This morning we spent an hour or so being naked in public. We left the park early and went west past Lake Berryessa and over the mountains to Calistoga. We had booked an early morning appointment for a couples mud bath at The Golden Haven Hot Springs Spa, one of many spas dotted along the streets of Calistoga. Calistoga is known for it’s wine, being at the north end of the Napa Valley, but it is just as famous for it’s natural mineral springs, the water from which is around 105 degrees and is piped in to the spas.
We got checked in and after waiting a few minutes a big dude named Jimmy came and got us and took us to our private spa room. He explained what we would be doing and how to get into the mud bath before leaving us to get undressed and covered in mud. Jimmy had explained to us that we couldn’t just step into the mud as the bottom of the bath has heating coils on it. We had to sit on the side, reach across to the handle (easier said than done if you have short arms) and then swing our legs in. We employed some form of those instructions and managed to get in without standing on the bottom, then we had to wriggle. The mud was really hot, and really thick and it was difficult to get in to it. You could lie in the mud and it kind of suspended you on top, so a lot of wriggling was involved to get in to and under the mud; then the bits that still weren’t covered we had to use our hands and scoop it over us. After giving us a few minutes to get covered up jimmy came back in and put a cold wash cloth on our heads and a mask on our faces, then he left us to relax in the mud. It was nice and very different, and quite relaxing if a little too hot to completely submerge our toes. We lay there for a little over ten minutes until it was time too get out; it’s too hot to stay in the bath any longer. Getting out was supposed to be the reverse of getting in but it was a lot more difficult since we were all wet and slippery. Mike found the heating coils on the bottom of the bath when he ‘fell’ back into the mud bath and had to put his hand out to stop himself – it was quite funny to watch a naked Mike wallowing in the mud!

The shower was the next stop to wash the mud off before getting in the spa. In the shower there were hand held sprayers which were a godsend to get in the places that the fixed showerhead just didn’t reach -You wouldn’t believe some of the places the mud got! While we were hosing off Jimmy filled our spa with hot spring water, and once we were relatively clean we got to relax in the spa for a while. I’m not sure what all was in the mineral water but it certainly made several body parts float.

The last part of the package was the cooling down which involved us lying in a darkened room, wrapped in blankets with ice cold washcloths on our foreheads and the backs of our neck. This was definitely Mike’s favourite part, I could tell by the snoring noises coming from his side of the room.
It was a fun experience, at least I thought so. I don’t think I need to do it again, but I enjoyed it and my skin is lovely and soft at the moment.
After leaving the spa we headed a little ways out of town to see the Old Faithful Geyser. It’s one of only three geysers in the world that have earned the ‘old faithful’ title due to their regular eruptions, one is in Yellowstone and the other is somewhere in New Zealand. The only time this geyser’s eruption is interrupted our delayed is if an earthquake is imminent. If it is not on time then an earthquake is likely in the next few weeks somewhere in the 500 miles surrounding the geyser. There was no delay today, and we arrived just in time to see the eruption. It was actually pretty impressive with steam and scalding water spraying up to 100 feet in the air. It was very cool, and it continued to spray for several minutes.

Mike: Geyser and goats cool! Mud bath, we did that!

On the same grounds as Old Faithful was a small petting zoo that had Jacob’s Four-Horn Sheep that looked like they had jester hats on, and also Tennessee Fainting Goats, although we didn’t see them ‘faint’. They don’t actually faint, but when they are scared or startled their muscles spasm for up to 10 seconds. When they are babies and this happens they tend to fall over, as they get old they learn to find something to lean against so they don’t fall over. The lady at the desk did warn us before we went to see them that they didn’t ‘faint’ easily, and it turns out she was right. Both the goats and the sheep had really evil looking eyes, like they were possessed, as there pupils were left to right rather than top to bottom – freaky.

To get back to the campground we drove south through the Napa Valley to Napa which is a beautiful ride, and like the drive to Calistoga, we saw more vineyards and wineries than I ever thought existed. Every piece of land is covered with grape vines, even peoples gardens, growing grapes to make every variety of wine. We stopped at a little park in Napa and had a picnic before heading home.