Offbeat Traveler: Yunessun Spa Resort’s Beaujolais nouveau spa

Wine lovers around the world celebrated this year’s Beaujolais nouveau on Nov. 15 (French law dictates that the earliest release date each year is the third Thursday of November). At the Yunessun Spa Resort in Hakone, Japan, wine enthusiasts toasted to the Beaujolais as they bathed in it. In honor of the French wine, the resort filled its wine spa, which is already usually infused with red wine, with 2012’s Beaujolais.

The wine spa is one of 25 attractions at the resort, located about 50 miles southwest of Tokyo. It also features a coffee spa, green tea spa and Dead Sea spa, whose salinity is the same as its namesake.

Sommelier Shunji Kanaya pours Beaujolais nouveau into the wine spa.   (Toshifumi Kitamura / AFP/Getty Images)

Guests with glasses of Beaujolais nouveau toast.  (Toshifumi Kitamura / AFP/Getty Images)

Two boys extend their glasses as a sommelier pours Beaujolais nouveau.   (Toshifumi Kitamura / AFP/Getty Images)

The resort celebrates Valentine’s Day with a chocolate spa.   (Yoshikazu Tsuno / AFP/Getty Images)

Two resort employees demonstrate the buoyancy of guests in the Dead Sea spa.   (Yoshikazu Tsuno / AFP/Getty Images)