Fitness retreats are now one of the common places to find when we visit a resort or a hotel. Most of these accommodations all over the world include health fitness spas. Fitness spas are viewed by many as a place where there they provide services of a beauty salon, but in reality they provide a lot of health related services for both sexes.

Fitness spas are believed to get their name originated from a town in Belgium called Spa. The word spa refers to water treatments which are provided in the spas. The fitness spas can be seen as the perfect place to relax; they are put up usually in nature’s exotic locations like nearby a lake or a rainforest.

These spas offer a variety of treatments like aromatherapy, body wraps, massage, bathing in hot springs, hot tub, mud bath and sauna steam bath. There may be additional services offered too, but these are the basic services present in all fitness spas. Now let’s see each of the fitness services in brief:

Aromatherapy is the use of essential oils to make a person feel rejuvenated and fresh. In some spas, they do this service by adding essential oils in the massage. The usage of aromatherapy dates back to the eleventh century when distillation was discovered and distilled essential oils were used as medicine.

Body wraps or mud wraps are treatments where a layer of mud is applied to the skin in order to clean the skin pores. There are a variety of treatments in this fitness service (body wraps), to make the body thin or to relive one of aches in the joint etc. Even this can considered being an ancient treatment, most of us would have seen illustrations of men or women covered by medical dressings which we refer to as herbs and mosses. Also Cleopatra is believed to have used medical dressings of Nile clay, face masks and milk baths to enhance her beauty.

There are various types of massages like Swedish massage, facial massages and more massages with respect to the countries and culture around the globe. Archeologists have discovered ancient writings related to massages in many civilizations around the globe. The famed physician Hippocrates once wrote "The physician must be experienced in many things, but assuredly in rubbing". The technique of massage abortion has existed since ancient times. Also one can find reference in the bible to usage of olive oil massage for a character named Esther in it.

Bathing in hot springs, mud tubs etc also seem to be an age old process. The Greeks created bathtubs, washbasins in their period to improve their personal hygiene and then established public baths too. The Romans expanded what the Greeks started and both believed hot springs to be a gift from god to cure their diseases.

There are also a variety of other spa treatments whose origins can be traced out from history. On the whole, we can see that the various spa treatments be it the weight loss spas, wellness spas or any other kind of fitness spa retreat have evolved over the years and can be trusted if done by qualified professionals in the apt manner.