1. WITHIN THREE HOURS
TRAVEL&LEISURE
30LONGBEACHMAGAZINE.COM JULY 2008
The
Golden
DoorWRITTEN By HEIDI NYE
LONGBEACHMAGAZINE.COM
I
walk through the golden door and step
onto a long, wooden footbridge. Beneath
and above me are greenery and bird-
song. Dappled sunlight illuminates my path to
another door, beyond which is a lounge with
sumptuous couches and an ancient Japanese
painting across one wall. A woman in a blue
and white kimono serves me tea. I then pass
through a sliding door and behold a courtyard
at the end of which is a large temple bell. I have
entered another world.
For the next five days, I am treated to the plea-
sures of the Zagat-rated best destination spa
in the country, the Golden Door in Escondido,
designed as a Japanese inn with art and
antiques valued at more than $1 million. The
$7,995 package includes a full week’s stay,
but my only child is graduating from UCLA
on Friday, so I have to leave early. As I tell the
other 27 guests—40 is the maximum—this is
the only thing that could have pulled me away
from the full experience.
Established in 1958 by Deborah Szekely, a
woman who advocated vegetarianism and
yoga decades before they became fashion-
able, the Golden Door is entering its sixth
decade of providing an experience that cannot
be had anywhere else, says Naples, Fla., real
estate developer Josephine Vitale, who has
stayed at many of the world’s best spas but
always returns to the Golden Door.
Downtown
Long Beach
One World Trade Center
Adjacent to the Hilton, off the WTC Plaza
(562) 753-2170
www.dailygrill.com
Certified Angus Steaks
Chops
Fresh Seafood
Classic Salads
Handcrafted Cocktails
Take-out
Private Dining Room

2. 32LONGBEACHMAGAZINE.COM JULY 2008
Sixty-five percent of the guests are repeat vis-
itors like Vitale. Many return during the same
week, year after year, renewing friendships
with those who may come from as far away as
Sydney, Australia. This camaraderie and the
longevity of the 150 staff make for a summer-
camp-for-adults atmosphere. “When you leave,
you feel like you’re leaving your mother,” says
guest Jeannie Meg Smith of Tiburon, Calif.
“The experience that I’ve had at the Golden
Door is one that I now have to have. It is part of
what I need for my life.”
I am here during one of the four coed weeks.
Although the Golden Door also has four men-
only weeks, it otherwise caters to women. Even
married couples are given separate rooms.
Otherwise, one guest might be having her
daily massage while another wants to get back
into the room to take a shower. This way, every
guest has his or her alone space, says general
manager Rachel Caldwell, who has been
working at the Golden Door since 1960. “But
we don’t do bed checks,” she adds, her bright
eyes flashing.
Guests also receive daily facials and two herbal
scrubs and a manicure-pedicure. Additional
treatments—including stone massage, reflex-
ology, energetic healing, and Thai foot ritual—
can be scheduled at an additional cost.
Wonderful though the treatments are,
however, they are not what sets the Golden
By the second
day, I develop
“spa brain,” a
peaceful state in
which I simply
look out on the
world without a
thought in my
head.
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14,262TO BE EXACT
GOT S OTS
WE VE’
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Distance: 85 miles
Travel Time: 1 hour, 45 minutes
Door apart. Many high-end hotels and resorts
have opened spas and offer treatments as part
of a package. The Golden Door is much more
than this. It offers a head-to-toe, mind-body-
spirit approach that is unique. Upon arrival,
guests are weighed and interviewed to design
a workout or inner-work program and menu to
address their specific goals. For those who are
used to an aggressive routine, cardio boxing,
strength training, tennis, lap swims, power
cycle, calypso dance, and Buns of Steel are
some of the offerings. I opted for the gentle
program as I’ve spent too much time with my
laptop lately and not enough time at the gym.
With never more than five or six people per
class—and once, in the hypnosis class taught
by on-site psychologist Cindi Peterson, only
me—individual attention and encouragement
are standard. In Ellen Walsh’s swim clinic, I
learn that my freestyle has been out of whack
my entire life. The ever-patient Walsh works
with me to improve my kicking, breathing, and
rhythm, basically redesigning my stroke in less
than a week.
Each day begins with a 5:30 wake-up call, fruit
and tea in the Wisteria Lounge, and a five-mile
mountain trek, a three-mile moderate hike,
or a gentle ramble through a meadow. With
377 acres, there is plenty to explore. Upon
returning to my simple but elegantly styled
room, I find a breakfast tray with a small vase
of freshly picked flowers from the three-acre
organic garden, which also provides much of
the produce for the kitchen. My window looks
out on one of the scores of stone lanterns that
pepper the property and a bamboo-pole-and-
stone-basin bird bath. Everywhere I turn at the
Golden Door beauty surrounds me: meander-
ing stone paths, waterfalls, a labyrinth modeled
after the one at the Chartres Cathedral, sunlight
through bamboo leaves, artistically designed
food served at the day’s three snacks and three
meals—sorbet emerging from a yellow lily and
romaine lettuce wrapped with thinly sliced
cucumber to give the appearance of a napkin
and its holder.
By the second day, I develop “spa brain,” a
peaceful state in which I simply look out on the
world without a thought in my head. Several
times during my stay, I am overcome with a
feeling very close to being in love in which
everything appears perfect—from the bamboo
grove the pedicurist paints on my big toe to
the pink lily in my room that slowly unfolds as
a fitting metaphor to my own opening as my
week unfolds.
Though every moment is delightful, my peak
experience comes on Wednesday night when,
swimsuit-clad, I enter a secluded hot tub with
water therapist Dave Towe, who stretches and
moves my body in ways that are impossible on
land. I feel like a gently undulating piece of
seaweed. I feel like I am flying. I have entered
another world within another world.
I came here stressed about work, but I leave—
all too soon—more concerned with the bonsai
trees and the votive candles that line the decks
at night than I am about anything I left behind
in Long Beach. I open the golden door and
re-enter the world of deadlines and decisions,
intent on keeping the peace within me that I
have found here. n