Spa Report -- While passing through DC a couple of weeks ago on a late Monday morning, I stopped to check out King Spa. My review: "Literally, not so hot."
For an area with mandatory nudity, the men's locker room wet area was downright chilly. The front door that for whatever reason needed to be left open created a serious draft into the wet area, compounded by the fact that the room ventilation in both the locker room and the wet area was also chilly given the purposes of the spaces. After showering, my damp body was literally shivering.
At 10:30AM, the dry sauna was merely "very warm." (As the other guy in there asked me, "How long have you been in here? I've been in here over 10 minutes and still haven't broken a sweat!" To be fair, the dry sauna did seem to warm up a little more by noon.)
The "hot tubs" were so close in temperature (the guy working there said the three pools were 97, 99, and 101 degrees when I mentioned the two "warm" ones basically felt like the same temperature.
Out of maybe 15 guys who I saw go through that morning, THREE of them showered with swim trunks on and left immediately to go to the roof pool area/never went further into the nude men's wet area than the showers.
Interestingly, of the five K-spas I've now been to (King Spa Chicago and the four No. VA spas), the men there at King Spa on that Monday were, unusually, nearly ALL in exceptionally fine, athletic physical shape.
The broader, clothed King Spa facilities look nice and luxurious (and warmer, with heated floors), but the wet area is kind of the main way I look to relax at a Korean spa. Less than half as enjoyable of an experience as Spa World (which had way more pools and ranges of temperatures) at more than twice the price.
Never going back to King Spa Virginia. The next time I'm through DC, I'm definitely going back to Spa World though.
