In the wild, we often find ourselves again. Whether hiking rugged trails, casting lines into glacier-fed rivers, or simply breathing in the crisp morning air around a campfire, the outdoors offers women something the modern world often withholds: a return to self. But as much as adventure builds strength and endurance, it also demands something sacred, restoration. Enter one of the oldest, most powerful wellness rituals known to women across cultures and centuries: the cycle of sauna, cold plunge, and thermal bathing.
Ancestral Roots, Modern Need
For thousands of years, cultures across the globe have turned to water and heat for healing. Finnish saunas, Icelandic geothermal pools, Japanese onsens, and Indigenous sweat lodges were not created for luxury, but for renewal, connection, and survival. These weren’t just ways to warm the body, they were sacred rituals that helped the soul recover. Today, as adventurous women juggling careers, families, autoimmune diseases, hormonal shifts, and mental health, we find ourselves craving this same sacred pause.
What Happens to the Body
The ritual of rotating between a hot sauna and a cold plunge or shower has scientifically-backed benefits:
Saunas raise your core body temperature, promoting detoxification, muscle relaxation, and improved cardiovascular function.
Cold plunges stimulate circulation, reduce inflammation, and trigger the release of adrenaline and endorphins creating that euphoric post-plunge high.
Thermal spas and natural mineral pools help calm the nervous system, balance hormones, and soothe joint and skin conditions.
For women especially, these rituals offer gentle, powerful support for:
Menstrual discomfort
PCOS and hormonal imbalances
Autoimmune flare-ups
Anxiety, depression, and burnout
Muscle recovery after long hikes or hunts
Reconnection with our bodies after trauma or stress
Why This Matters in Outdoor Adventure
At Her Wilderness, our love of adventure runs deep but so does our understanding that adventure without rest is just exhaustion. That's why moving forward we are intentionally carving out time during our trips for recovery when we can. Whether it’s a spontaneous soak in a natural hot spring, a scheduled spa morning, or a cold plunge after fishing all day, these moments aren’t an afterthought. They are the medicine. Because when we slow down and surrender to heat and cold, we give our bodies permission to heal. We restore the nervous system that’s been taxed by overdrive. We soften the armor we carry around in our everyday lives. We remember what it means to feel good in our bodies again.
A Ritual Worth Repeating
One of the beautiful things about sauna and cold therapy is that you don’t need a luxury spa to access it. Your healing can happen in a lake, a backyard ice tub, or a wood-fired sauna tucked in the woods. This practice invites you to be present. To breathe deeply. To feel your strength. To witness your own body hold pain and then release it. It’s not about toughness. It’s about tending. And in a world that often demands women to push through, this ritual invites us to drop in.
Try It For Yourself
If you’ve never tried a hot-cold cycle before, start simply:
Sit in a sauna or hot bath for 10–15 minutes.
Step into cold water (or take a cold shower) for 30 seconds to 2 minutes.
Rest and repeat the cycle 2–3 times.
Hydrate, breathe, and listen to your body.
Let the ritual meet you where you are.
You Deserve This Kind of Healing
As women who live boldly, we fish, hike, hunt, camp, mother, build businesses, and fight like hell for our health. We need rituals that pour back into us. Not just because we’re tired. But because we carry so much.
When I stepped into that sauna for the first time on our trip, I had no idea what would rise to the surface. Years of built-up stress had hardened into tension I didn’t even realize I was holding. The cold plunge that followed wasn’t just a shock to the system, it cracked something open. As the icy water rushed over me, I felt a surge of emotion I hadn’t expected: grief, release, relief. I cried, not out of pain, but out of sheer letting go the kind of deep release that only comes when your body finally feels safe enough to surrender. This wasn’t just about easing sore muscles or chasing endorphins. It was about coming home to myself. It was about reclaiming softness in a body that’s been in survival mode for too long. It was about saying, "I deserve to feel good. I deserve to heal."
There are so many physical benefits to hot-cold therapy, reduced inflammation, improved sleep, better circulation, but for me, the emotional impact was just as profound. In that moment, surrounded by other women who were also on their own journeys of healing, I felt reconnected, restored, and held by the elements, by my breath, by the simple act of caring for myself.
This is medicine. This is resilience. This is your return.