A Public Bath to Return to Basics: Oimachi 'Suehiro-yu' (Sauna Report)

Recently, I've been eating the same three meals almost every weekday.
Breakfast is granola, lunch is Cup Noodle PRO or 'Kanzen Meshi' (Complete Meal), and dinner is 'Jan-pilaf' (something like a 'swamp'). I used to cook elaborate meals, but after starting this lifestyle to control my calories and avoid gaining weight, I've continued it even after reaching my diet goals.
After all, it's easy and I don't gain weight. It's not delicious, but it's edible.
First of all, the effort to make it is low. Granola can be eaten just by adding milk, and Cup Noodle doesn't need to be heated at work. For the Jan-pilaf, I keep all the ingredients portioned in the freezer, so I just have to put everything into the rice cooker.
The effort for ingredients is also low. I can buy granola and Cup Noodle in bulk on Amazon, and for the Jan-pilaf, I can cover a month's worth by going to the wholesale supermarket once a month.
With this, if I exercise a little every week, I don't really gain weight even if I eat what I like on the weekends. (I'm currently looking for a partner, so I can't afford to gain weight.)

On weekends and holidays, I allow myself to eat what I like, but in reality, my repertoire and the things I want to eat aren't that varied.
Curry, ramen, sushi, pizza, fried food, meat... because of my plain diet during the week, I start to crave something a bit junky, but that's about it. There's less variety than I thought.

I think my sensitivity to food has dulled. Or perhaps the performance of my brain when I think 'what should I eat' has dropped. I used to call myself a foodie, but lately, that's not really the case.

That's why I've been intentionally trying to eat things I don't know.
When I think about 'what should I eat,' the search range is limited to things I know, and as a result, there's no variety. So, when I have the opportunity to eat out, if I see some food I don't know, I try to choose that.
Recently, I've eaten authentic Chinese noodle dishes with pond snails, and Sri Lankan curry with only mysterious words written on the menu.

The same goes for saunas.

I end up going to the same places I know. Unlike food, saunas involve location and whether or not a reservation is needed, so I tend to stick to my regulars.
If I go to a place I know, I understand what kind of sauna and cold bath it has, how crowded it gets, and so on, so I won't be disappointed.
But I thought a little that maybe that's not right. My sensitivity to saunas shouldn't be dulled just like my food sensitivity.
I want fresh stimulation.

So, this time I traveled quite far to go to a sauna I'd never been to before.
It's Oimachi's 'Suehiro-yu'.

'Suehiro-yu' is located a short walk from Oimachi Station. The way it suddenly appears among older apartment buildings and parks feels just like a neighborhood public bath.

The appearance looks brand new. This public bath was renovated a little while ago.
I entered the modern-looking design and paid the bathing fee with electronic payment.
Note that the sauna set does not include a towel. Shampoo and such are provided.
(The bag said 'Mimiga' (pig ear). The one next to it said 'Maguro' (tuna). Why?)

The changing room is bright and clean, but it retains traces of an old-fashioned public bath here and there, which is nice.
This feeling of crossing through time is a unique charm.

When I went to the bathing area, it had a somewhat interesting structure where the washing stations were built along walls arranged in an octagon.
The baths are packed compactly into a small space, including a regular bath, a vibra bath, a sitting bath, a reclining bath, and an electric bath.
The water was brown, so I thought it might be a black water hot spring, but it turned out to be a tea bath additive. (It was fragrant and nice.) After soaking for a while, I went to the sauna.

The sauna, having been renovated, has an appearance that makes you go 'Oh'.
It's a long, narrow sauna room like an eel's bed, and it has a faint scent of wood.
There is no TV. There is no 12-minute clock. Being a Bona sauna, I couldn't see a stove either. An abstract sauna room.

When I sat on the upper level, it was quite hot and humid, and the heat had no direction. It's a sensation that reminds me of the Bona sauna at 'New Wing' in Kinshicho, where the whole body is steamed. Since the heat comes from between the wooden seats, it's just like a shumai in a steamer basket. It's quite hot, so I finished up in a short time and went to the cold bath.

The cold bath is wide and shallow, a size where you can stretch your legs out properly. The water temperature is neither too cold nor too lukewarm, just right. There is a slight flow of water, but not enough to peel away the 'hagoromo' (thermal layer).
The water quality is average. With my senses sharpened by the sauna, it smells a little like chlorine.

The rest area is made by lining up chairs in a space that was probably a washing area before. There are quite a lot of seats.
It's a good impression that they are arranged so you can rest your head against the wall. There was a slight flow of air from somewhere, making it a pleasant outdoor bath experience.

Overall, the sauna was good as expected of a renovated public bath, but just as I thought that it felt like a neighborhood bath and wasn't quite on the level of 'Kairyou-yu' or 'Matsumoto-yu', I suddenly realized something.

Around me, there were typical sauna-goers wearing sauna hats, but there were also many elderly people who looked like locals.
For people who aren't 'sauna-goers,' isn't a public bath not something you go to multiple places to compare?
Therefore, neighborhood public baths don't necessarily need to be exceptionally better than other public baths.
Perhaps we sauna-goers, who go out of our way to visit neighborhood baths from far away, wearing strange hats and comparing this and that, are the ones whose stance is off.
A neighborhood public bath can just be the one-and-only for that town. Of course, it's true that it's better if it's clean or convenient, but comparing things like 'this one has that, but that one doesn't' is missing the point.

Thinking about it that way, 'Suehiro-yu' was a public bath that reminded me of my original intentions.
When I first got into saunas and public baths, I would just go to a nearby public bath. Now, I only go to clean or elaborate sauna facilities, and maybe I've been eating too much sauna and my tongue has become dull.

After fully enjoying the cold bath and sauna, I saw they were selling craft beer at the front desk, so I tried it.
It was quite bitter and soaked into my body after the sauna.

'Suehiro-yu' is a neighborhood public bath with a clean exterior and interior thanks to renovations.
The sauna is abstract and hot, and quite good.
The craft beer after entering is also delicious.

That is fine.