A Touch of Japan

There is no delicate way to put this.

Mac and I looked like two freshly breaded pork chops when we emerged from our enzyme bath at Osmosis, a day spa in western Sonoma County. The raw materials of the essentially dry bath--sawdust and rice bran, mixed with heat-producing enzymes--clung like a coating of bread crumbs to our bodies, which had turned bright pink from the heat. A few minutes in a fryer and a dollop of applesauce on the side, and we could have been someone’s dinner.

Admittedly, pork chops weren’t the first thing on our minds when we arrived at Osmosis Enzyme Bath and Massage on a cool Saturday morning last fall. Located about 60 miles northwest of San Francisco, Osmosis operates a Japanese-style enzyme bath in Freestone, population 92.

Owner Michael Stusser came across the treatment while training at a Zen monastery in Japan in the early ‘80s, and after he returned to the U.S. he opened Osmosis in 1985. These days, weekend treatments are often booked solid weeks in advance.

I’d heard about the place from friends. While maintaining skepticism about some of Osmosis’ health claims (improved circulation, removal of body toxins), they had assured me it made for a terrific weekend of relaxation in a quiet part of Sonoma County.

With its two-story, flat-front facade and wood-plank porch, the exterior of Osmosis’ main building resembles an Old West storefront set amid a lush garden. Inside, however, the feel is Japanese. Shoji-like sliding doors and simple yet elegant wood joinery are the predominant architectural features, and patrons and staff quietly pad about shoeless in their yukata (bathrobes). Soft music, much of it featuring Japanese instruments, floats through the building.

Our treatment began with a pre-bath tea of herbs and digestive enzymes served by our attendant, Kristin, in a Japanese-style sitting room that opens onto a bonsai garden. According to Kristin, a friendly young woman with a radiant complexion, the slightly minty brew is meant to boost the body’s metabolic rate and speed the elimination of toxins. It also happens to be a nice way to relax.

Kristin left us to sip our tea and wander in the garden, with its bamboo and dwarf maples, arched bridge and stream that gurgles over mossy rocks on its way to a carp pond. After 15 minutes she led us to a larger room in which a redwood tub big enough for two people was filled with a damp mixture of ground white cedar, rice bran and more than 600 plant-derived enzymes. As the mixture ferments for a few days and its temperature builds to about 100 degrees, the oils in the cedar release a bracing, pleasant fragrance.

Mac and I shed our robes and stretched out in two holes dug in the mulch. Kristin buried us up to our chins. At first the mixture felt tepid, and I was acutely aware of its fluffy texture and clean aroma. But after several minutes the heat began to build, and I found myself drifting into a dreamy, relaxed state that reminded me of waking in a warm bed the morning after a good night’s sleep.

Kristin returned several times to swab our faces with a cool, moist cloth and give us drinks of water, and after 20 minutes we reluctantly emerged from the tub, brushed off most of the mixture coating our bodies and showered.

Treatments at Osmosis end with a 75-minute Swedish massage or a 30-minute blanket wrap in a darkened room while listening to “Metamusic,” which incorporates natural sounds like rainstorms and crickets, and supposedly synchronizes brain-wave patterns.

The tea-bath-wrap package is $65, or $55 per person for two or more; the tea-bath-massage package is $140, or $130 per person for two or more. For an extra $15, you can have your massage in a small Japanese pavilion next to a creek. We opted for massages, and nearly three hours after arriving at Osmosis, we left feeling invigorated and hungry for lunch.

Deciding a picnic was in order, we stopped at Wild Flour Bread, just down the street from Osmosis. We picked up a savory loaf of Emmentaler, onion and Parmesan sourdough bread.

At the nearby Freestone Store, housed in an 1879 wood building with a wide front porch and a worn pine floor, we picked up a few more picnic supplies and then drove four miles on the redwood-lined Bohemian Highway to the village of Occidental, where we would stay the night.

Our lodging was the five-room Winding Rose Inn, a B&B; that occupies two 1903 houses on a forested hillside ($110 to $160 per night, including breakfast, with a two-night minimum most weekends and holidays). After checking into a good-size room with a featherbed, a private bath and views of the village, we ate lunch on the inn’s wisteria-covered deck.

Occidental is a funny place. It still has some of the rough-and-tumble feel of its origins as a Gold Rush-era lumber town, but its one-block-long downtown also contains craft galleries and New Age shops, a legacy of the hippies who settled here in the late 1960s. The town is quiet except during the summer and on weekends, when throngs arrive to eat at two huge, family-style Italian restaurants.

We joined a couple of friends for dinner at a less bustling spot, the Bohemian Cafe, which occupies a slightly funky old house downtown. The four of us shared a nice starter of local organic greens with warm goat cheese and a bottle of 1998 Kenwood Sonoma County Sauvignon Blanc. I enjoyed my main course of cumin-scented baked halibut and garlic mashed potatoes, but my companions were less enthusiastic about their chicken, steak and pasta.

The next morning, after a breakfast of fruit, granola and French toast at the inn, Mac and I drove a few miles to Western Hills Nursery. Started as a private garden in the late 1950s by two San Franciscans seeking the quiet country life, Western Hills slowly evolved into a small commercial nursery. It made a name for itself as an early proponent of California native plants, and it draws serious gardeners from around Northern California.

The nursery had the feel of a wild garden hidden among redwoods and deciduous trees--a garden too large to appreciate in one short visit. We left knowing we’d be back, perhaps when we can squeeze in another round of those breaded pork chops at Osmosis.

Christopher Hall is a freelance writer based in San Francisco.

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Budget for Two

Air fare, LAX-SFO: $256.00

Car rental, two days: 88.00

Osmosis treatment (including tip): 275.00

Winding Rose Inn, one night: 157.83

Dinner, Bohemian Cafe: 65.48

Wild Flour Bread: 5.00

Picnic supplies: 5.05

Bridge toll: 3.00

FINAL TAB: $855.36

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Osmosis Enzyme Bath and Massage, 209 Bohemian Highway, Freestone, CA 95472; telephone (707) 823-8231, fax (707) 874-3788, Internet https://www.osmosis.com. Winding Rose Inn, 14985 Coleman Valley Road, Occidental, CA 95465; tel. (707) 874-2680, Internet https://www.windingroseinn.com.