Farris Bad

Farris Bad sits on the waterfront at Batteristranden in Larvik, where the freshwater lake Farrisvannet meets the Larvik fjord. The spring beneath the site formed after the last ice age, when meltwater began filtering through the porous glacial moraine of the Bøkeskogen hill, dissolving calcium, sodium, bicarbonate and other minerals over a journey of roughly two decades before emerging from a natural underground grotto. Bathing here dates to 1843, when Karen Linaae opened the first small spa at the source; Dr. Ingebrigt Holm expanded it in 1880, and by the late 19th century the waters had drawn Nordic literary figures including Henrik Ibsen, Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson and Knut Hamsun. A separate spring struck in 1988, the Kong Olav V kilde, now supplies both the modern 2,500 m² spa, opened in 2009, and the Farris mineral water bottled commercially since 1907. Guests can descend into the spring-water grotto itself as part of the bathing circuit, making it, by the hotel's own description, the only spa in the Nordic region built directly over a working mineral spring.