19 of the best luxury spas in the Mediterranean

The Opium Health Spa, The Elysium Hotel, Cyprus

From Monaco to Bodrum the Mediterranean is full of hotspots that attract some of the largest private superyachts and the most expensive luxury yachts for charter. Thankfully, the Mediterranean is also home to some of the world’s best spas. So after a long week of socialising at some top Mediterranean party destinations, hop off your yacht and enjoy a spot of pampering.

1. The Opium Health Spa, Elysium Hotel, Cyprus

From a bright and contemporary reception area with a Grecian mosaic at one end, stroll down the stone-floored corridor to the vast indoor pool, which is surrounded by comfy loungers and lies adjacent to a Jacuzzi, sauna and steam room, perfect for an afternoon of relaxation after a stint in the fully-equipped gymnasium. Opt for a Pilates class with the charming in-house personal trainer to help improve your posture and core strength.

For the main pampering event, retire behind a curved wooden wall into the Balinese styled relaxation lounge, a quiet spot to enjoy a cup of herbal tea and a book before your treatment. Begin with an ESPA full body Balinese massage and enjoy 80 minutes of muscle unravelling by way of warm essential oils and hot stones — be sure to say what pressure you prefer, though a stronger massage will leave you feeling light and extremely relaxed. To add to your experience, opt for a restorative mud wrap to leave your skin feeling smooth and rejuvenated.

Best by boat: Superyachts up to 110 metres can moor at the Limassol Marina on the southern coast of the island.

Sani Resort

Halkidiki, Greece

Wrapped around a bay in Northern Greece with a marina for yachts up to 33 metres at the centre, the Sani Resort has five spas (with just a golf buggy ride between each). There is an extraordinary amount of treatments and wellness options for guests to try, all boasting luxurious products by Anne Semonin.

Guests at Sani Club can head to the beautiful Club Spa to unwind with a range of treatments, including Thai massage, Mediterranean salt exfoliation and Indian Shirodhara, among many others. Additionally, there's a couple's suite where you can enjoy a treatment with your other half. Bright, light and airy, this is an elegant space with both indoor and outdoor relaxation areas alongside thermal offerings.

The resort's newest hotel is the stunning Sani Dunes, which features the D spa. Here, guests can partake in the latest cryotherapy treatments, Xerolipo Bodysculpting, Opera LED therapy and a sparkling pink quartz exfoliation body scrub, among an expansive list of relaxing therapies.

Guests staying at Sani Asterias can enjoy an exclusive-use and fully-equipped spa, complete with two private rooms with steam baths and a couple's suite – this VIP-only spa is just one of the reasons to visit Halkidiki this summer.

Finca Cortesin

Casares, Spain

The towering atrium that houses the Finca Cortesin spa is a soothing oasis, which boasts a 25 metre salt water indoor pool bathed in natural light. Mirrored doors lead guests to beautiful stone thermal areas with steam rooms, Finnish saunas, a plunge pool and the first snow cave to be built in Spain.

A huge range of treatments are on offer, from manicures and pedicures to facials and body wraps – don't deny yourself the indulgence of a therapeutic Thai massage, which will leave you feeling so relaxed you can barely grasp your post-treatment cup of herbal tea.

Guests can also make use of the fully-equipped gymnasium just around the corner and the three outdoor pools – opt for 50, 35 or 30 metre lengths to keep in shape while on vacation in this tranquil corner of Casares.

Best by boat: Superyachts can make use of the anchorage just off the hotel's Beach Club, tender in and take a private car up to the hotel, which is just 1.5 kilometres away.

Aman Sveti Stefan

Montenegro

There really is nowhere else quite like this place: a 15th century fishing village built on a tiny islet that rises out of the sparkling Adriatic Sea. Its cute cottages have been converted to five-star hotel suites and, across on the mainland at Aman’s Villa Miločer, is one of the best luxury spas in the Mediterranean, with a heated indoor/outdoor swimming pool and treatment rooms with fireplaces for cosy winter pampering. Therapists make full use of the herbs that grow wild along this rugged coastline to create restorative massages that are heavenly scented with local valerian, sage, thyme and lavender. You can moor in the nearby Bay of Kotor at the Adriatic’s superyacht capital, Porto Montenegro, which has ambitions to become as important as Saint-Tropez and Porto Cervo on the Mediterranean yachting calendar.

Best by boat

Superyacht Heaven Porto Montenegro has 400 berths ranging up to 180 metre and a huge range of facilities. Yachts often anchor off Villa Milocer and tender into its pier, or to the pier on Sveti Stefan island.

