County Pulling the Plug on Old Spa : Redevelopment: With no takers, historic San Juan Hot Springs resort will be dismantled in favor of almost anything else.

Soothing, 120-degree mineral water still gushes from the ground at 50 gallons a minute, but the once plentiful bathers, revelers and therapy seekers are nowhere to be seen. For the first summer in 12 years, the historic San Juan Hot Springs spa sits boarded up and off-limits to the public.

Five months after the padlocks were set in place, the 25 hot tubs and 100-foot pool installed by the spa’s former operator will soon be razed to make way for the next, as yet unknown, chapter in the life of the century-old resort.

No takers have stepped forward to assume the lease on the 17-acre spa. So county officials, tired of the around-the-clock security demands, now believe it’s time to rethink the future of the internationally known resort nestled in the ancient sycamores and oaks off Ortega Highway at the outskirts of Ronald W. Caspers Wilderness Park.

Robert Hamilton, the manager of program planning for the county’s Department of Harbors, Beaches and Parks, said he is looking to “dismantle what’s out there as soon as we can.”

“We are interested in finding an operation that will take advantage of the unique character of the place, which is its natural mineral springs,” Hamilton said. “But we have no preconceptions of what that might be.”

That is not to say there has been no interest in the 1800s-era spa, county officials say. Japanese resort owners have toured the property, as have doctors and investors, all carrying their own notions of its future.

“Almost uniformly, everyone has a different idea on what to do there,” Hamilton said. “What we have not found is a great deal of interest in taking it over as is.”

Michael Hentzen, an official in the real estate division of the county’s General Services Agency, agrees that ideas for the spa’s redevelopment “are all over the place.”

“We’ve had people talk about such things as a conference center to a motel-and-cabin operation to a medical-type facility and therapeutic center. One man mentioned a dude ranch type of operation,” said Hentzen, whose division is actively marketing the property.

More than a decade ago, former San Juan Capistrano resident Russ Kiessig had his own grandiose plans for the aging resort, including a world-class conference center with overnight lodging. In 1981, Kiessig, already a successful resort operator, signed a 30-year lease with the county to operate the spa and proceeded to pump $1 million into its ramshackle remnants to channel the natural springs into hot tubs and a swimming pool.

Business surged, but then began to decline in the last few years. Kiessig complained that the county and Caltrans should shoulder much of the blame for the downturn.

The final straw for Kiessig came in 1990 when Caltrans removed more than 100 trees, including 13 oaks and numerous sycamores, to expand a bridge over Hot Springs Creek. Gone was the privacy and ambience he claims was needed for the resort to succeed. Kiessig left soon thereafter. He now operates the successful Sycamore Springs Resort in San Luis Obispo.

The luxuriant baths at the hot springs have been a mecca for pleasure seekers for years.

Indians and settlers of the San Juan Capistrano mission were lured to the area. Legendary San Juan Capistrano rancher Don Juan Forster acquired ranchland that included the property as far back as 1845 and blocked development at the site to maintain its use by the locals.

Historians say the heyday of the resort was the 1890s, when tourist guides listed it as a don’t-miss attraction. In the 1960s and 1970s, hippies and bikers made the pilgrimage into the woods for sessions of pot-smoking and nudism that often drew sheriff’s deputies.

Resort developers have come and gone and the old bathhouses they built on the property have since been moved about 15 miles west to San Juan Capistrano, where they are still in use. One structure, called the dance hall, sits next to San Juan Capistrano City Hall and is used for city meetings. Mayor Gil Jones owns another and has converted it to an office next to his Los Rios district home.

Jones, a lover of the rich history of San Juan Capistrano, said he would like to see the old resort brought back to life in some way. “It’s an important part of the history of this city,” Jones said. “We would like to maintain that.”