Traditional Outdoor Saunas: The Best Way to Unwind After a Long Day
As you leave the hustle and bustle of a long work day behind, there is a special feeling of placement that you get from entering the calm and quiet of your backyard. For many people, this feeling of transition from “work time” to “me time” is marked by the heat of a traditional outdoor sauna. The sauna offers a calming, slow-paced environment that is not influenced by the methods of today’s technology, which create more rapid fire communication through notifications and deadlines. Many ancient practices have survived for many centuries due to their effectiveness.
If you have been looking for the best home sauna resources, you likely already know that heat therapy is great for the body. But a traditional outdoor sauna offers something even deeper: a chance to reconnect with nature while you reset your nervous system.
The Magic of the Traditional Experience
Traditionally saunas are only Finnish saunas. To warm the hot stones, Finnish saunas employ an electric or wood fire. The air is then warmed from 160^\\circ F$ to 195^\\circ F$.
However, the löyly experience in a sauna and löyly in general, would be hard to pinpoint as it would be the most pleasurable experience you have had in a sauna. Löyly, to explain, means steam in Finnish and it occurs when water gets poured on hot stones in a sauna. It begins with a quick splash of warm water to your body before you breathe in deeply. It would be quite calming to experience inside a sauna, but definitely different when you are outdoors and have access to fresh air above you.
Why Outdoors is the Way to Go
While indoor units are convenient, placing a sauna in your garden or on your deck adds a layer of “escape” that a basement unit can’t match.
1. The Digital Break
A laptop or smartphone cannot be brought into a conventional sauna due to the high temperatures and steam. As a result, the usage of digital technology is no longer possible. You are disconnected from the outside world for 20 minutes. You have only time and space between you and the rest of the world as you relax in a heated wooden box with hot air rising from below and around you. To recover from stress and exhaustion, your modern brain requires a vacation from blue light and all of the distractions of a fully connected society.
2. Connection to the Seasons
Using an outdoor sauna in the winter is a special pleasure. There is a “cold plunge” effect when you step out of a $180^\circ F$ room into the crisp, cool air or even the snow. Your circulation is being alerted by this temperature difference. It leaves you feeling immensely alive and causes your skin to tingle. The sauna helps your body adjust to the summertime heat, which makes those muggy July days much more tolerable.
What It Does for Your Body
The benefits we experience following a sauna visit are not solely psychological. Research demonstrates that genuine biological processes are at work providing physical relaxation and aiding muscular recovery.
Muscle Recovery: After exercising or sitting for long periods” a heated sauna helps improve circulation to sore muscles through vasodilation of blood vessels that supply oxygenated blood to tired muscle tissues. As a result, heat helps the tired muscles recover faster when using the sauna, compared to if you did not have access to a sauna.
Cardiovascular Fitness: A sauna can provide the same effect as mild (low-intensity) exercise by causing the heart rate of someone sitting still in a sauna to be as high as someone performing low-intensity physical activity. Consistently using a sauna on a regular basis will allow an individual to improve their cardiovascular endurance by participating in passive aerobic exercises.
Improved Sleep Quality: The most important effects for many sauna users concern the sleep improvement effects that can be obtained from sauna usage. Saunas warm your body and then cool it down after you leave the hot environment. Your body’s core temperature is what triggers the biological clock of a human being to signal that it’s now time to start sleeping. Sauna users find that they easily fall asleep and also find themselves easily entrapped in a deep state of slumber.
Finding the Right Fit for Your Backyard
If you decide to find traditional outdoor saunas, you will notice they come in several shapes. The most popular for backyards is the barrel sauna.
The barrel shape isn’t just for looks. Because it’s round, there is less “dead space” to heat up. The heat follows the curve of the walls and stays down where you are sitting rather than getting trapped in high corners. Plus, they just look nice nestled among the trees or out by a pool.
Another option is the cabin style. These look like small log huts and will very often have enough room for benches at different heights. This is great, as heat rises-if you want a really intense sweat, you sit on the top bench; whereas if you want to have it a little gentler, you stay on the lower one.
A Ritual, Not a Chore
Traditional outdoor saunas provide the opportunity to have an enjoyable ritual and should not be viewed as just another item on your to-do list.
The Warm-Up: It takes approximately 30-45 minutes for a sauna to reach the proper temperature, so this is the perfect time to prepare your water and select which essential oils (e.g., eucalyptus, pine) you would like to use.
The Session: Enjoy a 10-15 minute sauna session, listening for the sound of water hitting the rocks.
The Cool Down: Open the door and step outside for some fresh air, while enjoying a glass of water.
Repeat: Most people complete two or three “rounds” of this process. After completing this ritual, you will notice a significant decrease in your stress levels.
Final Thoughts
The world has become noisier and faster. We spend our days connected to our screens and constantly hustling to get from task to task. There is one thing you can do to disconnect at the end of your fast-paced days – spend time in nature in an outdoor sauna. An outdoor sauna represents the ultimate “pause button” for life, as it allows you to be still, warm, and breathing.
If you want to experience the physical benefits of increased blood flow and healthier skin, or the mental tranquility of a quiet place to focus, a backyard sauna gives you both every single night.