JW Marriott Venice

Italy

What have we here? A spa with its own dock, so you can rock up, tousled from a turn around the lagoon, and hop straight on to a treatment bed. Built on a private island, on the grounds of a former hospital for respiratory disease, JW Marriot’s GOCO Spa Venice has fast gained a reputation as one of the best luxury spas in the Mediterrean. Clean, white lines, porthole windows and outdoor decks looking across to St Mark’s Square make it the ideal retreat from the crowds and velvet brocade stuffiness of old school Venice. QMS Medicosmetics is at the helm with its famous skin-brightening oxygen facials and collagen-boosting formulas. Guests can detox in the hammam, with its lung-cleansing salt wall, tone up in the aqua tonic pool with massage jets set to key metabolism-boosting points or wind down with alfresco yoga in the herb garden. It is the perfect place to end a luxury yacht charter in Venice or to recover after the Venice Film Festival.

Picture courtesy of JW Marriott Venice/Facebook

Le Mas Candille

Mougins, France

After the energy-zapping fluster of the Côte d’Azur, the green hills of Grasse are a rejuvenating haven. This Shiseido Spa is housed at the Hôtel Le Mas Candille in the medieval village of Mougins, 10 minutes from Cannes – and it brings the latest Japanese-inspired anti-ageing treats to brighten skin and undo the sins of sun worship. Indeed, as you cross the spa’s ornamental bridge you can feel your frown unfurrow. All the treatments use the Qi method: a traditional Oriental philosophy that aims to restore the vital energy that runs through the body. The Future Solution LX Facial Ceremony, which uses ingredients ranging from pearl to green tea and star fruit, involves a number of delicate steps, from exfoliation to light steaming with Oshibori hot towels and a firming face massage. And there’s the excellent Shiseido boutique, which sells hard-to-find specialist anti-ageing creams and Serge Lutens fragrances.

Picture courtesy of Le Mas Candille/Facebook

Thermes Marins

Monte-Carlo, Monaco

Resembling a luxury spaceship hovering over Port Hercules, this massive spa is a suitably cutting-edge place to rejuvenate after the Monaco Grand Prix or Monaco Yacht Show. There’s a spectacular pool and a sprawling gym, both of which overlook the clutch of superyachts far below, but the must-have experience here is cryotherapy. Used in the sporting world to help speed athletes’ recovery, clients brave a cold sauna (at -110C) for three minutes, wearing protective socks, gloves and not much else. This is not for the panic-inclined but it’s worth gritting your teeth for the serotonin-induced marathon runner glow. Kiss insomnia, jet lag and muscle inflammation goodbye and rejoice in your newly glowing skin. The less intrepid can enjoy elaborate pampering, too. Don’t miss the Absolute Youth Experience, with its mother-of-pearl powder body peel and series of massages and scented baths. Cleopatra would certainly have approved.

D-Hotel Maris

Marmaris, Turkey

From the glass-walled gym, you look out on to a sparkling bay, where there’s always a visiting yacht – as well as the hotel’s own charters, an Azimut 55 and a 30 metre Turkish gulet. This slick resort has enlisted the personal training services of Bodyism, the fitness company that keeps Rosie Huntington-Whiteley’s curves in cover-girl shape. Post workout, soothe aching limbs with a sea salt and oil scrub and an Aegean sea shell massage. Bodyism’s philosophy is hardcore but it’s not heartless, so sushi at the resort’s branch of the swanky Japanese restaurant, Zuma, is also on the schedule.

There are changes planned for the spa this summer so keep your eyes peeled as it looks set to become even more stunning in 2016.

Best by boat

Yachts anchor out in the sheltered bay around D-Hotel’s beaches. Tenders zip guests onto the jetty and straight into the heart of the resort. If you fancy a couple of nights on dry land book into the Presidential Suite which offers spectacular views across the bay.

Monastero Santa Rosa

Amalfi Coast, Italy

The nuns moved out a century ago but they still ring the church bell on your arrival at this heavenly spa hotel. Perched high on the cliffs at Conca dei Marini, overlooking the Amalfi Coast, the old convent is set among herb gardens that cascade down towards a wonderfully dramatic infinity pool; the perfect spot for eyeing the superyachts in the bay below.

In keeping with the ecclesial feel, treatments use Santa Maria Novella’s healing herbal creams and balms, originally made by Florentine monks for Catherine de Medici. The vaulted treatment rooms, in the old wine cellar, are cool and quiet. There, you can enjoy a herbal body scrub, nourishing bee pollen facial or maybe an Aloe Coulis body wrap that takes the sting out of sunburnt skin with manuka honey and ice poultices. Amen to that.

Borgo Egnazia

Puglia, Italy

Built from scratch in 2011 in the style of a traditional whitewashed village, this place is pretty enough for French Vogue to book it as a backdrop for fashion shoots. Staff welcome your bambinos with open arms at one of the Med’s best kids’ clubs. Furthermore, it doesn’t close until 10pm, so you can park the progeny and enjoy a gaping, guilt-free window to hit the spa. Expect acres of buttermilk marble, flickering candles, soothing pools, toga-clad therapists and top-notch treatments (Aquann, the saline float tank, is one of the best legal highs available).

Best by boat

The 318-berth Cala Ponte Marina from Camper & Nicholsons has recently opened, just down the road.

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