The German Spa

At the end of a trip for a family wedding, we had a layover in Frankfurt. We managed to extend the layover to a four day mini-vacation, which was great! I always say, travelling to see family is not a vacation. Often, after spending a lot of time with family, we NEED a vacation, and this was one of those times.

The initial plan was to rent a car and see a bit of the Black Forest. I asked some friends for tips on what to see in the area. One friend, Jack, said if we're going to be in Germany we should check out a spa.

"I'm not really into spas," I responded. "I guess Jasmine might like it."

"Oh," said Jack. "But you've never been to a German spa. First of all they're super cheap. Like 30 euros for the whole day with everything included. It's not like some luxury hotel thing you might have seen in other places. This is like a regular weekend family outing kind of thing."

"Ok..." I was still not convinced.

"And did I mention they're fully nude and co-ed?" Jack laughed. Suddenly he had my attention.

So I looked into spas in the area, and found that Baden Baden, on the edge of the Black Forest, is home to one of the oldest, most celebrated of all German spas, the Friedrichsbad. The information I could find online seemed to indicate that there were two wings, and half the week one wing would be for only women and the other for only men, but the rest of the week it would be mixed. I planned accordingly.

When we finally got to Baden Baden on a Friday afternoon, we parked the rental car and walked over to the spa. The palatial building was impressive, even on the outside. There was a long line of people at the front desk. People were giving up. Eventually we were able to speak to a staff member. She said the spa is too full so they can't let anybody in. We could wait, but she couldn't say how long the wait might be. There was no way to reserve a time slot. Disheartened, we contemplated giving up. Time-wise we could only afford one more day in the area, and as far as I knew, the next day, Saturday, would be gender-separated. Plus I figured if it's this busy on a Friday it must be insane on the weekend.

On a long shot, I asked about Saturday.

"Yes, you could come tomorrow," said the attendant. "If you show up in the morning or early afternoon, there usually isn't a wait."

"Even on the weekend?" I was surprised.

"Yes."

"But tomorrow it's gender-separated, isn't it?"

"No. We don't have separate days anymore. Every day is together."

"Really!?"

"Since Covid started we are under-staffed and we had to close one wing, so only one operates, so we can't have separate days." And so, Jasmine and I found a place to stay for the night in a nearby town, and a lovely little fancy restaurant for dinner, and made our way back in the morning.

We showed up at the Friedrichsbad around 11am, and there was no wait. We paid 35 euros each for the full day, including lockers, towel, shampoo, body lotion and tea. They gave us little wrist band "watches" that would let us in and would work the lockers. You can't have people walking around fully-nude with keys after all. Nude means no pockets, and no belts to loop a key ring on.

Once past the turnstyle, we arrived in the locker room. Immediately there was something strange about this. It looked, smelled and acted like a normal locker room you would find at any public pool in any country. But there was only one.

"This is a little weird," Jasmine said with a grin as we both started to disrobe.

"A little," I agreed, as I watched her. Jasmine is one of those women who is much more attractive than she admits. Her supple, perfect, natural breasts came loose, her pink-brown nipples standing slightly erect in the cool air. Her soft, milky perfect skin gleamed in the light, highlighting the curves of her round butt. As always, she was clean-shaven.

I was also hyper-aware of my own nakedness, wondering if I would get an erection (somehow I didn't). I've got a decent middle-eastern nerd-body. Thin with some muscular tone. Slightly dark skin and a good amount of body hair. But I had come prepared. I had groomed the "black forest" a bit.

We grabbed our towels, walked out of the locker room and into the wet area of the spa. The place was neither packed nor empty. Nude men and women of all ages were walking around in singles, pairs and groups, moving from one station to another.

The Friedrichsbad is what's known as a Roman-Irish Bath: a series of 14 different stations that you're supposed to visit in an order designed for maximum health benefits.

The first stop was the thermal water shower. We walked into a small shower-room again like you might find at any public pool, except here everyone was fully nude. I showered right beside Jasmine, casting a glance or two at the other people. There were a few well-endowed middle-aged men.

Now both dripping wet, we moved into the next room, the dry warm-air bath. This was a warm quiet room with four beach loungers and a few chairs. The room was packed, so we had to wait our turn to find a place to sit. There were several people of each gender, fully nude of course. The women here were mostly middle aged, with large breasts. The men ranged from muscular to a little fat. The strangest thing was how quiet it was. You could have heard a pin drop. People were minding their own business. Not shying away from glances, but certainly not staring. We enjoyed warming up from the shower, and then made our way to the next station.

The next station was a hotter, dry sauna room. Here we left our eyeglasses at the door in a handy shelf provided for that purpose. So I couldn't see too well. But we had a good sweat, in a room with several men and a few women.

The original spa experience then involves a soap and brush massage, but due to staffing issues that wasn't available, so it was on to the thermal pools. When we got into the first bath, I glanced around, and then turned to Jasmine.

"You know," I said quietly, "I might be the only circumcised man in the whole place."

