Chewton Glen Hotel and Spa

Back in November the husband and I decided that we wanted to go away. We started off looking at going abroad with the kid, Tenerife was an option but not being able to confirm whether crèches were open, with it being off season and all, laid rest to those plans. We looked at further away destinations like Cape Verde (where all the celebs seem to go to be photographed on a beach) but money just started to go into silly prices so we decided to look closer to home. Centre Parcs was another option but oh my that’s expensive, for a three night mid week stay with a small person under two we were looking at more than five hundred pounds. After going round the houses for a few weeks and ultimately arguing about not being able to agree on a destination, we ended up opting to go and stay with our in-laws for a few days. Not quite the tropical destination I had hoped for but hey, there was a plus point. They are based down in Dorset and we’d found a fancy spa hotel called Chewton Glen right on the edge of the New Forest to book ourselves into for a spa day. It looked like the perfect place for a day of relaxing, just what we needed.

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We went to Chewton Glen on a cold, mid week November day. We got there nice and early to take full advantage of the kid free day and after some confusion about where to park (we always try and park on the golf course or in staff parking at these fancy hotels, spot the tourists!) the very lovely spa staff talked us through our day and showed us to the restaurant where our breakfast awaited. Post pastry and caffeine fuelling, we hit the immaculate changing rooms then headed down to the ‘Grecian themed’ pool and attached ourselves to some loungers limpet style. After much people watching (there was an awesome 80+ lady doing endless laps with immaculate hair) and posh magazine reading, we headed into the Hydrotherapy pool area. Now this bad boy was the main reason why we booked Chewton Glen, a lovely big pool full of jets and bubbles to soothe all cares away, but just as we literally had our toes dipped in, we were told by staff that they were closing it for an hour or so due to some water levels being high, given that this was the main reason we had booked Chewton Glen we were gutted!! Luckily however this didn’t ruin our morning as the husband and I both had massages booked which split up the day nicely. As part of the spa deal we’d booked, we got an hours neck, shoulder and head massage and oh my, it was wonderful. The lady treating me, Holly made me feel very relaxed. I’ve had lots of massages and this was definitely one of the best. Post treatments we were informed that the hydro-pool was now open again, wahoo! We headed straight there and immersed ourselves for the next hour or so in the jetting, bubbly water, it was wonderful.

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After much hydro-pooling, we were ready for more food in the shape of lunch. There was a great choice of different salads, chicken, salmon and mini puddings (YUM) obviously I tried to pile everything on my plate at once and couldn’t eat it all 🙂 We got a complimentary glass of fizz to apologise for the hydro-pool being closed, given to us by the Manager who was incredibly nice and couldn’t have been more sorry for the inconvenience. After lunch, we headed back to the Spa, and mine and my husbands ‘pet hate’ of people bagging loungers when they are off doing other things was confirmed. Everyone else there that day was clearly in holiday mode and had left their towels behind, taking up every lounger in site, this drives me potty! Quite rightly the spa quite rightly operates a policy whereby they remove towels from loungers if it looks like people aren’t using them, which is good. Once we’d secured some seats we chilled some more, refrained from checking our phones and even did a bit of head bobbing. We then we spent the rest of the afternoon in the, yep you guessed it, the hydro-pool. There were some lovely heated ceramic loungers which were bliss to sit on after a float around. This area was definitely the best bit about the spa. My only minor moan was that the outside Jacuzzi was rather tepid and with it being a cold day when we went, it didn’t make for the toasty experience it should have been, but hey ho. Another minor moan (I’m not on a role here don’t worry) was that the steam and sauna rooms are in the separate sex changing rooms so you can’t go in with your other-sex partner. That’s just the layout unfortunately and can’t be changed, but this was a shame as that is part of the experience if you go somewhere like this with your husband. I have to add though that both the steam and sauna rooms were lovely, blissfully hot, clean and with plenty of water available.

We finished off by staying for dinner in the main restaurant. This restaurant was in another part of the building which was beautifully decorated for Christmas, think old manor house, roaring open fires and huge Christmas trees. For dinner we opted to go for the taster menu which was lovely, rather expensive but a good way to try a bit of everything. In hindsight I wish we had stayed overnight as the meal finished late and we were both shattered after a long day of doing, well, very little and it looked like such a lovely place to stay, next time eh.

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We had a wonderful day at Chewton Glen The deal we got was the Winter Warmer, £290 for two people, including breakfast, lunch and an hours treatment each. It was thoroughly worth it, we had a brilliantly relaxing day, we will be back!

 

 

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