My First Trip to King Spa Niles (and Why I’m Already Planning My Next One)

I finally did it. After hearing people talk about King Spa for what feels like years, I made the trip out to the Niles location with my friend Laurel and honestly? I get it now. I get the hype.

If you’ve never been, King Spa is a Korean spa with a whole circuit of pools, saunas, and heated rooms, plus a restaurant inside so you never actually have to leave. Which, as someone who once left a spa day early because I got hungry, felt like they built this place specifically for me.

We started in the pool area, which honestly might be my favorite part of the whole thing. We did the hot tub first, then jumped into the cold tub, then the steam room, then back to the cold tub again. We didn’t plan this order, we just kind of stumbled into it, but it turned out to be perfect. Hot, cold, hot, cold — by the end my whole body felt like it had been reset. There’s something almost addictive about the shock of the cold tub after sitting in heat, and I found myself going back for round after round.

After we dried off, we changed into the spa uniform and went exploring the heated rooms in the co-ed space, which is where things got really fun.

The gold pyramid room was gorgeous and calming, exactly what I expected a “relaxing room” to feel like. The charcoal room had this cozy, grounding vibe to it. Then we wandered into the oxygen room, which was quiet and peaceful except for one gal snoring so loudly I had to bite my cheek to keep from laughing out loud. Ten out of ten unplanned comedy. The Ice Room helped us reset after the very hot sauna rooms. Not only did it tighten our pores, it also helped reduce inflammation.

And then there was the experiment room. I was not ready. This room was by far the hottest of everything I tried that day — like, my feet were hurting just from the walk to get out of it. I have no idea what “experiment” they were running in there but I’m pretty sure the answer was “how long can this woman last.” Not very long, as it turns out. (I looked it up afterward — it’s actually called the Bul Ga Ma Sauna, if you want to go test your own limits.)

Somewhere in the middle of all this we stopped for food, and I need to be honest with you — the food might actually be underrated. I went in expecting a snack bar situation and came out wanting to go back just to eat again.

By the time I left I was that specific kind of tired where your body feels loose and heavy in a good way, like you just got a massage without actually getting a massage. I’m already thinking about who I’m dragging with me next time and which room I’m skipping the snoring person in.

If you’ve been putting off a King Spa trip, this is your sign. Go. Do the hot-cold-hot-cold thing. Eat the food. Survive the experiment room if you dare.