She glanced around, trying not to be too obvious, as she sized up the competition. "Huh. You may be right," she said.

As we were enjoying the warm spring water in the hot-tub sized pool, a young couple came and sat across from us. They looked like they were in their early-to-mid twenties. He was tall and lanky, light skinned but with dark hair and a hipster moustache. It seemed like he was having a good time letting it all hang out, as was I. With him was a thin, pretty Asian woman. She had small breasts with a round nice shape, hard little dark nipples, no body hair save for a trim well-kempt black triangle around her crotch. I'm not sure she was having the best time. She looked embarrassed and uncomfortable, as she kept moving her hands to block the view of her breasts, and then moving them away as if she felt she wasn't supposed to do that. I tried not to be too obvious about checking her out. She was not exactly my type, but certainly very pretty.

Now, obviously I'm not a pure nudist. I love nudity, especially social nudity. I'm fascinated by it. But I'm also turned on by it, sexually. I get a thrill out of being nude in public or among other people. I get another thrill out of seeing Jasmine nude in public. And I get a third thrill out of being around other nude people, especially attractive women. And embarrassed nude females is one of my favourite porn categories. So this was great!

We went to the next stop, a much wider but shallower hot tub with several jets. Here you could barely get your chest under the surface without lying back almost horizontally, so there were a lot of breasts on display. Again, most of the crowd were slightly older couples, including some women with gigantic breasts (great if that's your thing, but it's not really mine).

We waited our turn to enjoy one of the jets, and just as we got one, the young thin couple from the previous pool joined us. I guess they were following the circuit too, and were just behind us. Again the young woman seemed embarrassed, instinctively putting her hands in front of her chest every time she moved. But like Patrick Stewart in that silly comedy clip with Ricky Gervais, I've already seen everything. They were far enough away that they wouldn't hear us, so I whispered with Jasmine, guessing where they were from. Maybe he was Portuguese and she was Chinese. We'll never really know.

After some fun with the jets (I wondered if any of the women were having a good time with them) it was on to the next pool. This is the famous circular exercise pool under a gorgeous domed ceiling, with Roman statues all around. It looked like we were in some serious Catholic cathedral or something. Super pretty. And this pool was actually large and deep enough to swim. Swimming is one of those things that's really enhanced by being fully nude. If you haven't tried it, you're missing out. It's like floating in the universe with nothing touching you but warm, peaceful water. This feeling, in this location, was pure bliss.

We lingered there a while and then went to the last pool, the cool plunge bath. Something about going from warm water to cold water is supposed to be very good for you, or rejuvenating or something. It was cold, and rather unpleasant, but it's part of the experience so I went for it. 18 degrees (or 64 for you Americans) which feels even colder coming from one of the warm baths. I forced myself in down to my neck, and then jumped out. Jasmine dipped a toe in, said, "Nope!" and retreated. We both went back to one of the warm baths.

Now that we were no longer doing the circuit in the traditional order, we started to see more unfamiliar faces (and bodies). There was a guy here with some serious muscles. I wondered if Jasmine was checking him out. And there was a young woman who was very much my type. Long, light brown hair, piercing green eyes, milky skin, thin almost boyish figure with small round breasts and pert brown nipples, zero body hair. She looked almost perfect. I wondered if Jasmine knew I was checking her out. If she did, she made nothing of it.

Once we were warmed up, we went back to the showers and then to the drying room, where there were some lotions and creams available. As we were drying, the woman with the green eyes walked in and I got an even better look at her as now there was no water or steam in the way. I got a nice look from several angles as she started to lotion herself up. If ever in the day I was in danger of getting an obvious erection it was now, but I soldiered on.

The final two stations are the swaddling room and the tea room. Jasmine opted out of the swaddling. She wasn't a fan of being attended to by workers (who were fully dressed by the way), or being wrapped up. But I enjoyed it thoroughly. You walk nude into a slightly darkened, quiet room, drop off your towel, and wait for the attendant. The attendant (male in this case) shows you to a bed. You lie down on the pre-warmed blankets and he wraps you up like a baby. And you just lie there in the dark and quiet, swaddled like a baby. It was really soothing. After about five minutes, I got up to meet Jasmine in the tea room. We sat for a bit and then we were ready to leave.

On our way out, we walked past the reception desk. There was a young Indian couple at the desk, asking questions.

"But... the whole thing is nude?" said the husband.

"Yes, all nude," responded the reception worker.

"And we must be nude as well? It is mandatory?"

The attendant started to respond when Jasmine intruded. "All nude!" Jasmine said. "If you don't want to be nude, you're in the wrong place!"

As we walked to the car, Jasmine turned to me. "So? Did you have a good time?" she asked.

I was grinning from ear to ear. "YES! Obviously! Did you have a good time too?"

"I did!" she replied enthusiastically. Great success!

==== QUESTIONS ====

What's the largest number of people who have seen you nude at one time? What's the largest number of nude people you've seen at one time? If you haven't had an experience like this, would you like to try it? Let me know in the comments.