Man vs. Spa

When my mother-in-law bowed out of a mother-daughter spa weekend at the last minute, I got the nod. It was already paid for and, my wife insisted, lots of men go to spas.

That’s how I found myself spending four days at the famed Canyon Ranch resort in Arizona, structuring my days around steam baths, exercise classes, fat-less food and trying to locate my chi.

That’s also how I found myself hiking through the Sonoran desert with seven women from New Jersey, saying things like:

“Ladies, is it time for some water?”

And “You girls are doing great!”

As we trundled down dry washes and up saguaro-dotted slopes, one woman confided that her breast implants had left her with one side larger than the other. “I’m going to start buying two bra sizes, cutting them in half and resewing them,” she explained. I tried not to stare.

Canyon Ranch is a camp for prosperous and driven adults, with scads of activities lined up from early morning into the evening, including arts and crafts, aerobics and classes on such spiritual practices as chi gong, an ancient Chinese technique to restore the natural life force--or chi. There also are programs for those who smoke or overeat or drink too much or have other earthly afflictions.

Lots of the guests come from California, but more than half travel from the East Coast. All are well-to-do--the single-occupancy rates run from $3,480 a week to far more, depending on the time of year, health programs and room size. (Rates include three daily meals, use of all spa facilities, fitness classes, tips, airport transfers and many spa services.)

The resort, founded in 1979 by Mel and Enid Zuckerman, who still manage it, is made up of dozens of low-slung, Southwest-style buildings spread out over 70 acres surrounded by lightly developed rolling desert landscape. It is a peaceful setting with views of the Santa Catalina Mountains from well-tended gardens and alcoves.

There is space for 240 guests at a time. The standard rooms are essentially a basic, comfortable hotel room and most are a short walk from the spa building and dining areas. For more money there are more deluxe accommodations including one- and two-bedroom casitas, and the 2,700-square-foot Casa Grande ($8,660 a week, double occupancy).

Scheduling the many activities offered by Canyon Ranch can be so complex that the resort hands out day-planners to guests. One of the introductory programs is a “free” shoe analysis, and the woman who did ours identified my wife and I as severe pronators. (That’s flat feet, though I prefer to think of it as sole-impaired.)

Hello, my name is Mark. I’m a severe pronator.

The cure for my wife was an expensive pair of running shoes, available right on the spot. Fortunately they didn’t have a cure in my size.

Despite my pronated feet, the hiking program was a high point of the Canyon Ranch experience. Each morning at 6:30 or so there are half a dozen hikes available at various levels of difficulty. The resort provides day packs containing breakfast and water, guides lead you on the trail and describe points of interest along the way.

We went on hikes of about six miles each day in the nearby mountains and desert parks. One day we marched up a brutal 2,500-foot-high trail in the Santa Catalinas where occasional views of the desert emerged between steep pine-blanketed mountainsides. During that hike, a commodities mogul, an East Coast man, engaged us in a long conversation about Cinnabons cinnamon rolls, how many calories might be in them and how recently he had eaten one.

The best hike was to Tanque Verde Ridge in the Saguaro National Park on a trail winding through forests of saguaro and teddy-bear cactus to a dome with a 360-degree view of Tucson and the desert. A tarantula wandered up as we ate a nonfat bagel and yogurt, and we politely made room for it.

Most of the hikers were wives of lawyers, doctors, bankers and real estate brokers. They complained about being taxi-drivers for their kids and didn’t much care for President Clinton’s behavior.

There are, of course, men at Canyon Ranch. Quite a few, I discovered. I saw some of them through the mists in the steam bath. And a passel of them showed up for a men-only stretch class, getting rather rowdy when a young woman asked whether she could join us. (Absolutely not.)

Katie Penner, a spokeswoman for the ranch, said the proportion of male guests at the spa has steadily grown--in line with national trends--to about 40%. “The myth of the spa vacation is finally being broken,” Penner said. “It’s not about overweight women eating rabbit food.”

Baby boomers concerned about their health are triggering an explosion in the spa industry, she said, and Canyon Ranch has been steadily adding programs for men to meet the rising demand.

One staging place for men was the massage waiting area next to the Jacuzzi in the men’s spa. There we men in robes nodded at each other firmly but briefly, middle-age captains of industry waiting for our names to be called by young attendants bearing clipboards. Many of us did things we would never imagine doing in our real lives. A New York man confided that he’d just come from a clairvoyant reading. He’d never done this before and didn’t believe in it, but the woman had read his “colors and energy fields” and given a disturbingly accurate analysis.

I was determined to sample as many of the programs as possible. Canyon Ranch seeks to improve spiritual as well as physical health, and late one afternoon I attended my first meditation class. I was nearing a solid doze when the instructor planted a thought into the heads of the eight of us--mostly women--in the class: “It’s OK to be a wonderful person.”

On the second day of meditation, another instructor suggested we consider some situation in our lives, not judging or trying to solve it, but accepting. I considered whether I should buy a new car. Dodge Durango? Honda Accord?

