HotelChatter

Here’s the idea: wearing a bathing suit, shoes and socks, gloves, a headband, and a mask covering your mouth, you step inside the -166°F chamber for a maximum of three minutes, twice daily for a course as long as two to three weeks. Apparently the treatment works wonders for chronic pain, arthritis, and stress reduction.

If that doesn’t sound appealing, the hotel offers more tame treatments in its lovely two-level spa, which was opened in late 2007. It has 17 minimalist-style treatment rooms, a big pool, a variety of saunas and steam baths, and a team of house doctors.

While medical spa treatments aren’t given very much respect in the US, they have a long tradition in Europe, and the AlpenMedHotel Lamm offers an extensive list of treatments. The hotel’s restaurant specializes in a type of cooking called SuccoWell in which fruits and vegetables are juiced, and the chef prepares everything using these juices and other extracts.

Like many hotels in Austria, the AlpenMedHotel Lamm feels like two separate hotels in one. When it underwent its massive renovation in 2007, the owners (who are the fifth generation of the same family running the hotel) kept some of the hotel’s 71 rooms as they were, as to not alienate those customers looking for more cozy Alpine style. Others are brand new, sleek in black and white. When reserving a room, be sure to specify which style you’re looking for. And stay warm in that cryptotherapy chamber.

Room rates here begin at 103 euros or $128.