Spa
| Spa | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Type | Location |
| Open Hours | All Day |
The Spa sits in the south-west corner of the Railroad, and it is the most useful free thing in the valley. Standing still in the pool pours energy and health back at ten points a second, which means a farmer who has mined themselves flat can be fully restored in under a minute and go back to work the same afternoon. It costs nothing, it is open at every hour, and it never closes. That makes a mountain day run differently: mine until the bar is empty, soak, and mine again, rather than walking home to bed. The water outside the building hides a quiet secret of its own, and a lost necklace can be fished out of it.
Area
The Railroad opens up after an earthquake clears the blocked path north of the Carpenter's Shop, and the Spa is the low building on the far side of that area. It is close enough to the Mines, the Adventurer's Guild and the minecart stop to be folded into a mining trip without a detour.
Inside, two changing rooms flank a shared bath, one for women and one for men. Each has lockers with villagers' names on them, showers and a small exercise room, and all of it is in a shabby state when it is first found, down to remarks about the smell. Walking from the locker room along the covered path to the pool forces the farmer into a walk rather than a run and changes them into a swimsuit on the way through.
Getting into the pool is only half of it. The restoration only applies while standing in the water and standing still, so walking about in the shallows does nothing. Sitting down in the water and leaving the controls alone is the whole technique.
Residents
Nobody lives at the Spa and it has no shopkeeper, but it is not empty. Alex trains in the men's exercise room often enough that the Spa is one of the places to look for him, which is unusual for a building with no resident and no counter.
Fishing
The water outside the building can be fished in every season except Winter, when it freezes over. What comes out of it is not fish. The pool is where an Ornate Necklace has been lost, and the first cast after reading the right secret note brings it up. The necklace can be given to Caroline, who is pleased, or to Abigail, who is twice as pleased, so it is worth knowing whose it really was before handing it over.
For anyone who has not found that note, or has already solved it, the same water gives up a painting called Vista instead. Beyond those two, the only other thing on the line is rubbish, so this is a spot to fish once or twice rather than a place to work.
Notes
The Spa is at its most valuable early on, before Stardrops have raised the energy bar and before cooking has become a reliable source of food. In that stretch of a save the pool effectively doubles the usable length of a day, and it is the difference between reaching the mine's lower floors in the first year and not.
It stays useful afterwards for a different reason. Health recovers in the pool just as energy does, which gives a farmer who has been badly beaten up in the mines somewhere to recover without eating through a bag of food, and the energy benefit scales with a raised maximum rather than stopping at the starting level.
Television gives the place a nod once a year. A summer episode of Livin' Off The Land, in odd-numbered years, is given over to the Spa, which is the game's way of making sure nobody misses a free full restoration sitting on the map.
All Locations
Every entry in this group, with its key details.
