The Post’s Chris Bunting checks in to (and checks out) the L’Auberge de Sedona.
WHAT: Not too many earthly resort spas are ballsy enough to play up the fact that they’re creek-adjacent (there’s gotta be a sexier French word for that), but that’s the sort of self-assured humility L’Auberge de Sedona can afford, being the Macklemore of glossy travel mag trophies, winning one right after the next. Of course, Oak Creek is a pretty sultry streamlet, so pack a kayak and feed those hungry ducks!
NEW: Eleven-acre L’Auberge is no spring chicken, having opened in 1984, but in 2011, the thirtysomething’s 26 Lodge rooms and 32 Creekside and Gardenside cottages and suites were redesigned — plus, 29 new Vista and Spa suites joined the party (math-wise, a mere 87 ops in all). New this year is its herb and botanical server-upper, L’Apothecary, opening next month at the already-transcendent spa.
WHERE: While the polar vortex hogs all the headlines — media-whore that it is — there exists a kinder, gentler sort that make love, not war. Welcome to Sedona, Ariz. — only a two-hour drive north from Phoenix — whose most famous residents aren’t its rich retirees but its magically delicious desert vortices. I met a woman at a bar with photographic evidence of one that literally made a rainbow come out of her backside while she was glamping Red Rock country. True story!
WHY: There’s a reason A-list country singers and ex-ballplayers (whose vociferous discussions about bull castration are must-eavesdropped), not to mention IMDbers out the yin-yang (hey, ain’t that “Bull Durham’s” loveable locker room groupie Annie Savoy?), come here to play: its outlying desert luxury surrounded by extraterrestrial landscape like Coconino National Forest, Oak Creek Canyon, Magenta Cliffs and — most importantly — Snoopy Rock.
WORKING WELL: One word: spawesome! L’Auberge’s is known the world over. Pick your poison: vitamin C facial, Himalayan salt glow, Swedish massage, cranial sacral, Chakra yoga, FDA-okie-dokied LaserTouchOne cell stimulation (less scary than it sounds). They’ll kill you with kindness, here — hard. Caution: You’ll feel so restored it’s easy not to notice your robe’s wardrobe malfunctioning.
NEEDS WORK: Your room’s wall-hinged-arm-mounted (there’s gotta be a sexier French word for that) HDTV that awkwardly pivots and never quite seems like it’s altogether winning the war against gravity. But you’re not supposed to be watching that stupid thing anyway.
MUST TRY: L’Auberge’s brand-spankin’-new Love Series packages — melding massages, in-bed breakfasts, picnics and dinners hashslung by exec chef Rochelle Daniel (boss lady of the onsite Restaurant on Oak Creek), Champagne, strawberries and jeep tours into one combination or another — aimed at laycationers of all stripes, be they honeymooners, babymooners, elopers or straight-up adulterers. No judgments here! Did we mention the outdoor, open-roofed cedar showers you can kink out in?
DON’T MISS: You’re in the Southwest, you’re not doing the driving, so binge on the area booze with Debbie Schwendler’s Savour Arizona Verde Valley wine and microbrewery tours. Tool/A Perfect Circle/Puscifer’s cross-dressing frontman Maynard James Keenan even has a label around these parts you’ll likely come across called Caduceus Cellars. Why can’t we all be sober? ‘Cuz we’re drinking your wine, Maynard!
DETAILS: From $265