into the evening for a soak under the stars. The next-door Lakeside Baths shouldn’t be missed either, offering views of Chun Hui Yuan Hotel’s grounds beyond.

Alongside the 30-odd baths, Chun Hui Yuan has a heated indoor swimming pool, hot stone resting beds, steam rooms and saunas – the ‘hot’ sauna even has a plunge pool and television for optimum chill time. There’s an onsite spa offering a range of treatments, including a 40-minute foot massage (88RMB) and a whole-body oil massage (398RMB).

Feng Shan (金隅凤山温泉度假村) offers paradise from the perspective of a particularly sleazy toddler, with a landscape of concrete caves, plastic rocks, frog-shaped fountains and semi-submersed basketball hoops. Grin and embrace it, because it’s huge, it’s tasteless, and it’s open 24 tacky hours of the day.

Provincial leisure centre on acid it might be, but we enjoy this psychedelic idyll precisely because, at the end of the day, lying on a bubble bed next to a model elephant is always going to be a giggle. And if you look beyond the glare from the fairy lights and illuminated swans, the outside spring area offers spectacular views of the nearby mountains.

Facilities

Feng Shan offers stacks of reasonably private pools both inside and out, with noticeably different water temperatures and mineral levels. There’s also a 25-metre swimming pool complete with disco-tastic decor, some toasty kang beds, saunas and a cinema.

The baths at Shunjing (北京顺景温泉) are clean, tastefully decorated and, with more than 90 indoor pools to choose from, finding a quiet spot is simple enough. Like something out of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the setting is fairly mystical: sunlight streams through the glass roof, soft lanterns create an ethereal glow and smoky wooden bridges link rock pathways to the pools. The fake trees and plastic castle in the kid’s pool shatter the illusion somewhat, but fortunately aren’t too invasive.

Outside, vivid evergreens, springs and wooden pagodas feel authentic for the most part, but with fewer than a dozen baths in the garden – all of which back onto the Fourth Ring Road, and one of which is unbearably scalding, seemingly even for the hardiest of heat fiends. For outdoor bathing, you’ll want to look elsewhere.

Facilities

Inside, there’s a pool for everyone with waters measuring from 30-50°C – including particularly nourishing 'extra-mineral-rich' pools. There are saunas, hot stone beds and a range of spa treatments, like body massages (298RMB for an hour) and pedicures (98RMB for 45 minutes). A reasonably priced bar and buffet (98RMB), free Wi-Fi and cinema deliver sustenance and entertainment.

Though purportedly situated on a site where emperors past used to revel in toasty volcanic aqua, the recent renovations at Jiuhua (九华山庄) have left it with more of a lido-cum-spa feel, so a connection with nature feels somewhat lost. Nevertheless, it still sources hot water from 1,230m below the ground and its wide range of pools and reasonable price point make it a decent choice for a rejuvenating dip. And from higher vantage points, the distant northern mountains are visible, provided the skies are clear.

The outdoor space sees a whole host of herbal and heated baths surround a central swimming pool – all with different properties and health benefits – to help soothe the skin, tired muscles, blood pressure and the soul. Indoor facilities include numerous saunas and steam rooms, therapeutic showers and even a fish pedicure pool. The kids can be dropped off at the pool and play area, while complimentary post-soak rubdowns are available in the pleasant changing rooms. A basic range of snacks and drinks are also on sale.

Located west of Chaoyang Park, this city-based spa feels more like a classy bathhouse than the usual sprawling resorts found in the suburbs. The spring here is supposedly natural and has been tapped from 2,500m below ground.

Facilities

Men and women bathe in separate areas and nudity is mandatory. Submerging into the soothing water feels like entering an enormous bath, and each area also includes a spacious sauna and a steam-filled Finnish bath. While a basic buffet is included in the price (the club also provides faux silk peach pyjamas to protect your modesty), massages, manicures and scrubs are available for an additional cost.

WTown resort is located 130km northeast of downtown Beijing, where the Simatai Great Wall partitions the capital from surrounding Hebei. A stone warren of villas and meandering canals, WTown’s picturesque setting is an interesting backdrop for the sing 'n' soak KTV bathtubs that make up one of the resort’s several hot spring offerings. From nightfall, the Great Wall is lit up and offers a spectacular backdrop if you opt for any one of the al fresco pools. If not, it’s your partner’s gaze.

Facilities

There are two distinctly different hot spring experiences on offer at WTown Hotsprings, and while both of them involve KTV, only one offers pole dancing. For the couples, luxurious private rooms include the spring, KTV screen, microphones, unlimited reverb and seasonal fruit platter. For the racier, there’s a wet hall with roughly ten disco-lit personal pools encircling a podium complete with floor-to-ceiling pole, 'hired entertainment' and a Gongti-style bar that delivers drinks to your pool.