Cheese is the answer to most of life's big conundrums, but is "what substance should I immerse my body in?" one of them?

The only way to find out is the hit the Alps and do just that. If the idea of sunning yourself next to a pool on holiday in Benalmadena doesn't appeal to you, you might like to visit a Swiss mountain resort where you can bathe in cheese juice. Swiss people are thought to have bathed in whey, a liquid byproduct of cheese production, for centuries, believing it to have restorative properties. The practice, according to Insider's Guide To Spas, comes from a time when tourists would come to cheese-making parts of the countryside to drink vitamin- and protein-rich whey. Hotels then began filling baths with whey and advertising its benefits for the skin. Now tourists and natives alike now travel to remote parts of the Swiss alps to try this unusual spa therapy. Here's how it goes down. During the cheese-making process, milk is heated. The curds, the hard bits that will be used to make cheese, form in the liquid and are removed. What's left is the whey. This warm liquid is poured into a bath and you hop in and have a soak, letting the whey work its magic on your skin. It's also good for the mind and the nervous system, Salmi Tongi, a Swiss cheese producer who offers whey baths in the village of Engelberg, told Beauty Insider recently. Fortunately, the whole thing won't leave you stinking. The reviews we read suggest that the whey has a sweet and milky smell, which makes sense as the cheesy curd has been removed, and that the treatment does indeed leave skin supple and soft. The ultimate hen weekend for your cheese-obsessed friend? We think so.