Baan Hom Samunphrai: Thai Herbal Steambaths, Traditional Herbal Remedies

There are two separate Steam Baths with changing rooms, lockers, showers and a shaded relaxing pool between them. (Direct sunlight is not always a blessing in the tropics--cool water always is!)

The healing properties of steam heavy with the natural essences present in its medicinal plants has long been known in Thailand. New mothers spend at least a month after childbirth in a herbal steam bath tent with their babies close beside them, and the whole family sits in the evening by the cooking fire not only to escape the mosquitoes but to benefit from the medicinal fragrances of the herbs in the cooking and the aromatic wood on the fire. Herbal extracts are also rubbed into the body with hot, fist-sized compresses, and poultices are wrapped around bites, wounds, and sprains. The external application of herbs through heat and steam is a very important aspect of Thai traditional preventive medicine as well, and the sense of well-being among Thai country people is partly a result of their 'folk' aromatherapy.

Heat, steam and herbs have long been associated in Thailand with childbirth as well as with health and a general sense of well-being.

Our steam baths are a product of considerable research and ingenuity, and our guests are unlikely to forget them. Too often even in the best of Spas there is not quite enough steam in the bathhouse, and if fresh herbs are used at all they are often boiled in the water leaving sticky residues that last for weeks and months to come. Our herbs are picked fresh and placed in an open basket directly over the steam outlet in the centre of the bathhouse. Our compresses are prepared 2 or 3 times a week too, often with the assistance of our guests and students.

What do the baths do? Cleanse the body above all, the toxins pouring out in the sweat. But they also enter into the body through the pores, particularly in the scalp, feeding the skin, freshening the blood, opening up the nasal passages and lungs, and last but by no means least, dispelling our gloom. Finally, our steam baths are always accompanied by fresh ginger tea, a delicate stimulant and restorative. Indeed, the whole quality of life is improved by the herbal steam bath experience, and good talk and friendship are always right there beside the Baan Hom pool.

Fresh herbs including camphor, turmeric, and macrude are picked and prepared each day for our massage compresses and steam baths.