The exercise programs were much as you’d expect, but with a huge variety and number of choices. I tried a Spinning class one afternoon. The idea of Spinning seems to be to work yourself into a frenzy on a stationary bicycle with a group of others doing the same thing while listening to loud music and being exhorted to go faster. There was me, seven women and two women instructors. After about 10 minutes, as I considered whether I might need an ambulance, I heard bagpipe music (Was it the theme from “Titanic”?) and Gayle, leading the class, saying, “Think about where you are going. See where you are going. Where are you going?”

As best I could tell I wasn’t going anywhere, but I was sweating a lot getting there. The bagpipes segued into rap, I got dizzy and humiliated myself by leaving the class early as the women pumped onward.

On the second night, I tried a watercolor class with three women who spent much of the class talking about childbirth with the pregnant instructor. I painted saguaro silhouettes against an orange and purple sky and thought it was pretty good. I missed the sculpture class.

By the third day I thought I had this spa thing down. But I made a rookie error, scheduling a class on chi gong meditation and a massage too close together. It was a nasty scene at the end of meditation as I shoved past two women while returning my blanket, pillow and floor pad to their proper shelves. By the time I got to my massage I was completely stressed out and, on top of everything, hadn’t been able to find my chi.

The nutrition programs at Canyon Ranch are designed to help people lose weight and eat healthier food. That meant that even the most delicious sounding things on the menu had little or no fat. Which meant that I was hungry for the first two days.

But eventually I figured out the solution. Eat more. On the third night I had my best dinner: borscht, a double order of rack of lamb, full order of tortellini from the pasta bar, two banana tarts for desert. For food without bad things in it, the meals were generally delicious.

Since meals are included in the huge package rate, menu items only have notations for calories, fat and fiber, as if revealing the price in an unfamiliar foreign currency and, for me, underscoring the sense of having gone someplace far away.

I stopped counting calories on the day that I passed 3,000 over my dinner of tomato juice, pasta bar plate, salad bar helping, potato with nonfat sour cream, Asian shrimp stir fry with extra shrimp, miso soup, a bread stick, yogurt, apple strudel and tea.

On the final day, I had a steak sandwich of sorts in the dining room and then hit the outdoor barbecue for the chicken, corn and several reduced-fat brownies.

In the spa area there were ample supplies of various ointments, mousses, creams, soaps and other stuff that men generally don’t use or, if they do, don’t talk about it. For me this quickly became as hard to resist as free food. There were free razors and shaving creams, and I felt compelled to shave my chin and head several times, followed by heavy doses of after-shave.

By the showers, a sign is posted: “Water is the desert’s most precious resource. Please don’t waste it.” As I took my fourth shower of the day, it occurred to me, maybe they should have thought of that before they put a spa here. In the next shower, one of the captains of industry had decided the liquid soap wouldn’t do and bellowed for an attendant to bring him a bar of soap.

By the fourth and last day, I knew it was time to leave. For one thing, we found a scorpion in our bathroom, which I trapped under a glass while hyperventilating. Also, I found myself enjoying the place. It’s kind of nice to wake up and worry only about how you’re going to exercise, feed and pamper your body. It’s a fine thing to get a massage every day.

I began looking forward to another hike and in-depth discussion of Cinnabons. Even worse, I was beginning to think I might find my chi.

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GUIDEBOOK

Ranch Roundup

Getting there: United and Southwest offer nonstop service LAX-Tucson; America West has direct (one stop, no plane change) and connecting flights. Round-trip fares begin at $78. The ranch offers free shuttle service to and from Tucson airport.

Spa specifics: Canyon Ranch Health Resort, 8600 E. Rockcliff Road, Tucson, AZ 85750; telephone (800) 742-9000 or (520) 749-9000, fax (520) 749-7755, Web site https://www.canyonranch.com. Standard stays are four, seven or 10 nights.

Four nights: Rate per person for standard room is $1,750 double, $2,140 single occupancy. Includes lodging, all meals, use of spa facilities and four spa services, pools, tennis courts, fitness classes and programs such as hiking, biking and art classes. Sales tax (7.5%) and service charge (18%) add 25.5%. Summer rates (June 13-Sept. 23) about 25% less. Higher rates for longer stays and the more deluxe haciendas and casitas.

Where to eat: All meals are in the ranch dining room, which features gourmet-quality food made with healthful ingredients. Alcohol is not served or permitted in any public areas of the Ranch.

Getting around: The ranch provides transportation to hikes off the premises. Everything else can be reached on foot.

Things I did there: Hiking, watercolors, eating, meditation, chi gong, stretching, Spinning, weight-lifting, abs-plus, massages, steam baths, saunas, inhalation, underwater treadmill.

Things I didn’t do: Yoga, funk aerobics, dieting, tai chi, Wallyball, kick boxing, deep-water pump, sculpture class, biofeedback, hypnotherapy.