Schloss Elmau Luxury Spa Retreat & Cultural Hideaway

Everything in this hotel was perfect. They take much care for the little details. A very welcoming and warm hotel. The hotel and the rooms are very clean, beautifully decorated. The food is very good! The hotel view is special, to the bavarian Alps.

This beautiful retreat in the Bavarian Alps was a magical vacation for my family. Our room was quite spacious; the girls had a bedroom off the opposite side of a living room, our master bedroom had wide, expansive views, and the bathroom was beautifully appointed. I loved the amenities provided in the room as well as the resort throughout the spa and in the afternoons at the retreat. Contrary to other high end resorts, there was so much offered gratis that you felt valued as a guest. My daughters had a wonderful time in the kids’ club at a “creativity in AI” class that they insisted on doing twice. We also felt spoiled by the nightly classical music performance. The talent was extraordinary and we loved having the opportunity to introduce the music to our girls for an easy, one hour concert. If we could, we’d return every year. At the very least, it will be on our list for a return.

I have stayed at Schloss Elmau a number of times since 2020, most often with a very dear friend and sometimes by myself, and each time it has been a wonderful, magical experience. After a recent five night stay in early July I can reaffirm what I wrote in 2020 and what numerous other guests have noted, that Schloss Elmau is a magnificent luxury hotel, spa, nature and yoga retreat, and multifaceted cultural center, with a program every month that includes numerous concerts of outstanding classical and jazz musicians, and talks by well-known writers and thinkers--during my first stay Nobel Economics Laureate Joseph Stiglitz was a guest. Schloss Elmau is located in a magnificent semi-protected natural area with breathtaking mountain scenery, and wonderful hiking, skiing and biking opportunities at its doorstep. It’s all of that but it is much more. At least from my experience it is unique in the world for how it combines all these attributes. I’d like to mention in this review just one of the numerous unique world class aspects of Schloss Elmau in its role as a ‘cultural hideaway’-- its program that attracts some of Germany’s and the world’s best authors to stay and give talks, including Nobel literature prize winners such as 2018 Nobel laureate Olga Tokarczuk and Booker prize winners Julian Barnes, Zadie Smith, and Ian McEwan. On some occasions on short notice a famous historian or political figure may arrive for an unexpected stay and give a talk—an experience I had in autumn 2022 when on very short notice the renowned British historian Timothy Gordan Ash arrived for a stay and discussion on the fate of Europe and the Ukraine war. One of the highlights of my various stays has always been a chat with the erudite and friendly Dr. Martin Lau, a specialist in German literature and theater who helps coordinate Elmau’s program for literature and arrangements for visiting authors. Martin, who can often be found at the book store, has given me and my partner wonderful recommendations for reads of contemporary German literature, and introduced us both to some of best works of contemporary German authors which we have both appreciated greatly.