Mud as elixir - Spa center in Baranda, worth EUR 25 million, to offer medical treatment, rest and recreation

(future look of Baranda Spa Center)

At first glance, Baranda is similar to any other village in Banat. The first thing one thinks of when this village is mentioned is the series "Vratice se Rode" and the movie "Montevideo, Bog te Video" (Montevideo, Taste of a Dream) since both were shot in Baranda, whereas the tourist potentials of this place are rarely mentioned.

The village`s rich flora and fauna are favorable for the development of eco-tourism since a broad range of services can be offered to visitors: food, accommodation, picnics, hunting, fishing, rare birds, and thermal springs and healing mud as the most important among them.

Local inhabitants claim that the mud in Baranda is so good that other spa resorts used to take it and present as their own, and it was even transported to Novi Sad on a horse carriage.

Because of the potentials offered by Baranda`s mud, people in this village have been waiting for a long time for a spa center to be built, and the municipality of Opovo has recently taken some concrete steps at the initiative of a group of inhabitants.

According to a detailed regulation plan designed by Atelje Vucicevic from Belgrade, the plan is to build a spa center that would grow into a complex of Baranda Banja spa resort in time. This spa center will be built on the bank of an armlet of the river Tamis, in the vicinity of the village, and span 40 hectares.

Broader approach to the area

An area abundant with healing mud spans alongside the banks of both armlets, on both sides of the Tamis river. Although the mud treatment is seen as the most attractive natural predisposition of the spa center and the basis for its formation, Milica Vucicevic, architect at aforementioned Atelje Vucicevic, says for eKapija that Baranda Spa Center is designed to look different than a hospital or a sanatorium.

(future look of the mini hostel)

– The primary purposes of Banja Baranda spa resort are: spa and recreational tourism, rural tourism, and ecological agriculture within the municipality of Opovo, which is why the essence of the spa center will not lie only in a medical treatment, but also in a relaxing attitude towards a disease.

According to Atelje Vucicevic`s design, this spa center is not conceived as a facility where people will be offered the services of treatment, rest and relaxation. Instead, such role will be given to the entire complex comprising a series of accompanying facilities.

The spa center should include four basic areas: a zone of direct services, a department store, a spa hotel, and initial facilities. Their construction will be carried out in phases for financial reasons.

The first phase will include the construction of initial facilities (3 small hostels with 10 suites and accompanying facilities), sports courts, green areas, complete infrastructure and roads.

- The construction of initial facilities would cost about EUR 4.5 million: about EUR 3 million for complete infrastructure and roads, and about EUR 1.5 million for hostels and sports courts in the first phase of works - says architect Vucicevic.

After the construction of a hotel, once the center comes to life, individual services of initial facilities will acquire the status of small exclusive villas for special categories of guests through their adaptation.

The next phases will include the construction of commercial facilities, restaurants and stores.

Investors

Vucicevic says that the maximum investment in the entire complex should amount to about EUR 25 million, covering 100% of costs of the construction of complete infrastructure and roads, all facilities, green, free and sports areas.

- All prices used to estimate the value are maximum because the aim is to create an exclusive and representative spa center.

The detailed regulation plan is on public display. Vucicevic says that certain local and foreign investors have already expressed interest in investing in this spa center, but everything will be clearer once the planning procedure is finished.

I.B.