Dominik Alpine City Wellness Hotel

The Dominik Alpine City Wellness Hotel is at via Terzo di Sotto 13, in the oldest part of Bressanone, in a green and quiet area on the bank of the Rienza and a few steps from the Rapp gardens. It is an unusual position for a hotel with a spa of this size: the Duomo is reached in five minutes on foot and the entrance to the pedestrian zone is right there, but the building stays off the tourist route. Those arriving by car have to follow the signs towards Luson and not the satnav, which tends to send vehicles into the pedestrian area. The property has four stars, rooms in Alpine style with TV, minibar and in part a balcony, a restaurant with a terrace and a weekly gourmet dinner.

The wellness area is the main reason to stop here, and it is spread over several levels. On the spa floor there is a heated indoor pool with counter-current swimming, so it can be used both for lengths and for floating about doing nothing, with an indoor whirlpool beside it. On the terrace on the seventh floor you go up instead for the heated panoramic pool, which looks over the roofs of the old town and the mountains around: it is open from May to October, so anyone booking in winter has to reckon with that part being closed. Also on the terrace there is a large outdoor whirlpool. The water and steam area comprises a Finnish sauna, an aromatic herbal sauna and a Turkish bath, with a relaxation area equipped with water mattresses and a sunbathing lawn facing the Valle Isarco. There is a gym with a treadmill, spinning and step, open from 7:00 to 20:00 like the pools, and a treatment area that works from 9:00 to 11:30 and from 15:00 to 20:00 with massages, foot reflexology, hot stones, hay baths and facial treatments. The saunas open at 15:00. In the common spaces of the spa people move about in a bathrobe and slippers, provided by the hotel.

On the rules of access there is a point to read carefully. The hotel presents itself as adults only, and it is so in the sense that there are no children: the website writes that all the spaces, from the restaurant to the wellness area and the lawns, are free of children. But the threshold stated on the website is 14 years, not 18, and the same rule applies to the spa, with the note that from 16:00 the sauna is reserved for those aged at least 16. The booking portals give 18 years instead: anyone travelling with a young person of 15 or 16 would do well to write to the hotel before booking, because the two sources do not agree.

The Dominik suits those who want a real spa without giving up the town: you come out of the pool, cross the road and you are in the old town of Bressanone. The Brixen Card included covers lifts, public transport and museums, and the Plose with its slopes is a few kilometres away. It is less suited to those looking for an isolated hotel high up with a view of the Dolomites from the window: here the mountains are seen from the terrace, not touched.