Century Spa - you leave me no choice

It's been three weeks since I wrote them a scathing letter. I told them that if they responded to my requests, I'd keep the matter private and not call the health department.

They didn't. So here's the letter, and I'll let you know how my phone call to the health department goes.

Dear Manager of Century Spa,

I'm a five year visitor to your facilities, and I want to say first that how delighted I am with your refurbishment. I think the new facilities are some of the best in the city. And I should know – I write a popular blog called "Good Heat" (www.goodheat.blogspot.com) wherein I review different spas and saunas around Los Angeles.

However, I'm DEEPLY disappointed in your lack of care for the health of your customers. You've allowed your spa to turn into, for all intents and purposes, a gay sex club. It was bad before your refurbishment, then it was a whole lot better, now it's worse than ever before. This is incredibly frustrating, disappointing and embarrassing for your customers who come to your spa to relax and unwind.

To be specific, here's what I've seen at your facility:

• Excessive leering
• Guys touching themselves in the showers and steam rooms
• Guys touching each other in the clay room and the mugwart tub

I've heard that both oral and anal sex also take place at your facility, but thankfully, I've never had to witness this.

I'm not trying to be libelous. But if you're not aware of these things, you're turning a blind eye to a serious health code violation. And if you think it doesn't go on, log onto Craigslist.com and search "Century Spa" in "All Personals." You'll see that guys advertise there every day to meet and have sex at your facility.

The second problem is that there's no one on staff that seems to be able to address this problem. Every time I come, I've been greeted at the front desk by a woman, all of whom are nice, but with none of whom I feel comfortable bringing up these concerns, due to a language and culture barrier. That's why I'm resorting to writing a letter. I can't take it any more, and I'm tired of having to leave the sauna when things get weird.

I direct a fair share of business your way, both through my blog and by bringing friends and family with me when I dare to go. I want to mention that this weekend I'm meeting with another sauna enthusiast to found the The Los Angeles Saunamens Association, a club that I think will garner an initial membership of about forty gentlemen. We would love to include your facilities on our list of places to visit, but you need to address the problem that you have with the gay sexual activity that takes place at your spa.

Here's some of the things that you need to do:

• Post signs saying that leering or any sexual activity whatsoever will not be tolerated and police will be called if violations occur.

• Have identifiable staff members working in noticeable places around the spa.

• Eject patrons and call police when violations occur.

Please contact me and let me know how you intend to combat this problem. For now, I'll keep this matter private, but if you refuse to take action, I'll have no choice but to take this matter public and contact the health department.

I really enjoy your facilities and wish to be able to use them without concern for my health or worry that I'm going to be sexually harassed.

Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter,

Clay Allen

If Your Heritage is Native American...

then your good heat comes from a sweat lodge. And I say balls to the recent tragedy in Arizona or New Mexico or wherever that was where a bunch of well intentioned people were mislead by a shyster who thought he could give a good heat.

The sweat lodge is a proud tradition. The Native Americans went deep on the heat, as well they should. Check out the beliefs of the Souix, who viewed heat thusly:

"... as representing the womb of Mother Earth, its darkness as human ignorance, the hot stones as the coming of life, and the hissing steam as the creative force of the universe being activated. The entrance faces east, source of life and power, dawn of wisdom, while the fire heating the rocks is the undying light of the world, eternity."

Read the whole article here.

More heritage posts to come. This is who we are. Let's get into it.

Exciting news

The City Spa on Saturday was not only relaxing and perfect in every way, but it was revolutionary. We're building towards a brighter future.

This is getting official. We've got a brand. We've got formalities. And you're included.

Expect a redesign of this blog very soon. Look for us on Facebook. Await the launch.

It's happening.

City Spa Today

With seasoned sweatsmen Mr Eric Helin. The end of a two week cleanse. Nothing but time. Can't wait.

PS This picture makes a bold claim. The only? Really? Mental note: Investigate the boldness of this claim.

New Terminology - MAN TRAP

Picked this one up over at City Spa a few weeks back. I was there with Mr. Helin and was talking to an older gentlemen about the facilities, and he began extolling the virtues of the man trap in the sauna.

"The what?"

"The man trap."

"What's a man trap?"

"The man trap! It's that little room between the sauna and the outside! You know what I mean! The man trap!"

Where I'm from, we call that a vestibule, which is a strange and lovely word, but I like man trap much better.

Fighting Cruisers at Century - Last Resort

I've written a letter to the proprietors at Century Spa. I'm going to keep it private for now, though I suppose there's nothing in there that I haven't already said here. But still. I'll be sure to let you know how they respond.

It goes out today. Exciting? No. Not at all.

I'm just so tired of it. The sauna, the schvitz, the bania is a sacred place to me. And I'll forgive the occasional wandering eye of a gay dude. Kid in a candy store. I get it. But to have a really great facility that's ruined by with dudes on the make is just unacceptable. I won't stand for it.

And, as I said in the letter, if they don't take action, I'm calling the health department. It's a spa, not a sex club.

Results ... gross

I don't think my Craigslist post had any impact. I checked later in the day, and three other people posted looking to hook up at Century Spa. And not only that, but people responded. Things like, 'Hey, liked your post. Where u live?"

For cry eye.

It looks like I'm going to have to do things the old fashioned way. To the snail mail mobile (aka, Microsoft Word)!!

Fighting back on cruising at Century

Really really tired of it. Starting an internet campaign. Going to hit as many sites as possible.

Was at Century yesterday, enjoying the scene and relaxing, and things in the clay room were just about to get hot. These two guys on were on the floor and one reached over, and this guy with a big beard FREAKED OUT. He jumped up and started yelling for security!! I've never heard ANYONE yell so loud in that spa! People cleared out of the clay room fast, including me. Two of the employees came and the bearded guy pointed out the two guys who'd been jerking in the main spa. They were escorted out. It REALLY shook the spa up. About HALF the people left after. I stayed, so I don't know, but I heard the POLICE were called. BE VERY VERY VERY CAREFUL if you're going to cruise at Century. They are CRACKING DOWN and CALLING POLICE.

I'll let you know if it works.

Korean Mist Room at Century Spa is an A+++

The redesign of the facilities at Century Spa are overall a 1000% improvement of what they were before. They spared no expense in this effort. You can read the details in an earlier entry, but what you need to know right now is that the Korean Mist Room is finally open, and that room alone is worth the $20 and fairly heavy presence of looky-loo gay dudes.

It's a rock room - small egg sized rocks sank into mortar - and it's heated with a sauna oven. And it's relatively small. It's about half the size of the weird, towel lined dry sauna they have there, room enough for 8 gentlemen max, I'd say. There's an unnecessary feature mounted on the ceiling: this weird, three nozzled mister which sends out hot mist. Weird, but not a detriment in any way. This room is HOT.

It's effectively a turkish sauna: radiant heat with high humidity. There aren't any faucets, but there is a cold shower.

Added plus: The cruisey gay dudes don't like this room so much. Too hot for them. I know because I asked them. Loudly.

It's my new tactic with dudes at Century. I talk really loud about how I like a really hot heat, how I like the Russian style heat, how I'm serious about this shit. For the furtive cruisey dude, volume and calling direct attention goes against their looky-loo code of creepiness.