It seemed like every desirable hotel in the Palm Springs vicinity was booked to the rafters the second weekend in April. Extras weren’t easily found, either. Two Bunch Palms in Desert Hot Springs said we could take one of their famous couples’ mud baths and have dinner on Thursday but asked us to avoid the weekend, which would be “a very different experience from what Two Bunch Palms usually offers: tranquility, serenity and complete relaxation,” an e-mail informed.
When we’d booked our long weekend back in January, we hadn’t understood. But it didn’t take long to figure out the issue was the annual Coachella music festival. Luckily for Frank Sinatra, Bob Hope, Dinah Shore and Gene Autry, they’re all dead — though they might have been haunting the local streets named for them, boggled by the passing parade of beautiful, barely dressed, latter-day flower children, as well as those who just came to party, teetering on silly substances and 5-inch platforms. “I don’t know how she got to her room last night,” a valet muttered at the posh Parker Palm Springs as one unsteady rich girl lurched by at 11 a.m. in full makeup, Jackie O sunglasses and skimpy hot pants. I wondered what made him think she did.
We’d come for tranquility and relaxation — and found some, fortunately, at Hope Springs, a sublime, not-for-everyone, adults-only, refurbished Mid-Century Modern motel with 10 chic-simple rooms arrayed around three pools fed by geothermal hot springs — one hot, one warm, one tepid and big enough to swim in. It’s so off the radar, it’s marked only by a sign for Cactus Springs, a previous incarnation. So mostly, we lolled in the waters that gave Desert Hot Springs its name before it gained a different sort of fame as an American capital of crystal meth and the charmers who make and consume it. But we also got Coachella wristbands on the theory that if God hands you rock, roll with it.
Half the other guests at Hope Springs were there for the festival, which expanded to two consecutive April weekends this year. But all seemed intent on chilling, as well, so mornings were spent lolling in desert sun and hot pools, watching the resident hummingbird and discussing which bands were awesome, and which of the ancillary parties might be worth attending.
The all-weekend do at Two Bunch (previewed by Page Six) was hosted by children of the new owners from LA, who plan a slow, rolling renovation, but promise not to alter those mud baths or the equally renowned spring-fed grotto, where signs warn to speak only in whispers. On the 50 weekends a year when the place isn’t decorated with blow-up sex dolls and tattooed, beer-swilling club kids, that is.
Alternating between Coachella and its crowd, and places they seemed unlikely to go, we lunched al fresco one day at the poolside Citron at Viceroy (formerly the Estrella Inn, a Hollywood-crowd hang whose name remains on the hotel spa). We also breakfasted outdoors at Norma’s and ate a sublime classic French dinner in the dark, clubby Mr. Parker’s, both at the art-filled Parker, formerly owned by Autry and then Merv Griffin. Both hotels have luxuriant gardens and impeccably kept grounds.
Another night, we went funky at Rio Azul, a Palm Springs Mexican joint where the margaritas were as big as the check was small. Our waitress, who lives in nearby Indio, home of the festival, was clearly ready for the Coachella crowd to go away. “But it’s good for business, I guess,” she allowed. Good, too, as a reminder of the allure of tranquility, serenity and complete relaxation.