There is nothing quite like a relaxing soak in naturally heated mineral water to ease muscle tension and soothe aches and pains. This guide leads soakers to 83 easily-reached natural hot springs.
Byron Hot Springs is sometimes called the "Carlsbad of the West," after the famed European health spas. The resort hosted the famous, the wealthy, the infirm, and the curious alike during the early 20th century. The 160-acre property, in eastern Contra Costa County near the San Joaquin River, featured three grand hotels designed by renowned San Francisco architect James Reid. Amidst this stylish backdrop were prominent guests in 19th-century finery, early Hollywood royalty, Prohibition entertainments, mineral water "cures" for various ailments, and secret interrogations of World War II POWs (when it was known as "Camp Tracy"). Aside from the hot springs themselves, the resort boasts one of the oldest golf courses in the western United States.
Spa resorts were a favoured destination for affluent seekers after health and comfortable leisure in opulent surroundings from the seventeenth to the twentieth century, although in the railway age they began to suffer from competition from new fashions in leisure and tourism, especially the seaside holiday. During their heyday the leading spa resorts became hotbeds of political and diplomatic intrigue, and gathering-points for high society. As such, they also became important businesses, and distinctive, carefully-managed urban environments. ‘Taking the waters’ at a mineral springs resort fell into eclipse over much of the Western world in the mid-twentieth century, only to revive in more diffuse guise as ‘health and wellness tourism’ in the new millennium. This book examines an important body of practices and experiences from the perspectives of health, pleasure, conspicuous consumption and display, urban governance, culture and politics across a quarter of a millennium, drawing its examples not only from the British Isles, France, Spain and Central Europe, but also from the United States and Australia. An international team of distinguished historians puts this neglected theme back on the historical map, at a time when spas and their treatments have never been so popular and visible in contemporary society. This book was published as a special issue of the Journal of Tourism History.
"Virtuous Waters is the first study of mineral waters and bathing in Mexico. It traces the evolving ideas about these waters, from European contact to the present, in order to shed new light on human-environment relations in the modern world. Our relation to water is among the most urgent of global issues, as increasing scarcity and pollution threaten food shortages, deteriorating public health, and the collapse of aquatic ecosystems. Drawing on ideas from political ecology, the author brings together an analysis of the shifts in the concept of water and a material history of environments, infrastructures, and bathing. The book analyzes a range of issues concerning complex "water cultures" that have formed around Mexican groundwaters over time and suggests that this understanding might also help us comprehend and confront the water crisis that is coming to a head in the twenty-first century"--Provided by publisher.
Tuscan Springs, originally "Lick Springs," was a collection of mineral waters near Red Bluff, California, which Native Americans considered such sacred ground that even warring tribes would lay down their weapons and bathe there together in peace. It was here that Dr. John A. Veatch became the first person in America to discover "white gold" (borax) in 1856, and he renamed the site after the fumaroles of Italy. While plans to extract the mineral proved impractical, word quickly spread of the healing properties of these alleged miraculous springs, and hundreds soon "were taking the waters." But, it was not until the property fell into the hands of an ambitious local merchant, Edgerton Walbridge--equal parts Teddy Roosevelt, William Randolph Hearst, and P.T. Barnum--that the springs gained worldwide fame, drawing visitors to Tehama County from throughout the country by carriage, railroad, and steamboat.
Survey of mineral health springs and their use. Listing of springs in California and in prominent other places in the United States and in Europe. Brief history of early California and Franciscan missions.
Complete with maps and extensive advice, this guide to Japan's hot springs is an invaluable resource for anyone travelling to Japan. Easier to get to than many might imagine, Japan's hidden hot springs are among the few remaining repositories of ancient Japanese ambiance and sensibility. Bucolic and charming, they bear little resemblance to the sterile, clinic-like spas of the West or to the concrete jungles of Japan's best-known onsen towns. The hot springs introduced here belong to another time but they are disappearing fast. Discover them before it's too late through this selective, personalized, and authoritative guide. In this spa guide are unbelievable gems that you would otherwise never, ever, find by yourself. Japanese people are often shocked that you found such a place. It's a very concise collection of the "true and traditional" Japanese onsen ryokan. It is for anyone who seeks a traditional experience of what onsen used to be before modernization set in.
"This list of United States thermal spring locations and temperatures and accompanying maps have been compiled in the course of preparing the maps: (1) Geothermal Energy Resources of the Western United States by National Geophysical and Solar-Terrestrial Data Center, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) (Grim, 1977); (2) Geothermal Energy in the Western United States and Geothermal Energy in Alaska and Hawaii in the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Assessment of Geothermal Resources of the United States-7978 (Muffler, 1979); and (3) State maps in press and preparation for the State Coupled Resource Assessment Program, U.S. Department of Energy, Division of Geothermal Energy (DOE/DGE). The list is a compilation of compilations, mainly from Waring's (1965) monumental Thermal Springs of the United States and Other Countries of the World; a Summary, USGS GEOTHERM computer file of thermal spring and well data, and currently active DOE/DCE-sponsored thermal data collection by State agencies and other organizations"--Page 1.