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Aborbing the Sophisticated Experience of Sonoma, CA

by Bill Morton

Mercer Island Reporter - July 01, 2000

Freestone, Sonoma County, Northern Calif. — Yes, I love soothing hot springs and mineral baths. Who doesn't?

I've sampled the famed "onsen" hot spring bath resorts hidden in the Japanese Alps. I've floated to nirvana in the ancient tubs of Karlsbad, 60 miles west of Prague.

Washington State has its own turn-of the-century cowboy version along the Columbia in the funky hamlet of Carson. And the mud baths of Calistoga in California's Napa Valley haven't escaped my constant search for physical renewal a la heat and water.

Osmosis is different. Quite different.

We had taken a recent five-day getaway to Northern California's Sonoma County in late October. Our hope was to arrive late enough in the fall to avoid the tourists and still catch some of California's Indian-summer sun and warmth. In truth, when Alaska Airlines and Southwest Air are offering flights to the Bay Area for $69-$79 round trip, who needs a reason?

Our first stop in Sonoma County, an hour's drive north from either SFO or Oakland, was to pick the mind of Estelle Miller, Sonoma County Visitors Center's cheerful director. I was looking for unique comers of the county. "If you want unique, then Osmosis is a must. It's the only bath of its kind in North America," Estelle said. The innkeepers at Bodega Bay Lodge and the Sonoma Coast Villa echoed Estelle's sentiments. The question remained, could we get a reservation for its enzyme baths on such short notice? After all, in its l5 years of existence, Osmosis has greeted over 100,000 guests, 80 percent of whom return bringing friends and family along.

"So what is this enzyme bath?" I asked its creator Michael Stusser. Michael had joined us in a traditional Japanese sitting room and offered us a cup of enzyme-laced herbal tea. Michael was especially pleased to join us. He was born in King County. His brother and cousins have businesses in Seattle and Woodinville.

"I had studied landscape gardening I and was living in Kyoto, Japan, on an apprenticeship when I developed back problems including sciatica. Japanese friends recommended all kinds of hot springs and exotic heat treatments, but this one topped them all," he explained. "After a week of treatments, the sciatica was gone. "I knew I wanted to re-create this wonderful healing experience for others once I got back to the U.S."

Michael's Japanese touches are visible everywhere on the grounds of Osmosis. Just outside the tea room, an exquisite formal Japanese garden offers sounds from a waterfall. ~ After several cups of tea, the next stop was the tub rooms. Enzyme baths are 3 -foot-high, 7-foot-square: "sand boxes." Instead of sand, a mixture of fragrant cedar sawdust, rice bran and more than 600 active enzymes awaits.

Our bath attendant dug two parallel 6-foot-long troughs, invited us to lie down on our backs, and proceeded to cover us with a 6-inch layer of the sawdust-enzyme mixture. With our heads propped up on a hill of the cedar sawdust and with the shoji doors opened to the redwood hills of Freestone Valley, we waited. About 30 seconds. It doesn't take long to experience, not just warmth, but heat. Like a foot-thick soft down comforter, within a minute we were hyper warm.

"What creates the heat? Hot pipes underneath the cedar mixture?" I quizzed the attendant as she brought in refreshing, cold terry washcloths for our soon perspiring foreheads~

"No heated pipes. No heated water. The heat you feel comes from the natural fermentation of the enzymes at work. It's nature's purification process." "Try putting your hand in the compost pile at your house and you'll believe it," she said.

Our attendant explained that if the heat was too intense, she could simply scrape an inch or two of our enzyme sand off the top.

After 20 minutes, we emerged from our enzyme bath as a couple of noodles. We stepped next door to shower and shampoo. Cedar sawdust was everywhere.

Scrubbed and glowing, we donned our kimonos for phase two, a choice between a half-hour blanket wrap accompanied by taped music or a 75-minute massage.

Why go halfway? We opted for the massage, then were faced with another choice. Option One: an inside private massage room. Option Two: an even more secluded open-air, cedar-paneled pavilion hidden among the trees behind Osmosis along Salmon Creek. The natural symphony of chirping birds and gentle breezes are included in the package.

The town of Freestone, population maybe 100, sits five miles inland from the Pacific and 60 miles north of the Golden Gate Bridge. Osmosis is not an inn or a B&B, and that’s fine because many all star properties are located just minutes away.