Queen Spa

A massage in a city you do not know is mostly a guess. You lie down, somebody begins, and either the pressure is right or you spend an hour deciding whether to say something.

Queen Spa starts the other way round. Before anything begins you are asked how hard you want it and which parts hurt, and you are asked again while it is happening. Guests write that down more than they write about the room, and they have been writing it for years.

The treatments are the other half. Bamboo, warmed and rolled along the muscle. Candle, where the wax is melted and poured warm as the oil. Four hands, two therapists working at once. They call themselves the first in Da Nang to do all three, and you will not find that row of names on most doors on this street.

The rooms are built as scenes rather than cubicles. One is Egyptian, gold and carved, with two beds side by side. One is a family room. One is planted like a rainforest. Tea and something small come before, and something sweet after.

It is on Pham Cu Luong in An Hai, a few streets back from My Khe, open from ten in the morning until half past nine at night.