{"id":809848,"date":"2026-07-18T10:03:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T10:03:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/809848\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T10:03:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T10:03:12","slug":"a-vancouver-company-is-putting-a-pay-sauna-in-esquimalt-gorge-park-%c2%b7-capital-daily","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/809848\/","title":{"rendered":"A Vancouver company is putting a pay sauna in Esquimalt Gorge Park \u00b7 Capital Daily"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"cd-art-p\">A 10-person mobile sauna is coming to Esquimalt Gorge Park this October, run by Vancouver company Gatherwell near the Gorge Waterway Nature House.<\/p>\n<p class=\"cd-art-p\">Council approved the one-year trial unanimously, with drop-in sessions priced at $29 for 75 minutes. Gatherwell covers the install and operating costs, and hands the township 15 per cent of gross revenue. Staff figure that nets Esquimalt around $40,000 over the year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"cd-art-p\">Founder Jonathan Chawla says he turned to municipal parks after Vancouver&#8217;s bylaws stalled his plan for an outdoor sauna and cold plunge. There were no permits for the new industry, so even small cold-plunge baths got treated like public pools. He took the Scandinavian route instead, pairing saunas with existing bodies of water and dropping the plunge pool entirely.<\/p>\n<p class=\"cd-art-p\">The committee that reviewed the proposal wasn&#8217;t unanimously sold. Members flagged the $29 fee and asked how much commercial activity belongs in a public park. Council has directed staff to work with Gatherwell on subsidies for low-income residents, possibly through the township&#8217;s existing LIFE program.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A 10-person mobile sauna is coming to Esquimalt Gorge Park this October, run by Vancouver company Gatherwell near&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":809849,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194298],"tags":[49,48,55],"class_list":["post-809848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-vancouver","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-vancouver"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/809848","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=809848"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/809848\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/809849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=809848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=809848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=809848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}