As you might imagine, given our location in the midst of one of the finest wine producing areas of the world, Santa Rosa and the surrounding area offers a full range of hedonistic delights. Perhaps on your trip you might sneak in a visit to one of our many spas! In our neighborhood, they come in a wide variety of styles: here are three suggestions to consider (all require reservations).
The Hyatt Vineyard Creek, where we’ve held a block of rooms, offers full in-house spa services. These read like a tasting menu, which includes Merlot Grapeseed Scrub, Chardonnay and Pomegranate Soak, and Lavender Body Butter Massage. We have no personal experience to report here, but the location is sure convenient.
If you’re willing to venture further afield, we can recommend our favorite, Osmosis, locate in west county (synonymous here with “laid back,” “left over hippie,” and definitely “hedonistic”). The drive out to Freestone alone, along Bodega Highway, is enough to relax you: rolling hills (the kind that inspired Christo
to create “Running Fence”), contented cows, and, in the summer particularly, the first hints of ocean air. Osmosis is located in a converted Victorian house and surrounded by a wonderful, calming Japanese garden. If you indulge in the full treatment, you (this is best done two by two) start by being served a special enzyme tea while seated in a private room with a view out to the beautiful garden, then take a “bath” in a wooden tub “filled with a fragrant blend of finely ground cedar, rice bran, and plant enzymes imported from Japan. These ingredients heat naturally, by fermentation, creating biologically generated warmth that mimics the body’s natural metabolic process.” In other words, it’s a lot like being buried up to the neck in a clean compost pile–but don’t let that turn you off! You’ll feel heated from the inside out; you relax while looking out into another section of the garden (which you can walk in later); an attendant brings you cool water and gracefully wipes the sweat off your brow. Afterwards, you have to scrape and shower off all the bran and cedar bits; then you can have a massage. By the end, you won’t feel a bone in your body, your skin will feel totally refreshed, and you’ll be ready for the indulgences available at the Wild Flour Bread Bakery across the street–the most amazing bread, fresh out of the oven (and lots of free tastes!).
The classic spa indulgence is available over the hill in Calistoga. The name is an amalgam of 
“California” and “Saratoga,” which may give you a hint of how old a spa town this is (the first baths opened in the 1860s). This is the source of the ubiquitous “Calistoga water,” which was long held to have medicinal qualities. It’s an interesting small town: while catering to visitors, it still feels like a real town, since it serves a large portion of the workers who tend the vineyards throughout the Napa Valley. There are a number of places to have a mud bath; the practice is said to have originated with the Mayacamas Indians. The New York Times lists Indian Springs, Dr. Wilkinson’s Hot Springs Resort or Golden Haven. We haven’t been in years, since we have been wooed away by Osmosis, but we always loved the experience in the past.
