How to spend a slow day off in St Albans
You’ve got a free weekday. Maybe it’s a day’s leave you booked months ago, maybe the diary just emptied. Either way, you’ve typed “what to do in St Albans” or “spa St Albans” into your phone because you want the day to feel like a day off, not a to-do list with better weather.
Here’s a plan for exactly that. It’s built around a slow morning, a float and an infrared sauna, a proper lunch and an afternoon with nowhere to be. Most of it costs nothing. You can follow all of it, some of it, or just steal the parts that suit you.
Why a weekday is the best day for it
Saturdays in St Albans are busy. The market is in full swing, the cafés fill up and the park paths are shared with half the city. Lovely for a buzz, less so for quiet.
On a weekday the town moves at a different speed. The park is mostly dog walkers and the odd runner. The Cathedral is calm. And the bit that matters most for a slow day: you’re not rushing to fit everything in before Monday.
If you can pick your day, Wednesday has an extra draw. The Charter Market runs on St Peter’s Street every Wednesday and Saturday, and the Wednesday market has a good food section with hot and cold stalls and bakery bits.
Morning: a walk with no destination
Start outside. Verulamium Park is the obvious choice, and for good reason. It’s around 100 acres on the site of the Roman city, with a lake walk that’s flat, easy and full of birdlife. Near the far end of the lake you’ll find stretches of the original Roman town wall, free to wander past. Further up the slope is the hypocaust, a Roman mosaic floor laid over underfloor heating, kept in its own small building and also free to visit.
Don’t make it a sightseeing tour. Walk the lake, look at the water, let your head catch up with the fact that you’re not at work. Forty minutes is plenty.
If you’d rather stay on the station side of town, Clarence Park is a five-minute walk from St Albans City station. It’s a Victorian park, opened in 1894, with old trees, rose beds and its original drinking fountain still in place. Smaller and gentler than Verulamium.
One rule for the morning: leave the phone in your pocket. Checking email “just once” is how a day off quietly turns back into a work day.
Late morning: float, then infrared sauna
This is the centre of the day, and the part that makes it feel different from a normal weekend.
Being is on Bricket Road, close to St Albans City station, and it’s the only place in St Albans with floatation, infrared sauna and expert massage under one roof. For a slow day, the float-then-sauna pairing is the one to book.
The float
You get a private room with an open pool of body-temperature water and over 500kg of Epsom salts. With that much salt you float without trying. You don’t tread water or hold yourself up, you just lie back and let the water take your weight for an hour.
Because it’s an open pool rather than an enclosed unit, there’s nothing closing in around you. Expect the first ten minutes to be your brain running through the week. After that it usually goes quiet. If you’ve never done it, our guide to what to expect on your first float covers the practical bits, and there’s more on floatation in St Albans on our float page. A solo float is 60 minutes and £60.
Then the sauna
When float and sauna are in the same visit, always float first. You come out of the water loose and slow, and the warmth of the sauna carries that on rather than interrupting it.
Our infrared sauna in St Albans is a private room. A 30-minute session gives you 25 minutes in the heat plus time to change and shower, for £30. Infrared warms you more gently than a traditional hot-air sauna. If you’re curious about the difference, we’ve written up infrared versus traditional sauna.
Want the whole thing? Add a massage. Our being Massage is 60 minutes for £80 or 90 minutes for £110, and the full rundown is on our massage in St Albans page. It turns the late morning into most of the day, which is no bad thing on a day off.
You can book your float and sauna online and pick a late-morning slot so the walk doesn’t feel rushed.
Lunch, then an afternoon with nowhere to be
A slow lunch
On a Wednesday, the market food stalls on St Peter’s Street are a short walk from Bricket Road, and eating something hot from a stall on a weekday has a pleasant feeling of skipping school about it. Otherwise, pick somewhere you can sit for an hour without being nudged out. There are plenty of cafés and pubs in the city centre and down towards the park.
Order a proper meal, drink plenty of water after the sauna, and don’t plan the afternoon over lunch.
A wander with one anchor
Give the afternoon a single loose anchor and let everything else happen around it. The Cathedral is a good one. Entry is free, and it has the longest nave of any cathedral in England, at 85 metres. Some of the bricks are Roman, taken from the ruins of Verulamium when the building was started in 1077, and the nave still has medieval wall paintings. Twenty minutes sitting in there is about as calm as town gets.
From the Cathedral it’s a short path down to Verulamium Park if you want a second, slower lap of the lake. Or drift back through the old streets towards the market. If you see a bookshop, go in.
How to stop a day off turning into errands
The biggest risk to a free weekday isn’t the weather. It’s the creeping sense that, since you’re off, you might as well get the car serviced, drop off the parcel and sort the boiler quote. By 3pm you’ve had a productive day and no rest at all.
A few things that help:
- Book something with a fixed time. A float at 11am gives the day a shape. You can’t wander off to the tip if you’re due in the water.
- Write the errands down the night before and put them on a different day. Getting them out of your head stops them nagging.
- Set an out-of-office, even for one day. It’s permission to not look.
- Leave the car at home if you can. St Albans City station is close to the centre, and without a car the errands get harder to fit in.
- Decide in advance what counts as a good day. “Walked, floated, ate well, sat in the Cathedral” is a good day. Nothing else needs ticking off.
If you’re not sure whether you need a day like this, our piece on the signs you need a recovery day is a fair test. And if it’s someone else who needs it more than you, we’ve put together gift ideas for someone who needs a break, including gift vouchers from £50.
What if you were really after a spa day?
Fair question, since plenty of people land here searching for one. Being isn’t a spa. There’s no swimming pool or steam room, and no robes-and-slippers package. What you get instead is time on your own in a private float room, a private infrared sauna and expert massage, booked by the session so you can build your own day around it. For a lot of people that’s the part of a spa day they actually wanted. We’ve written more on an alternative to a spa in St Albans if you want to weigh it up.
When you’ve settled on a day, book online and choose a slot that lets the morning walk breathe.
Frequently asked questions
What is there to do in St Albans on a weekday?
Plenty, and most of it is free. Walk the lake in Verulamium Park and see the Roman wall and hypocaust, visit the Cathedral (free entry), browse the Charter Market on a Wednesday, or take a lap of Clarence Park near the station. Add a float or infrared sauna at being if you want the day to feel properly restful.
How long should I allow for a float and sauna?
The float is 60 minutes and the sauna session is 30 minutes, which includes 25 minutes in the heat plus time to shower and change. Allow around two hours door to door so you’re not rushing between the two.
Should I float or use the sauna first?
Float first, then sauna. The float slows everything down, and the warmth of the sauna afterwards carries that on.
Do I need to bring anything?
Not much for the sessions themselves. The float room and sauna room are both private, and the sauna session includes time to shower and change. If you’re walking beforehand, bring comfortable shoes and a change of clothes.
Is it easy to get to without a car?
Yes. Being is on Bricket Road, close to St Albans City station. If you do drive, The Maltings (AL1 3HL) and the Civic Centre car park (AL1 3JX) are both nearby.
Fitting it into your day
Not sure what a float involves? Our float page covers the open pool, the room and how a session runs. Read more about floatation.
Planning a float and sauna together? Ask us how long to allow and what to bring. Message us on WhatsApp.
Got your day off sorted? Book a morning slot and keep the afternoon free. Book online.