Rotorua's Glorious Bath Houses
Healing properties believed to be so beneficial to human ailments proved to be less kind to buildings. After two years Rotorua’s original bath house collapsed, as did numerous other buildings added to the complex in subsequent years. But such was their popularity that rebuilding was never in doubt. The waters were regarded as soothing and sedative, relieving pain and reducing swelling in joints and tissues. The ‘Priest’s Bath’ was recommended for treating arthritis, rheumatism, and 'cases of nervous debility', as well as lumbago, sciatica and chronic dyspepsia. Sexual impotence could also be helped, and the Priest’s Bath was said to 'reduce the craving for alcohol'.
Rotorua’s Bath House spa also helped pioneer modern practices of physiotherapy, with patients being encouraged to use swimming to exercise without bearing their weight on injured limbs.
By the time of the First World War, the benefits of Rotorua's mineral pools were so highly regarded that convalescing soldiers were brought to the area to recover from war wounds.
The Government Bath House is now a museum, but other spas have taken its place.
Soaking in a hot mineral pool and feeling the cares of the world dissolve is now as much a part of the Rotorua experience as the geysers and mud pools themselves.
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| Opening of the Government Sanatorium and Baths, Rotorua |
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