Back to the Salt Mines

Ah, the deck chair, the heat, the smell of salt — think you’re at the ocean? Think again. It’s an English salt cave, where deck chairs sit on pink, white and gray salt rocks, and a “spelotherapy” air-conditioning unit rumbles away, pumping salt particles into the atmosphere.

Sitting in the cave is designed to alleviate a range of respiratory and skin conditions, including asthma and psoriasis, and to reduce the effects of stress. Just 45 minutes in a “therapeutic cave,” as they’re called, is equal to three days on the beach, apparently, thanks to the iodine, bromine, magnesium, potassium and other minerals said to have antibacterial and antiviral properties.

The technology is new but the principle is not: Apparently Polish salt miners had fewer pulmonary problems than other people. So in the 1990s post-communist era, scientists in Poland began to explore recreating them. There are now 200 of these salt caves in Poland alone, and they’ve spread to central Europe — and now England.

"Basically, the salt clears the airways of mucus and reduces inflammation in the sinuses," the London cave's Hungarian-born founder Sofia Benke told the Telegraph. "It's a treatment I was familiar with in Hungary, and I was surprised it didn't exist in the U.K.

"The salt on the floor and walls is untreated rock salt from the Red Sea; originally, we'd wanted to use untreated British salt, but unfortunately it's brown, and doesn't look so appealing."

For more information on salt caves, visit http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1725240,00.html. Or maybe what you really need is a day at the beach?