Blackstone Hotsprings – The Wet Room

It’s another Blackstone work day for me, and I sign up for an hour in the Wet Room before my shift starts.

The Wet Room is oh-so popular with Blackstone regulars, and for good reason. A large multileveled bath, complete with a waterfall, is the centerpiece of a warm, spacious, well-ventilated room, and next to the bath, there’s a mineral water steam room. Inside that steam room are benches and a second more powerful waterfall that doubles as shoulder massager. (Or as a friend once put it, “That steam room, holy [expletive], such a pounding on one’s back!”)

If you’ve ever wondered what our minerals look like when they’re not dissolved in spring water, then you might want to check out the steam room, because there’s an interesting buildup going on in there. The minerals collect on the benches, on the floor, on the walls. It looks like poured limestone, or maybe hardened quicksand. I’d have photographed it, but for all the steam and water…

In fact, for all its beauty, the Wet Room is very difficult to photograph! The shots here really don’t do it justice. Forgive me, Wet Room.

After I’m thoroughly soaked and steamed, I chill out for a bit in the courtyard, trying on this piece of advice from the Blackstone website (but wearing clothes instead of a robe):

“Hotspring Baths do not have to be endurance contests! Once your tub is at a comfortable and safe temperature, you can soak for between 5 and 15 minutes.

Then we always suggest that you wear a robe and sit outside to cool — spend as much time cooling in the dry desert air as you spent soaking in the hot mineral spring.” source

In the office later on, a co-worker who’s especially good at walking the healthy eating & lifestyle walk asks me what I’m doing to counteract the loss of minerals and etc. When I raise an eyebrow, she says “oh yes, well if you’re soaking every day then you’re sweating a lot more, and so you’re losing minerals too.”

Well shut my mouth! I was honestly under the impression that I’d be gaining, not losing, minerals.

Now that the idea has been introduced, I consult the healthiest person I know, Yarrow of Yarrowheals.com, enthusiastic advocate for achieving health, mostly by eating more greens, but also via herbal tinctures and natural balms that she makes and sells.

Here’s her response:

Looks like I’ll have to explore this further…and maybe price a juicer.